On Monday morning, Kaden Ercanbrack (63 kg, NMU/NTS) will take the mat at the 2025 U23 World Championships in Novi Sad, Serbia. It will also be the first such experience for the 21-year-old. Ercanbrack, who began attending Northern Michigan in the fall of ‘22, had been a steady climber whose improvements were noticeable, but certainly more discernible to his teammates in the room.
Then it all started to click.
Ercanbrack entered the US Open/World Team Trials in April as an underdog to contend – unless you ask those same teammates. The collective at NMU all knew what others did not. They saw, and felt, Ercanbrack’s increased potency on a daily basis, and therefore expected him to make a run. Which is what happened. Ercanbrack advanced to the semifinals of the 63 kg bracket, fell to Olympian/well-decorated Ildar Hafizov (Army/WCAP), and proceeded to win his next two matches to earn himself a spot on the US National Team for the first time. The secret was out.
Now the Utah native finds himself in a different position. He is on the cusp of representing the nation at a World-level event. Ercanbrack will battle the winner between David Jotyan (ARM) and Ecuadorean Jeremy Peralta Gonzalez to crack open his time in the tournament. Ercanbrack understands the landscape. Though he prefers to perceive the Worlds as on the same wavelength as any other tournament, he simultaneously recognizes that it’s not just any other competition. After all, this type of opportunity is exactly that for which he had asked. You don’t go and commit all of your wrestling and athletic energy to a sport like wrestling just to be a participant. There are bigger goals attached.
Of course, it took a journey to get where he is. Ercanbrack has over the past three years put in the work necessary and, as they did in April, the pieces are falling into place. However he may perform at the U23 Worlds is but another step on his walk towards what many believe will become a Senior career adorned by significant successes. The young man himself affirms this belief, and does not doubt his capabilities, nor does he doubt how much more said capabilities will expand as he continues to progress. And for good reason.
His teammates sure don’t.
Kaden Ercanbrack — 63 kg, NMU/NTS
5PM: Coming from Utah, how did you become interested in Greco-Roman wrestling? What was your upbringing in this style all about?
Kaden Ercanbrack: All the credit would have to go to the LaMonts. Craig, Taylor, and Grant. That family. I wrestled in their club starting in fourth grade. It was folkstyle, but they opened my eyes to Greco and I fell in love with it. I knew that was what I wanted to do since middle school, really.
5PM: So even in high school you knew that you wanted to do Greco? Because I know that you were a good high school wrestler.
KE: Yeah. I enjoyed folkstyle, but it wasn’t like I loved folkstyle. Where my true love for the sport came from was on the Greco side of things.
5PM: Was NMU always the place that you wanted to go, or were you thinking of other options?
KE: NMU was definitely the place I wanted to go. I think that there were a few JUCO schools who reached out to me for folkstyle, but NMU was the place where I knew I wanted to go. And as soon as they sent me an offer, it was a done deal from there.
5PM: Did Taylor or anyone give you any guidance when it came to Northern? Obviously, Taylor didn’t go to NMU but he certainly knew what it was all about.
KE: Yes. I remember in high school that we were talking about it. I used to do privates with him all the time, and he would tell me, or tell us, about how there was this path. He wrestled folkstyle in college, obviously, but he had said that there was this path at NMU. He said, “If you want to go Greco in college, this is probably your best option.” He was a pretty big influence on my choice, I think.
5PM: Other than the fact it was Greco, what else did you know about Northern before you got there? Did you have a grasp of the personnel, landscape, and so forth?
Kaden Ercanbrack: I pretty much got informed about it through the LaMonts and I had also reached out to a couple of guys who had been there. I remember that I spoke on the phone with Dalton Roberts. Taylor had gotten in touch with him for me and so we talked about what Northern is like. He kind of told me the layout of things and how it works, that sort of stuff.
