{gallery}03_04_10/austoncarter{/gallery}Auston Carter, his shoulder heavily taped due to an injury, faces Michael Hogan of Douglas at 140 pounds during his third title match. A 7-4 decision earned the 2009 championship, his third. Tribune photo by Don AmendFour years ago, Powell freshman Auston Carter, sporting a blonde hairdo, squared off against Matt Cearns, a junior from Torrington who brought a 24-7 record and the 130-pound East Regional championship to the mat. Cearns had pinned his last seven opponents, six of them in the first period, on his way to the finals.

A freshman wrestler might have been intimidated by that record, but if Carter was, it wasn't apparent, as he mounted an aggressive attack that had his opponent looking to his coach in bewilderment. Carter dominated the match and, with 42 seconds left in the match, pinned his opponent for his first state championship.

Last week in Casper, Carter stepped on the mat at the Casper Events Center for the last time, 15 pounds heavier and with a short haircut this time, to take on Wheatland's Tyler Smart, who had won more than 30 matches during the year.

This time Carter was unable to dominate his opponent, who took a one-point lead on a second-period escape and held it into the third period.

“He was really hard to wrestle, and he was ready for me,” Carter said. “The way he wrestled made it hard for me to shoot.”

Carter tied the score with an escape of his own, and in the final minute of the match, finally found an opening and took a 3-1 lead on a takedown. He allowed Smart to escape, and held him off in the final seconds for his state title.

Those two wins, coupled with final-round decisions in 2008 and 2009 over Douglas wrestlers Pat Lehnen and Michael Hogan at 140 pounds, earned Carter a unique place in Powell High School wrestling history as a four-time state champion, the first in the team's history.

In addition, it makes him one of only 13 four-time champions in Wyoming wrestling history, and even in that bunch, he belongs to an elite group. Only two other wrestlers have won one of their four titles at 130 or more pounds, and only two others have won one of their titles at 145 pounds or more.

In short, winning four championships, particularly in the middle weights which frequently are loaded with top wrestlers, isn't easy to do, and Carter can attest to that.

“My last two matches were the hardest,” Carter said, “but all of them were tough. They were all against good wrestlers.”

How did it feel to win his fourth championship?

“It was unreal,” he said. “I couldn't stop smiling.”

But there was a catch. In the end, the Panthers lost the team championship by one point, and Carter's team spirit made it difficult to keep smiling about his own success.