Jacobs School celebrates Match Day 2025

BUFFALO, N.Y. – The crowd of Class of 2025 University at Buffalo medical students exuded no shortage of energy and enthusiasm as they gathered earlier today for Match Day at the Powerhouse in South Buffalo. One hundred and seventy-one UB medical students matched into residency programs in Western New York and across the country. Match Day is a nationwide rite of passage, informing soon-to-be medical school graduates where they will pursue their residency training programs.   

 A culmination of many achievements

“My heart is filled with excitement, and I can sense the mix of anticipation and eagerness in the air as we celebrate this special Match Day,” said Allison Brashear, MD, UB’s vice president for health sciences and dean of the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, while welcoming the crowd of students, family members, faculty, and other supporters.

 “I want to thank the parents and support people,” she said. “Students don’t get to this day without all of you.” 

Brashear noted that Match Day isn’t just a ceremony — it’s an intense, heartfelt moment where years of longing meet destiny.

“This day is the culmination of more than just academic achievement. It’s the embodiment of every tear shed over a textbook, every patient story that touched your soul, and every time you questioned your own strength and found it anyway,” she said.

“It's the moment when the abstract dream of ‘doctor’ becomes a tangible reality.”

David A. Milling, MD, executive director of the Office of Medical Education and senior associate dean for medical education, said “Match Day and graduation day are two days I really look forward to. This is a happy day. I’m very happy for you.”

He then called each student forward to receive their envelopes as various Jacobs School deans and faculty members handed them out one by one. The letters in the envelopes tell each student what residency program they have matched into for the next phase of their training.

As anticipation built and the students waited for noon, Milling reminded the students of the work they’ve put in and their exciting futures ahead. “This is where you’re supposed to be. This is where you’re going to train, and it will be an amazing experience for you.”

At noon, confetti blasts of blue and white filled the air and carpeted the ground amid whoops and cheers of jubilation, gratitude, and the realization of dreams come true.

Many will join local residency programs

The Jacobs School has a strong tradition of retaining graduates and training the next generation of health care providers who will remain as physicians within Western New York and care for the community.

In all, 25 percent of the class — 43 students — have chosen to stay at the Jacobs School for their residencies.

Among the specialties that have the most UB matches from the class are: family medicine (six), psychiatry (six), internal medicine - prelim (five), surgery (four), pediatrics (three) and emergency medicine (three).

Six medical students from the Class of 2025 matched to programs at Yale University and two matched to programs at Brown University.

This year’s matches also included nine students from the MD-PhD Program. These students matched to prestigious training programs across the country, including at UB, Johns Hopkins University, Yale University, Duke University, the University of Michigan, Case Western Reserve University and the Mayo Clinic.

This year’s class included nine MD/PhD, one MD/MBA, and one MD/oral and maxillofacial surgery dual-degree students.

Justin Im from Queens, New York, matched to a neurological surgery training program at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard University.

He said his medical education at the Jacobs School was instrumental to feeling prepared for his training program. “Medical school was super formative education wise, learning about how to take care of patients and obviously making lifelong friends,” Im said. 

This year’s match also included multiple couples who matched to training programs together. Rhea Marfatia and Bryan Velez will both be joining the internal medicine residency program at Montefiore Medical Center and the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City.

“This was one of our top choices, so I’m really, really happy about it,” Marfatia said. “We’re absolutely thrilled and excited to be together. That’s what we wanted to do, and we got it,” Velez said.

Student who faced near fatal accident to begin training

In 2019, shortly after sending off her medical school applications, Catherine Lawton experienced a life-threatening accident and serious injuries during a Labor Day camping trip. While inside her tent, an oak tree fell and struck Lawton, leaving her with two collapsed lungs, a fractured pelvis, and a back broken in 10 places. The accident left her with a paralyzed left leg and incomplete spinal cord injury.

After a long hospital stay, Lawton eventually interviewed for and joined the Jacobs School as a medical student. Today, she found out she matched to the physical medicine and rehabilitation program at the University of Washington School of Medicine.

“It was my first choice, so I’m very, very excited,” Lawton said of her program match. “It’s amazing, the rehab that everyone’s doing and the new tech that’s coming out. I love the focus on adaptive sports and engineering solutions that they have in Seattle.”

Fourth-year medical students are listed at this link with their future medical specialties and the locations of their residency matches.