5PM: Although NMU was, or is, intended as a developmental training center, there is usually a steep learning curve involved for new guys. You have to jump right in and wrestle at a national and international level. What was it like for you as a freshman to be exposed to that degree of training on a day-in, day-out basis?
KE: It was pretty crazy. I remember that I did a visit my senior year of high school, and I thought that I was pretty good. I had a pretty good headlock and what not, you know? I thought I was pretty good (laughs). And I remember wrestling with Max Black and Jacob Cochran, and I was getting thrown around. I didn’t know what I was doing. Then when I got onto campus my freshman year, I was thinking, Okay, I really have to focus up this first semester and try to get as good as I can before the US Open, and hopefully wrestle well. So I took the chances I got with the best guys in the room and they beat me up quite a bit – but it helped a lot, I would say.
5PM: So just when you got there, the current group at NMU had just started to blossom. Now that you are a big part of it, what has it been like witnessing the level of competitiveness and formidability increase amongst you and your teammates?
KE: It is really amazing when you sit back and think about it. But when you’re in it, or when we are talking about it ourselves, it’s like this is what we expected, if that makes sense. This is what we wanted to do. We wanted to put this many guys on World Teams, we wanted to have this much success, and we knew that we could – even if it is supposed to be “developmental” or whatever. I feel like we just expected this much of ourselves. It has been really cool to be seeing the results; but at the same time, we’re competing up to the level that we can and should be doing.
5PM: You guys have a lot of horses and you’re one of them. How does the culture of the program influence everyone’s work ethic and commitment?
KE: I feel like that comes with it. We all kind of complain about training but we’re still going to do it. Then we’ll talk about it later like, That was tough, right? But we also know that when we go in, we’re going to give it 100% of what we’ve got. That is the culture, and it is amazing. A lot of the new guys come in and they’re like, Oh, they weren’t joking. We tell them stories about the bleachers and everything, how this stuff is hard. Everyone runs as hard as they can. There is not much slacking off that we can do.
5PM: You had your first overseas tournament in Norway a couple of years ago, which came attached to a camp. You also silver’ed in that tournament. By this time, you had a foundation at least, and had competed as a full-time Greco athlete. But since this was your first trip, what was it like for you?
Kaden Ercanbrack: The tournament was not my favorite and I was disappointed in how I competed. But as far as the training went, I was super-happy. It was great to learn from them. They were really helpful with us, the Senior guys there. Haavard Joergensen, I wrestled with him a good amount while I was there, or as much as I could. The way that he would describe things… I mean, I had a basis, but what he was saying was a different side of the coin. It was like, Oh, this is where I need to take my wrestling, so I can be somewhat like this. I felt like I needed to develop my own way to think about things like he does when it comes to different positions and hand-fighting.
5PM: The 2025 World Team Trials. There were some heavy hitters in your weight class and this was where you really made a splash. But there was a big gap in competition before the tournament. What was your confidence and mentality heading into that tournament?
KE: I would say my biggest thing mindset-wise was, I’m finally ready to compete to a level that I know I’m capable of. Because in the room with my teammates, everyone was always telling me things like, This is your year. I remember even as a freshman, Benji (Peak) and George Sikes, and all of them, were saying, You’re going to make that U20 World Team, and it hurt that I wasn’t able to live up to those expectations even though I was good enough to do so.
So I really had to lock-in this year with a mindset of, I am on the same level as these guys and I can compete with the best in the country. I was telling myself everyday that this was something I could do, and that it was something I was expected to do.
5PM: Through no fault of your own, you had not had competitive opportunities before the Trials. How did you stay competitively-minded despite the lack of tournaments during the season leading up to April?
KE: I feel like it is just something that happens in the room. Like with Max and Payton, we just get on each other during live go’s, making it as competitive as can be. That way, you can get the feeling of, If I get thrown right now, everyone is watching me and it’s going to be bad. Bringing that mentality into practice is something we do really well up here – especially leading up to those tournaments in the spring.
