Bio

Bo Bettinson was selected to start the St. Ambrose wrestling program when he was named head coach in October 2020.

In his five years running the program, Bettinson has coached 11 Bees to the NAIA National Tournament. Mick Chagnon, Matt Robertson, and Jayden Terronez represented St. Ambrose at Nationals in 2022. Bettinson then took Jayden and Daniel Terronez to the 2023 NAIA Championships. In 2024, Bettinson coached a new face to the NAIA Championships in Diego Machado. The 2025 season was another succesful year on the mat as both Chagnon and Jayden Terronez returned to Nationals. Then in 2026, Guiseppe Guerra, Georgino Moraga and Josh Zeman advanced to the National meet.

Prior to joining the Bees, Bettinson served as an assistant wrestling coach at Montana State University Northern since 2017. In his time with the Lights, the program registered 18 NAIA national qualifiers, 10 All-Americans and six national finalists, including one national champion. Montana State Northern finished fourth at the 2018 NAIA Championships, 10th in 2019, and 12th in 2020.

His teams also find success in the classroom, ranking in the top three among all NAIA schools on the National Wrestling Coaches Association (NWCA) Scholar All-American Team list on a consistent basis.

Bettinson has ties to Iowa, having wrestled and coached for Waldorf University in Forest City. At 125 pounds for Waldorf, he was a four-year team captain and four-time NAIA national qualifier. He finished second at the Northern Plains Last Chance World Team Trials in 2013. Bettinson won 105 matches in his career with the Warriors.

He got his coaching start as a graduate assistant coach at Waldorf from 2015-17. He also volunteered with the Waldorf women's wrestling team from 2011-15.

Bettinson received his Bachelor's Degree in Foundations of Education from Waldorf in 2015. He earned a Master's of Organizational Leadership and Sports Management in 2017.