The ISU wrestling team continued to build its identity in the young season, winning its home opener over Utah Valley State on Friday, 33-9, and crowning four champions in the Harold Nichols Cyclone Open in Fort Dodge on Saturday.

The seventh-ranked Cyclones (3-0) won seven of the 10 matches against the Cole Sanderson-coached Wolverines, and had 30 takedowns while giving up only three.

Travis Paulson (165 pounds) and freshman Joe Curran (197 pounds) each picked up pins, and Ben Hanisch (125 pounds) avenged a 2004 loss with a 4-1 win over Talon Vickers.

“We were worked hard in every match,” said coach Bobby Douglas. “[The Wolverines] were well prepared. We still have a lot to work on.”

At the Cyclone Open on Saturday, Iowa State again faced Utah Valley State, along with other wrestling programs from the Midwest.

Nate Gallick (141 pounds), Jason Knipp (149 pounds), Trent Paulson (157 pounds) and Travis Paulson (165 pounds) won titles in competitive finals.

“This tournament gets better all the time. If you look at the scores of the matches, there are a lot of matches that are pretty close,” Douglas said. “We lost some matches on mistakes, but it is the time to make the mistakes. Overall, we wrestled exceptionally well.

“We are scoring points and that is what we came to do. The more points we can score, the better we are going to be at the end of the year.”

On Saturday, Travis Paulson won a rematch of last year’s first round of the NCAA Tournament, again beating Nick Baima of UNI, 3-1.

Gallick had two escapes to beat Dustin Hinschberger of Wartburg, 2-1. Jason Knipp beat Ellsworth’s Seth Andersen, 2-1, while Trent Paulson faced the only high school competitor of the tournament, Jon Reader, winning 10-6 in the finals.

Hanisch beat teammate Nick Fanthorpe for third place by injury default. Mitch Mueller topped Charlie Ettelson of UNI by default.

184-pounder Kurt Backes sat out of this weekend’s action with a back injury.