Wednesday’s wrestling practice ended with head coach Bobby Douglas watching as his wrestlers sprinted back and forth across the Lied Rec Center’s 60-yard field. When they sprinted toward him, he yelled out to them: “Keep going — the last 10 yards are the most important.”

The wrestling team is in the final 10 yards of the season. The Big 12 and national championships are a few weeks away. This Sunday the Cyclones have their last meet at Hilton Coliseum, a doubleheader against Fresno State and North Carolina State.

For seniors Austen Palmer and Aaron Holker, this is the last time they’ll wrestle in front of a Cyclone home crowd.

“I was overwhelmed,” Holker said when remembering his first time on the mat at Hilton. “It was just like a dual meet, but [the fans] loved it, like it’s something special.”

Both Holker and Palmer had shortened careers at Iowa State. Holker was convinced by Douglas and the Sanderson brothers to transfer from Brigham Young University after his sophomore year. Palmer transferred from Virginia Military Institute during his junior year, wanting to have the chance to train with national standouts Cael Sanderson and Zach Thompson.

“I wish really that I had a longer time here,” Palmer said. “As a freshman you don’t realize how fast four years go. And now every single match is valuable.”

Douglas also sees these final two matches of the regular season as valuable. The back-to-back matches will prepare the wrestlers for the day-long format of the Big 12 tournament. Douglas said he will emphasize conditioning and takedowns in the remaining practices.

“We’re cranking it real hard, doing somethings we hope will make a difference,” he said. “We’re working a lot more on takedowns. We’re trying to wrestle them when they’re tired.”

Douglas plans for the team to train through the final home meet, but he said Sunday’s matches will not be easy. Fresno State beat Nebraska, which beat Iowa State two weeks ago, and the Cyclones have too little information about North Carolina State to prepare for them.

“Any time someone comes into our house, they are going to wrestle us hard,” Douglas said.

The team has struggled this year, falling from being ranked in the top five to their current rank of 17th. Douglas said this weekend’s bout will be a good gauge of the young team’s maturity before the postseason tournaments.

“I don’t have a real good feel for where we are at,” he said. “Hopefully, I’ll know a little bit more after these two matches.”

Palmer and Holker are keeping their focus despite the finality of Sunday’s matches.

“I’m not going to make the matches bigger than they are,” said Palmer, who is currently ranked 10th at 184 pounds. “I’m going out there to score points and do well for myself and the team.”

Last year, Holker went into the postseason unheralded but won a national title. This year, he has the pressure of being the wrestler to beat and he said that it is almost a relief to be near the end.

“It’s been a tough year,” said Holker, who is currently ranked fourth at 141 pounds. “It’s good having the last meet to look forward to and to accomplish my goals in this last month.”

“I want to end on a good note,” he said, referring to the upcoming weekend. “I definitely want to win both [matches] by a good number and just prove something out there.”