ASHLAND — Though she has exhausted her eligibility at Southern Oregon University, Sienna Ramirez is proving that her best wrestling days are in front of her.

Ramirez, a five-time All-American and the NAIA’s 2021 155-pound champion for the Raiders, started her post-collegiate career in April by winning the 68 kg bracket at the 2022 U.S. Open in Las Vegas. That made her the No. 1 seed at the USA Wrestling Senior World Team Trials Challenge Tournament in Coralville, Iowa, where last Sunday she defeated former Menlo (Calif.) national champion Solin Piearcy in two of three matches — each of which were decided on criteria — to win the finals.

Ramirez’s triumph over Piearcy, whom she never defeated collegiately, gave her a spot on USA Wrestling’s U23 women’s freestyle world team, with which she’ll compete in July at the Spain Grand Prix and in August at the U23 world championships in Sofia, Bulgaria.

It also moved her one step closer to making USA Wrestling’s senior-level world team. She’ll have to earn that spot by completing another tall task at Final X 2022 in Stillwater, Okla., on June 3. Her opponent there will be Tokyo Olympics gold medalist Tamyra Mensah-Stock.