5PM: In that tournament, you made it to the semifinals against Ildar (Hafizov) and then you went into the consolation bracket and won your last two bouts without giving up a point. After dropping the match to Ildar, did you pivot into a “next best thing” mindset?
KE: Yeah, for sure. I mean, you lose to Ildar and it’s tough. But it’s Ildar, you know? So, you want to be on the same level as those guys but it was my first time in the semis at a US Open, it was my first time having success at the Trials, and it became, Okay, let’s just keep this rolling. There’s no need to get down on yourself, get distracted, and not wrestle well. I knew that making National Team was a possibility, so I kept rolling with it and kept my eyes on the prize.
5PM: It’s a huge accomplishment to make National Team the way you did, plus it put you on the U23 World Team. Did it carry any extra meaning to know that you also gave NMU another National Team member for this year?
KE: Right? It’s a weight off your shoulders, you know? You become one of the guys in the room who has had success. I feel like I always had the potential to be on that National Team and give NMU that good name. To be able to do it was such a weight off my back and it felt really nice.
5PM: What was the first block of months for you like going from April through the summer as far as training is concerned?
KE: For practices at NMU, we’d go two days a week in the morning and two days a week in the afternoons. I’d get a lift and a light job. We’d practice in the morning and do another exercise in the afternoon. Nothing too intense during the summer. But then in June, I went to the National Team camp in Colorado Springs. That was a really good camp. It was super-intense with a lot of foreign guys there. It was super-helpful as far as picking up on things and learning what they did. Then it was the same thing as before that through July.
5PM: That camp was Croatia, Ukraine, and Georgia. We talked about Norway, that was the Scandinavian feel. What did you learn when testing yourself against the guys from these other countries?
KE: They’re a totally different feel. They are really good, obviously. I know that everyone probably says it, but par terre for them is crazy. They are really good at both offense and defense. With some of those guys, I would feel like, If I can just get my lock, I have a really good gut and I’m going to turn him, but then some of those guys would defend it and it was just really crazy.
I would pick their brains about it. The way they think about sliding off of a lock is completely different from how I think about sliding off of a lock. It would be, Maybe I can pick that up and think about it this way, or just try it their way and see if it would work better. They are insanely good and that is who we have to be able to beat. As much time as we can get to train with those foreigners is amazing, and you have to be appreciative of them showing their little tricks here and there.
5PM: Having two teammates who were on the Senior World Team, guys you’re close to, that sort of thing must feel more reachable to you than ever I would imagine.
KE: Oh yeah, for sure. To see them do that is amazing. They work so hard. When you see guys like them working that hard next to you, you’re like, That’s what I have to do. If anything, you have to work harder, because I’m a little behind them, right? But getting to that level, it is amazing to see them have that kind of success and to know that it is within reach. It’s like, I’m going with these guys who have accomplished this goal that I’ve had forever. We’re not far away. We just have to gear up and get it done, and make a Team eventually.
5PM: Going into a World Championships, you hear athletes either talk about the tournament as of major importance, or they approach it like just another tournament. How do you prefer to see it?
KE: I’ve always been someone who sees it as just another match. That’s how I like to think of it. But I wish I could think of it like, Oh, I’ve got to rise to the occasion, like those guys who compete so well. But I get into my head too much when I think about it that way, and it’s something I think needs to change for me to have a good performance in this competition. To think of it as, Okay, it’s just another match, I’m just going to wrestle how I know how to wrestle, and not one match is more important than another. It is always just two guys on a mat with a ref.
5PM: What are you looking forward to most about the World Championships?
Kaden Ercanbrack: It’s my first one, so I’m just excited to go and wrestle, and to bring home a medal. I’m really looking forward to getting my hands on those guys and really understanding this World stage even better.
Kaden Ercanbrack wrestles at the 2025 World Championships beginning on Monday, October 20 in Novi Sad, Serbia at 10:00am local time (4:00am ET). FLOWrestling is carrying the live broadcast for the US audience (subscription required).
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