An athlete was removed from the University of Northern Colorado’s wrestling team’s roster following his disqualification at the Southern Scuffle tournament in Chattanooga, TN, on Jan. 2. The disqualification came after third year wrestler Baylor Fernandes used an illegal move on his competitor, Taylor Lilliard from Indiana University.
“At this very moment, he (Taylor) is seeing the doctors at IU as he is in a full leg brace and on crutches,” Tina Lillard, mother of the Indiana wrestler, said on an X post written on Jan. 3.
In this same post, Lilliard also claimed that Fernandes has a history of dirty moves saying he has had six flagrant calls with disqualifications in the last two to three years. A popular wrestling account on X, The Wrestling Room, has also made posts detailing Fernandes’ use of illegal moves throughout his collegiate career.
One of these posts contained three clips, including one from the match against Lillard, where the former UNC wrestler can be seen getting disqualified after injuring his opponents. In the clip of the match against Lillard, Fernandes can be seen pressing his knee down on his opponent’s fully stretched leg until he collapses to the ground in pain.
The other two clips provided in The Wrestling Room’s post show Fernandes being disqualified in his matches against South Dakota State wrestler Tanner Cook and University of Tennessee at Chattanooga wrestler Kamdyn Munro. Both Cook and Munro can also be seen falling to the ground in pain following illegal moves by Fernandes.
Accompanying these posts are several comments from users outraged by Fernandes’ actions:
“Needs to be removed and have eligibility stripped for sure. Seen his name come up in this nature multiple times over the last couple years and it’s infuriating every time it happens,” commented user Cal Nisson.
The UNC Athletic Department declined to comment on the situation when questioned by the Greeley Tribune and no official statements have been made regarding Fernandes’ status. The wrestler was included in two articles on the UNC Athletics page covering the Southern Scuffle, but nothing was mentioned about his disqualification and Fernandes can no longer be found on the team’s roster.
Fernandes joined the Bears wrestling team following a 17-5 win/loss record in his freshman year at the University of Minnesota and before that he found success in high school wrestling becoming Iowa high school state champion in 2019.
To UNC though, Fernandes is now just another “former student athlete”.
