AUBURN HILLS, Mich. – Iowa State’s three senior All-Americans Trent Paulson (157), Travis Paulson (165) and Kurt Backes (197) have led their team for four years, but the three senior captains and NCAA Qualifier Grant Turner (174) left the Palace of Auburn Hills on Saturday night with one goal never reached – a team national championship.

The seniors ended their Cyclone careers with a second-place finish to top-ranked Minnesota on Saturday night. Iowa State finished with 88.5 points, short of the Golden Gophers’ 98 team points.

“Our seniors did a great job for us,” said coach Cael Sanderson. “They didn’t all reach their goals, but they gave their best shot and they worked hard this year.”

For 157-pound champion Trent Paulson, the ultimate goal of winning an NCAA title is finally a reality.

“It’s a dream come true,” said Paulson after his championship win. “I’ve been imagining this moment since I got to Iowa State, and to actually feel it is unbelievable.”

Paulson battled back to take a 4-3 lead over Wisconsin’s Craig Henning with one minute and 25 seconds to go in the championship match after being down 3-1 going into the third period. The senior captain then intentionally released Henning to tie the score at 4-4 and try to win the NCAA title from his feet.

“I knew he was a good scrambler, so I didn’t want to take a chance on getting in a scramble and giving up a reversal,” said Paulson. “I wanted to wrestle him on my feet and score my points there.”

The three-time All-American did just that with a low double-leg takedown with only 14 seconds to go in regulation.

Henning escaped to make the score 6-5, but it wasn’t enough to knock off the top-seeded Paulson.

Trent rode some of his twin brother Travis’ momentum into the finals after watching him come away with a winning takedown with 11 seconds to go in the fifth-place match earlier in the day.

There were 30 seconds left in the match, and Trent told Travis to ride Michael Patrovich of Hofstra out, but Travis felt he could take him down from his feet.

Travis Paulson took fifth place, finishing the highest the three-time All-American has ever placed at the NCAA tournament.

Grant Turner took the eventual 174-pound third-place finisher Eric Luedke of Iowa to the wire in an opening round 3-1 loss to the eventual All-American. Turner then lost his consolation match to Kurt Brenner of West Virginia 9-4.

Turner helped the Cyclones immensely this year. Iowa State qualified all ten wrestlers for the NCAA tournament in part through Turner’s automatic qualifying spot that he took by placing third at the Big 12 tournament.

In the end, he just didn’t want his Cyclone career to be over.

“I really just wanted another year,” said Turner. “When you get so close like that, you can almost taste it [the team title]. It’s hard to go home in second when you’re that close.”

Kurt Backes took the underdog role into the tournament with only a nine seed for the senior and rode it all the way to the finals where he met second-seeded Josh Glenn of American University.

Backes took a 4-3 lead early in the third period, but the score was virtually tied with Glenn having secured a riding time advantage.

A controversial takedown by Glenn was taken off the board with only 20 seconds to go in the match after a livid Sanderson argued that he did not have control.

The 197-pound championship match then went into overtime with the score tied at 4-4.

Glenn wasted no time in overtime as he snatched Backes’ ankle and held on at the edge of the mat for the 6-4 decision.

“I just wanted to go out with a bang,” said Backes after his championship loss. “I did the best I could. I thought I did a good job . I gave my best effort.”

Backes finished his Cyclone career a national runner-up and a two-time All-American.