OMAHA, Neb. — Jake Varner did something uncharacteristic of himself Saturday night after winning his second NCAA title — he smiled.

“I don’t know if I was bested by Dan Gable,” Varner joked after his victory in front of a sold-out crowd at the Qwest Center in Omaha, Neb. “We have the same amount of titles, I just made it to the finals more time. No, to be put in the same sentence with [Gable and Cael Sanderson], they’re legends in wrestling. Just to be put in the same sentence as Cael is something special.

“I look up to that guy. He’s one of my best friends, he’s my mentor, he’s my idol, and it’s just something awesome to be part of.”

Varner, the 13th four-time finalist in NCAA history, defeated Nebraska’s Craig Brester for the sixth time in his career, taking down his rival by a 5–2 decision. The ISU senior had beaten Brester in last year’s 197-pound championship by a decision of 2–1 to capture his first NCAA title after placing second two straight years at 184 pounds.

“Those first two years that I took second, those were hard,” Varner said. “My goals coming into college were going undefeated and win four titles. I still didn’t win the title [after my freshman year] and that kind of made me work harder. I worked even harder the next year and I lost again. Those are things that you just kind of think of, they’re in the back of your head. You don’t dwell on them, you just learn from them.”

Their final match started as it usually did between the two foes — they continually locked horns and looked for a sign of weakness, an opening for them to make their move and capitalize. Brester’s solid defensive awareness prevented most of Varner’s first-period attacks from connecting, ultimately forcing a restart in the middle after an attack by Varner was dodged. Varner almost gained the perfect position for a takedown after the restart, but Brester caught him in the act and shoved the striking Cyclone senior off as they again braced themselves.

Tensions for this match rode high, as a scoreless first period kept fans on the edge of their seat.

Varner escaped from the down position to take an inevitable 1–0 lead at the beginning of the second period. Brester escaped to tie the score at 1–1 with 1:39 to go in the match after starting the third period in the down position.

Varner managed a takedown with 58 seconds left to take a 3–1 lead as the entire crowd erupted. Brester managed to escape 14 seconds later to make the score 3–2, but another takedown by Varner with eight seconds left sealed the deal for the Cyclone senior.

“He’s the best, hands down, in the country,” ISU coach Kevin Jackson said of Varner, who finishes his collegiate career with an overall record of 121–10. “You’ve seen some great wrestlers out there, but Craig Brester is a very capable wrestler. His only losses over the last couple of years have been to Jake Varner. We had to beat him four times this year. That is a very difficult thing to do against a quality guy, and to score two takedowns in the final against a kid in almost his hometown is a very difficult task.”

Varner capped off his senior season with a perfect 31–0 record, and handed Brester his third loss of the season. For Cyclone fans, the night didn’t end with Varner’s second title, as one match was left to go in the championship round featuring one of Varner’s closest teammates.

Senior heavyweight David Zabriskie faced Oklahoma State’s Jared Rosholt for the 10th time in his career. Zabriskie, who had avenged last year’s semifinal loss to Duke’s Konrad Dudziak by beating him in a 6–5 decision in this year’s semifinals, was 6–3 against Rosholt going into his final collegiate wrestling match and had both won and lost against his Cowboy rival during their two previous meetings this season.

Zabriskie and Rosholt began their final bout as Varner and Brester had begun theirs  — scoreless. They used the first period to plot their moves, test each others’ strength and wear each other down in what looked like another potential overtime match between the two. Zabriskie and Rosholt had gone to overtime twice in their prior nine matches with Zabriskie winning both decisions.

After an escape by Rosholt from the down position, Zabriskie took him down with 24 seconds left in the second period before another escape by Rosholt evened the score at 2–2 to end the second period. Zabriskie scored his third point to go up, 3–2, after escaping from the down position to begin the third period. From then on, Rosholt fired off a frenzy of desperation attacks to try and cause the upset, but Zabriskie began backing away defensively, causing an array of boos from the crowd before Zabriskie received a warning for stalling with 22 seconds left in the match.

Zabriskie’s strategy worked, riding out the remaining 22 seconds without a call for stalling while continuing to evade Rosholt’s attacks to avoid getting taken down for two points, as the “Beast from the East” won by a 3–2 decision to win the national title at heavyweight.

“This is my final meet as a college athlete,” Zabriskie said after his victory. “So being able to go out winning an NCAA title, it’s everything anybody could ask for.”

Zabriskie finishes his collegiate career with an overall record of 116–22, just five wins shy of his teammate Varner, who came to Iowa State in the same recruiting class as him and has been alongside him throughout his college career.

“We’re both practice partners,” Zabriskie said of Varner. “So it kind of shows that the hard work the both of us put in there has paid off.”

This was the first time Iowa State had multiple wrestlers win national titles since 2002, when Aaron Holker (141), Joe Heskett (165) and Cael Sanderson (197) all took first in their respective weight classes en route to leading their team to a second place finish in Albany, N.Y.

Jackson couldn’t have asked for a better way to end his first year at the helm of the Cyclone wrestling program. Advancing three wrestlers to championship matches and having the two seniors win their final matches to be crowned national champions is an experience that cannot be easily matched.

“For us to end the tournament with two champions, and to have Zabriskie and Varner walk out of here being national champions in the time they spent at Iowa State,” Jackson said. “Getting over 100 wins apiece and they’ve been proven winners and consistent performers, they deserve to be the best and deserve to be national champions.”