LINCOLN, Neb. — Iowa State couldn’t bring home the team title at the Big 12 Wrestling Championships Sunday at the Devaney Center, but the Cyclones still pushed eight wrestlers on to the NCAA Championship.

The Cyclones finished second in the five-team field with 68 points and crowned three champions.

Oklahoma State won the tournament with 84 points while Oklahoma was right behind the Cyclones at third totaling 65 points.

Nebraska finished fourth, and Missouri took fifth place.

The Cyclones are off until the nationals which is March 16-18 at the Kiel Center in St. Louis.

“We had some good performances, and I felt that no one quit out on the mat. We went out there and tried our very best, but this thing was won yesterday in the seeding meeting,” said Cyclone coach Bobby Douglas.

Cody Sanderson at 133, Cael Sanderson at 184 and Trent Hynek at heavyweight all won conference championships for the Cyclones. Top-ranked Joe Heskett was upset in the 165-pound final to finish second.

Cody Sanderson, ranked third, earned the meet’s Outstanding Wrestler award with his title winning performance.

In the finals Sanderson pinned Nebraska’s Todd Beckerman at 3:26.

Sanderson took control right away scoring a takedown and adding two near-fall points in the first period before turning Beckerman over for the pin early in the second period.

Sanderson is now 29-2 on the season.

“This is the first major college tournament I have won. It’s nice to walk off the mat as victor and a relief to get it over with,” Sanderson said.

Sophomore Cael Sanderson won his second conference title by posting an 8-4 decision win over Daniel Cormier of Oklahoma State.

Sanderson gave up a rare takedown, but he reversed Cormier right away to stay undefeated at 35-0.

“I did not wrestle as well as I would like to, but I won. This is something we can all build off of,” Sanderson said.

Hynek also remained unbeaten by pulling out an 8-6 victory over Oklahoma’s Dave Anderton. Hynek is now 21-0.

“I really didn’t know what to expect entering the last match, but I knew I was in pretty good shape. After that match I realized there is some things I have to work on,” Hynek said.

Heskett, a sophomore, had his 21-match winning streak snapped by losing 3-2 to Ty Wilcox of Oklahoma State. With the match tied at 2-2, Heskett was penalized for locked hands in the final seconds of the match.

Heskett heads to nationals with a 26-2 record.

Also qualifying for nationals with third-place finishes were Sonny Marchette at 141, Billy Maldonado at 149, Cole Sanderson at 157 and Zach Thompson at 197.

Sanderson bounced back after losing his first match to put together a pair of major decision wins to place third.

Maldonado finished third after throwing Missouri’s Jeff Urban to his back for a pin at 4:21 in the third-place match.

Thompson, ranked fourth, was denied to repeat as champ at 197 by losing a 2-1 decision to Nebraska’s Brad Vering in the semifinals. Thompson won a 3-1 overtime score over Oklahoma’s Orville Palmer to finish third.

“I was really proud of our guys that wrestled back to finish third. Sometimes it’s harder to get third than it is to get first,” Douglas said.

Matt Azevedo and Perry Parks missed qualifying by finishing fourth and fifth, respectively. Azevedo competed at 125 pounds while Parks was at 174.