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Pueblo County’s聽Hunter Willits became the 20th wrestler to win four state championships on Saturday night with a victory in the Class 4A 152-pound final, while his twin brother, Grant, captured a third title in the 132-pound bracket.

After Hunter’s decisive 13-0 major decision over Longmont’s Nathan Morris, the packed Pepsi Center crowd rose to its feet to acknowledge a rare feat in high school wrestling.

“It feels like a lot of hard work that’s finally paid off considering all the time and practices and things on my own I had to do to get to this point,” Hunter Willits said. “They showed a video of all the four-time state champions on the video board聽before the meet started, and to be a part of that group now is surreal.”

Together, the brothers headlined the Hornets as they cemented a聽second consecutive 4A team championship. Pueblo County, with eight wrestlers in the finals, had already clinched the championship heading into Saturday night.

And while the pressurized lights of the Pepsi Center can get to some 鈥� especially during聽Saturday night’s finals 鈥� the Willits brothers remained unruffled.聽After a lifetime spent traveling the nation and competing against the best the sport has to offer at prestigious tournaments such as聽Fargo, Super 32, Doc Buchanan and Ironman, each Willits wrestler headed聽into the finals聽with a “just another match” mind-set.

“They just keep聽doing what they’ve grown up doing,” Pueblo County coach Eddie Soto聽said. “They’ve been wrestling for a long time and they’ve traveled all over the place to compete in big venues, so this is just another tournament for them. Performing here just comes naturally to them.”

In four years of wrestling聽at the Pepsi Center, the brothers amassed an astounding 29-2 record. The tandem’s lone losses came聽as a result of聽Grant having to forfeit two matches his sophomore year for not making weight. Had it not been for 0.1 of a pound, Grant聽would be a four-peat champion, too.

“It haunts me a little聽bit, knowing I could’ve been a four-timer like my brother, and when people would bring it up back when it happened, it was really hard to talk about,” Grant Willits said. “But now, I don’t worry about it too much. At the time I couldn’t believe it happened to me, but I definitely think it made me stronger in the long run because it made me wrestle with a chip on my shoulder.”

Both wrestlers are committed to Oregon State, having chosen the Beavers over offers from Air Force, Minnesota, Boise State, Arizona State and more.

There, they’ll aim to carry聽on the Willits wrestling tradition as first laid down by their father Rick (1980 Class 3A champion at 132 for Pueblo East and 1985 NAIA national champion at 150 pounds for Adams State) and then their older brother Keenan, who was runner-up at 160 pounds at the 2014 state tournament to four-time champion Phil Downing of Broomfield.

Despite the enormous amount of success the brothers have enjoyed, Hunter (45-2) and Grant (44-3) aren’t taking anything for granted as they head off to Corvallis in the fall knowing there’s an entirely new mountain to climb.

“All summer and during the season, I trained like it’s not me that’s supposed to win a title this year 鈥� like it was my freshman year and I need to prove myself all over again,” Hunter Willits said. “I know I’m prepared for the moment, because I never think聽about the end goal too much, only what I need to accomplish against the guy across the mat from me.”

And as聽Pueblo County, along with Class 5A repeat victor Pomona, again cemented itself as one of the state’s best programs regardless of classification,聽being part of the Hornets’ ascension to the top of the prep wrestling universe has been one of the sweetest parts of the twins’聽high school ride.

“Last year when we won state as a team it was the first male sport championship that County’s ever won, so to be able to repeat would be聽huge,” Hunter Willits said. “And to represent Pueblo as a whole is a huge to me, because I believe the city’s really coming around in wrestling. It’s been fun to be at the front of that surge.”