This story has been updated with the results of the March 20 semifinals.
CLEVELAND — The middle of March for high school seniors can be some of the best days of their young lives.
The finish line of one of life’s marathons is nearly complete. There are still events like prom and those last final exams to go, but you’re almost there.
Jax Forrest could be living that life as a senior at Bishop McCort High School in Johnston, Pa. Instead, he’s nearing the finish line of what has been a sprint since January, as he’ll be wrestling in the 133-pound championship match against Ohio State’s Ben Davino at the 2026 NCAA Division I Wrestling Championships for Oklahoma State University in Cleveland.
“Yeah, it’s definitely just not what I planned, but rarely in life do things go as planned,” Forrest said after his 18-3 tech fall of Northern Illinois’ Markel Baker in the March 20 quarterfinals. “I had a great opportunity that was presented to me and I’m going to go for it and go all out for it. So, I mean, it’s an awesome feeling. It’s great. But, like I said, I wasn’t coming here to just try and make the semis. I want to try and win tonight and then win tomorrow and go be a national champ.”
Forrest’s journey is as unique as they come, even in a weight class that has three true freshmen out of its four semifinalists. That included Virginia Tech’s Aaron Seibel, who he beat in a 14-3 major decision during the semifinals Friday night, 12 months after beating him for the Pennsylvania state championship in 2025.
The thing was, Seibel was a senior in 2025 when they met for that Pennsylvania title, while Forrest was technically a junior. However, Forrest took courses to accelerate his high school graduation to December, allowing him to enroll at Oklahoma State in January.
“Yeah, it’s definitely going by really fast, but I’m so fortunate to have teammates and coaches with me every day,” Forrest said. “… I’m trying not to think about how fast things go because then everything starts spinning. Just trying to stay wherever my feet are and whoever I’m with at that moment.”
Forrest’s final high school match was on Dec. 30, 2025, when he beat St. Edward’s Karson Brown in the Powerade Wrestling Tournament in Canonsburg, Pa. Twelve days later, on Jan. 11, he was pinning Oklahoma’s Carson Schmidt in his first college match.
The winning hasn’t stopped since, as the semifinal win improved Forrest to 17-0, with all but three of those either by pin or tech fall. Even two of those three wins was a 15-2 major decision in the Big 12 Championship final over Arizona State’s Kyler Larkin and the semifinal win over Seidel.
Seidel, though, was the one truly close match. Forrest outlasted the Hokie freshman 10-9 in a dual in Blacksburg, Va., on Feb. 15.
“I lost him,” Seidel said after his own quarterfinal win. “State finals, lost him a couple times before that, and obviously just lost him a little bit ago. … Last time we wrestled, it was going my way and then all of a sudden, I stopped wrestling for a couple seconds. So just going to go out there with the same mindset and just believe that I’m the best and I can beat the best.”
Davino was the only semifinalist at the weight class who was not a true freshman, as the Buckeye is a redshirt freshman. He outlasted Penn State true freshman Marcus Blaze in the other semifinal 3-2 in the tiebreaker.
Forrest is one of six semifinalists who were in high school in 2025, although he’s the only one who was in high school the first semester of the 2025-26 academic year. He’s one of three Cowboys semifinalists who fall into that category, along with Sergio Vega (141) and Landon Robideau (157).
“He’s just Jax, man,” Vega said after his 4-1 quarterfinal win over Iowa’s Nasir Bailey. “You can’t even explain it. He’s a superstar. He’s a stud. … It’s awesome to watch him because it’s like you want to wrestle like that. You want to go and whoop these dudes and it’s, like, he’s really doing it. So it just gives you confidence to see that you can actually do it and you can have fun while doing it. He has a smile on his face all the time.”
The ease with which Forrest has had the success isn’t necessarily supposed to happen that way. At least, it’s not supposed to look as easy as it does for him.
Oklahoma State coach David Taylor is considered one of the best wrestlers of this century. That stretches from his days as a four-time Ohio high school state champion at St. Paris Graham to winning two NCAA titles and the Hodge Trophy as a collegian at Penn State.
Taylor, though, had to redshirt when he first arrived in Happy Valley. Yet, in Forrest, there was something he could just tell made him different than the rest.
“I think when you think about people and what drives them, I think you look at the trajectory of his career,” Taylor said the day before the tournment started. “Even to this point, he wants to be really good, but I think what he wants to be is he wants to be unique. He wants to be unique, and I think that’s something that you’ve got to give him guardrails on that. You can’t be so unique that you start trying to overthink things.
“But I think what he’s done and his path to this point has been unique, and that’s awesome. … He’s a pretty special kid, and we’re excited that he wrestles at Oklahoma State.”
Chris Easterling can be reached at ceasterling@thebeaconjournal.com. Read more about the Browns at www.beaconjournal.com/sports/browns. Follow him on X at @ceasterlingABJ
This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: Freshman Jax Forrest goes from high school to NCAA wrestling final
Reporting by Chris Easterling, Akron Beacon Journal / Akron Beacon Journal
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