U20 57 kg Champion: Lorianna Piestewa to compete on world stage after winning nationals

Posted by Quentin Jodie | Jun 5, 2025 | Wrestling |

WINDOW ROCK

Colorado Mesa University wrestler Lorianna Piestewa went 6-0 at the 2025 USA Women’s National Championships early this spring.

Piestewa was crowned champion in the U20 57 kg weight class at the national tournament, which was held Apr. 4-6 in Spokane, Washington.

The former Miyamura High standout will represent the USA at two international wrestling meets, which is governed by the United World Wrestling (UWW) and USA Wrestling (USAW).

As part of the USA team, Piestewa will be traveling to Madrid, Spain for the Grand Prix of Spain Wrestling in the U20 World Team Tour in July. She will then travel to Sofia, Bulgaria to compete in the U20 World Championships in August.

“Honestly, it’s still pretty surreal,” Piestewa said her national title championship in a recent interview with the Navajo Times. “The people who go to the U20 World Team Trails are obviously the best 20-and-under wrestlers. We all wrestle to go to Spain and Bulgaria.”

Piestewa is scheduled to compete in Spain on July 4-8 while the Bulgaria competition will be held on August 18-24.

The national tournament in April was Piestewa’s second time competing in the World Teams Trials. In her first attempt, she wrestled at 50kg and went 1-2 during her junior year in high school in 2023.

Last year, she broke her ribs, and she was unable to compete.

“I didn’t go in there expecting to win,” Piestewa said. “I went in there expecting to compete better than I have in years prior but winning the whole thing was, like, so amazing because my team was just being super supportive of me. So were my coaches.

“My parents were watching from home, and I had my former coaches there from New Mexico Nationals,” she added. “It was pretty great to win it all in front of everyone. I think it’s just a great opportunity to compete overseas at Spain and Bulgaria.”

At the World Team Trials, Piestewa earned a pair of 10-0 technical falls over Hailey Laabs of California and Elabell Taylor of Washington as the tourney’s fourth seed in the first two rounds.

She then earned a 5-3 decision over second-seeded Shelby Moore in the quarterfinals. Moore, who hails from Washington state, wrestled collegiately for McKendree University.

“I kind of went into that match wanting to beat her because Shelby Moore is the girl who made the collegiate finals with Amani Jones,” Piestewa said. “She was on the other side of the bracket, and I didn’t get a chance to wrestler her at nationals. I was really excited that she was on my side of the bracket (at the World Team Trails), so I went in there wanting to beat her, showing that I should have finished second in the nation.”

Incidentally, that 5-3 win was Piestewa’s toughest match as she earned a technical fall over third seed Kaidance Gerg of Idaho in the semifinals.

“She was a really tough opponent,” Piestewa said of Moore. “I went in there being smart and being technical. It was a fun match to wrestle because I knew who she was and what she achieved.”

In the 57kg finals, Piestewa topped Carrisa Qureshi of California in the best-of-three title match.

In the opener, Piestewa won 10-6 and in the second match she earned an 8-0 win.

“The first match we were really scrapping back and forth,” Piestewa said of the finals. “She was beating 6-0 and there was 1:40 left in the last period and I just knew that I had to score, so I kind of started to push the pace a little a lot more.

“I was able to take her down and then we stood back up,” she added. “I took her down again, and I was able to catch her in a leg lace and turn her.”

Those maneuvers earned Piestewa an 8-6 cushion as Qureshi tried to take down the Diné/Hopi wrestler.

“I countered her move and that was how I got to 10-6,” Piestewa said. “Man, I was thinking that was a really tough match.”

By learning from her mistakes, Piestewa dominated the second match as she was two points away of earning another technical fall.

“I looked at how she scored on me, and I just adapted,” Piestewa said of her strategy. “I was able to use her weaknesses as tools to beat her a second time.”

Piestewa is looking forward to competing internationally with the USA team, but she has bigger dreams she wants to pursue.

“Just being a part of the world team is already amazing, but everybody wants to be in the Olympics,” Piestewa said. “Everybody wants to be an Olympian, and I want to do that as soon as possible. The next Games is in 2028 and I am going to try my very best and just keep working as hard as I can to try and qualify for it.”