'Iolani School senior Carla Watase is a sweet, soft-spoken, church-going girl who exudes innocence and humility.

But try to beat her on a wrestling mat, and be ready for six minutes of hell — if you can last that long.

"When she steps into a match, she's able to just flip the switch," said 'Iolani coach Yoshi Honda. "Competition is what drives her, and she challenges herself and expects perfection, so a lot of times her closest competitor is herself."

In four years of high school wrestling, Watase's record is 136-2. She again enters the Chevron Hawai'i State Championships as a No. 1 seed, this time at 108 pounds, and is on the doorstep of becoming only the second girl to win four individual state championships.

Moanalua's Caylene Valdez did it from 2000-2003, and Kamehameha's Hoku Nohara also has a chance to join the ultra-elite four-peat club if she wins the 220-pound title tomorrow.

"I'm really excited," Watase said. "This is my chance to to do it; it's been my goal."

Watase's only two losses came last year, when she forfeited a match because of a bad ankle and then lost the next day while competing despite the injury.

Her sophomore year, she wrestled the entire season with a torn muscle in her left shoulder, postponing surgery until after she won the 103-pound state title.

"I actually tore it the summer before, in Fargo (N.D.)," said Watase, who won the state title at 98 pounds as a freshman. "But I didn't find out until a couple months before the season, and if I had the surgery then, it would be too late (to wrestle in 2004-05). So I waited."

That meant not only enduring pain, but also adjusting her wrestling techniques to minimize exposure to the bad shoulder.

"She changed her style, and that just goes to show how complete a mat wrestler she is," Honda said. "We tried to have her shooting more on the outside so she wouldn't roll on it as much, but she had to work that into the way she wrestled."

It also did not eliminate all the pain.

"When I made a bad shot, it was really sore," Watase said.

She went undefeated, but it was a struggle till the very end.

In the state championship match, Kahuku's Danica Auna took a 2-0 lead on a takedown in the first period but Watase tied it early in the third period and then won 16 seconds into overtime, 4-2.

The victory was crucial in helping the Raiders edge Baldwin, 130.5 points to 129.5, for their first girls team state championship.

After the two losses last year, Watase rebounded from an illness to win her third state crown by defeating Mililani's Brandie Dela Rama, 11-5, at 103 pounds.

This season, Watase is undefeated again and won her fourth Interscholastic League of Honolulu crown with a 10-0 defeat in the title match last Saturday.

'Iolani also won the ILH team championship for the first time since her freshman year, 142 to 140 over Kamehameha.

"I'm super proud of our team because everybody really stepped it up," Watase said. "It was hard because two girls quit (during the season) and another girl got injured, so we had three empty classes. But we still believed and everybody worked so hard ... I think if everybody steps up again, we can take it (the state championship)."

Like many of her teammates, Watase has had more than just the state tournament on her mind this week. She had exams in advanced placement statistics and biology, plus a report due for AP bio. She also is taking AP calculus and carries a cumulative grade point average of over 4.0.

"I've been busy," she said.

Watase, who also plays the piano and ran cross country as a sophomore, is deciding between wrestling at Pacific (Ore.) University or attending the University of Hawai'i, which does not have a wrestling program. She also is waiting on other college options, and said she is thinking about optometry school as a post-graduate possibility.

But first, there is the fourth state title to aim for, a by-product of years of training at 'Iolani and with her father, David.

"Her dad gave her an excellent base and is a big reason she got to this level," Honda said.

It's a level that only a select few ever reach.

"I want to make sure I have no regrets," Watase said. "I'm pretty excited."

Reach Wes Nakama at wnakama@honoluluadvertiser.com.