The first one is always a little more important than the rest.

This weekend at Mat-Town USA on the Lock Haven campus, the Penn State wrestling team will compete as a team for the first time all season after putting together two strong performances at open competitions.

The Nittany Lions have shown some signs of promise early this season. Penn State's first two showings have given the team a lot of confidence heading into this weekend.

"We have taken a lot from the East Stroudsburg meet," Penn State wrestling coach Troy Sunderland said. "We had guys beat guys who were more highly ranked and more successful coming out of high school, last weekend. This is an important first step, and it gives our guys, especially the younger ones something tangible to see how their hard work and improvement has started to pay off."

The Lions will be tested, as they will compete against ranked teams. Many of the teams will be from the state of Pennsylvania including No. 16 Lock Haven, No. 15 Pittsburgh, Slippery Rock, Bucknell and Franklin and Marshall. Other teams that will be at Lock Haven include Big Ten rival Purdue and Old Dominion.

"It's important to go out and wrestle our best," senior Kevin Shippos. "We know that we belong with these teams. We can hang with the best of the best. This weekend will be the first step at putting Penn State back on the map, in the wrestling world."

Penn State will have 10 wrestlers who can score team points competing, but a total of 20 wrestlers competing in all. The Lions' squad will have Mark Becks back in action for the first time all year at 184 pounds. Becks missed the two open tournaments with a stress fracture in his leg.

The Lions hope to improve on their fourth place finish at Mat-Town a year ago. They know they it will not be easy, as there will be a strong contingency from Lock Haven and Pitttsburgh standing in their way. Therefore, making the matchups with these teams that much more important to win.

"The matches with our rivals (Pittsburgh and Lock Haven) are the ones that we definitely need to win, if we want to out score them," 141-pounder Scott Moore said. "Making it to the finals, scores the team a lot of points, so there will be more pressure on advancing to that point. The finals are more meaningful now, more than they have been in the last two tournaments."

Mat-Town presents the first of many challenges that await the Lions this year.

"We go through phases," Sunderland said. "We start the year without any pressure on the guys at opens, and then move our way into tougher competitions. Starting this week it becomes more important with dual meets and the Big Ten season approaching, where like this one, the matches are team scored."