(Zach Agee Photo)
Gabe and Luke Willochell never expected to be on the same wrestling team as each other. With the age gap between the two, it just never seemed to be in the cards for these brothers to land on the same team.
Gabe graduated high school right at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, taking his talents to Edinboro University, a small-town Pennsylvania school competing in the Mid-American Conference at the D-I level in wrestling. Luke didn’t graduate high school until 2025–just a little less than a year ago and well after his older brother.
If one good thing came of that tumultuous time when Gabe began his collegiate wrestling career, it was the extra year of eligibility he was granted because of it. Combine that with an additional redshirt season, and suddenly everything had fallen into place for the two brothers to finish out Gabe’s final season of eligibility on the same team.
“I don’t know if I expected it to happen, but I kind of knew after the COVID year and I took another redshirt that there was a possibility it would line up that we would be in college at the same time,” Gabe said.
So, how did two brothers from Pennsylvania–undoubtedly one of the top wrestling states in the country–find themselves in Laramie, Wyoming?
It’s a lot simpler than you might think.
“Whenever I transferred, I wanted something completely different. I wanted to go far away and there’s more opportunity here,” Gabe said, as he transferred to Wyoming after wrestling three seasons at Edinboro, where he qualified for the NCAA championships in 2021.
Gabe joined the Wyoming wrestling team for the 2023-24 season and it wasn’t too long after the start of that season that his younger brother announced his commitment to wrestle for Wyoming that November.
“Before I committed here, I didn’t even know Wyoming was a state,” Luke joked. “[My brother] had a pretty big impact on me, but at the end of the day it was my decision and I ended up choosing Wyoming.”
Because of their age gap, the two have never really had much of a direct influence with each other on the mat, as Gabe was already off wrestling at the collegiate level when Luke was just beginning his high school career. Sure, Luke tried his best to emulate his older brother’s best moves growing up, but it wasn’t the same as grinding an entire season out together.
“Most of my moves came from watching him,” Luke said.
Now that the brothers are grappling on the same team for the first time, that has changed.
Both, however, credit their father for introducing them to wrestling from a young age. Wrestling video games, WWE and trips to buy wrestling gear propelled them both into their distinguished wrestling careers.
“I got the Smackdown! vs. Raw video game in 2009 and I think my dad was soft launching getting me into wrestling because he got me the video game, then he was like, ‘let’s go check out these shoes at Dick’s,’” Gabe said.
“It was the same for me,” Luke said. “I was watching WWE and I saw John Cena and I was like, ‘I wanna try that.’
“Then, I got to practice and there were no Vader Bombs or jumping off the top rope,” he added, laughing. His brother joined in.
All these moments have so far led the pair to an incredible season together, with both heading into the Big 12 championship tournament currently ranked amongst some of the top wrestlers in the nation for their respective weights. Luke currently ranks as high as 22nd at 133 pounds in the coaches’ rankings, while Gabe ranks as high as 29th at 149 pounds in the coaches’ rankings.
The sky is seemingly the limit for these two, who are eyeing not only Big 12 titles at their respective weights, but a chance at both making NCAA Championships together in Gabe’s final season.
There’s no better motivation than wrestling alongside one another.
“During the dual meets, he always goes first, so it definitely helps me out whenever he goes out there and wins,” Gabe said.
“Now that I’m teammates with my brother, it’s pretty easy to get motivated and try harder,” Luke added.
The Willochells and the Cowboy wrestling team will take to the mat for the Big 12 Championships on March 6-7.
