AJ Ferrari to Transfer to Nebraska

The most notable name in the transfer portal is on the move as AJ Ferrari announced that he will transfer to Nebraska for the 2025-26 season. Ferrari is expected to compete at 285 lbs for the Cornhuskers. 

Earlier this offseason, Ferrari announced his transfer to North Carolina. Just over a week ago, news trickled out of Chapel Hill that Ferrari had been denied admission to UNC and would be on the market once again. 

Ferrari is a two-time NCAA All-American and two-time conference champion. He won a national title in 2021 as a true freshman for Oklahoma State and amassed a 19-1 record. Since then, Ferrari had a long road back to the NCAA Tournament. He was injured in a car accident in January of 2022 and was unable to compete in the postseason. Later that year, Ferrari was dismissed from the Cowboy team and did not compete in college until the 2024-25 season. 

Ferrari returned to the collegiate wrestling world this past season for CSU Bakersfield. He entered the NCAA Tournament with a perfect 17-0 record after defeating returning All-American Stephen Little (Little Rock) to claim a Pac-12 title. 

At the 2025 NCAA Championships, Ferrari showed off his stingy defense and low-risk offensive strategy in defeating his first three opponents by a 15-2 margin. That set the stage for a semifinal contest with Iowa’s Stephen Buchanan. Ferrari spent some time during the 2023-24 season training with the Hawkeye Wrestling Club at the University of Iowa, but never enrolled at the school. His younger brother, Angelo, is a freshman 184 lber at Iowa. 

Buchanan was able to give Ferrari a dose of his own medicine in a 3-0 win. After the Buchanan loss, Ferrari responded with back-to-back wins over Joey Novak (Wyoming) and Jacob Cardenas (Michigan) to claim third place. Cardenas entered the tournament as the top seed and was the Big Ten champion. He and Ferrari were briefly high school teammates at New Jersey’s Bergen Catholic High School. 

The win over Cardenas and the third-place finish gave Ferrari a 22-1 season record and ran his collegiate record to 51-2. 

The fit at heavyweight for Ferrari and the Cornhuskers could be a good one. 285 lbs was the only weight which Nebraska did not send to Philadelphia for nationals. Without counting Ferrari, Nebraska will return six All-Americans for the 2025-26 season. They’ll be in prime position to claim an NCAA team trophy for a second straight year.