AMES – After a week off from competition, the Iowa State women’s basketball team returns to the court today.

The 11th-ranked Cyclones (9-0) will face Northern Illinois (2-6) on Sunday at Hilton Coliseum at 1 p.m. CT.

It’s Iowa State’s first game since handing Indiana its first loss of the season in the Coconut Hoops event in Fort Myers, Fla., back on Nov. 30. Audi Crooks scored a single-game school record 47 points during the 106-95 victory over the Hoosiers that day.

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Iowa State vs. Northern Illinois time today

Location: Hilton Coliseum in Ames, Iowa.

Date: Sunday, Dec. 7

Start time: 1 p.m. CT

Tommy Birch, the Register’s sports enterprise and features reporter, has been working at the newspaper since 2008. He’s the 2018, 2020 and 2023 Iowa Sportswriter of the Year. Reach him at tbirch@dmreg.com or 515-284-8468.

Tommy Rittenhouse threw five interceptions Saturday. He atoned big time when it mattered most.

The Illinois State quarterback threw two touchdown passes to wide receiver Daniel Sobkowicz in the final three minutes and completed a gutsy 2-point PAT as the unranked Redbirds defeated No. 1 North Dakota State 29-28 in the second round of the FCS playoffs in the Fargodome on Saturday.

The Bison (12-1), the No. 1 seed, were defending FCS champions and had not lost since Nov. 23, 2024. The Bison won the FCS title 10 times from 2011 to 2024 and had beaten the Redbirds 14 straight times.

“I’ll do it again if we win by 1 point, I don’t care,” Rittenhouse said of his five INTs. “My first three interceptions were tipped at the line of scrimmage. They (NDSU) did a great job all game. That’s a really tough defense to go against, but I just trusted the guys around me. Everyone was coming up to me saying it, and I knew I was going to. That’s all I could do to give us a chance.”

WE TOLD Y’ALL ABOUT THAT RITTENHOUSE TO SOBKOWICZ CONNECTION 🤯 https://t.co/Qt7MuPLLKr pic.twitter.com/2dVZxKMTnT

— Illinois State Football (@RedbirdFB) December 6, 2025

Illinois State head coach Brock Spack said his team was partly motivated by their 42-10 defeat to UC Davis in the second round last year.

“Sometimes what happens in the last game of the season is good for you,” Spack said. “That (loss) really bothered them. That’s what I told them today, lets just be us. Just be us. That’s all you gotta do and you can win the game.”

By most measures, the Redbirds (10-4) had little chance of winning. The Bison returned one of Rittenhouse’s picks 73 yards for a touchdown and another one 21 yards to the Illinois State 4, leading to a touchdown that gave NDSU a 28-14 lead with less than 13 minutes remaining in the game.

But NDSU senior quarterback Cole Payton, considered an NFL draft prospect, struggled for most of the game and completed 4 of 12 passes for 101 yards and one touchdown. He was injured after being strip-sacked by Jake Anderson, who recovered the fumble to give Illinois State the ball at the NDSU 23 with 1:51 left in the game.

Several plays later, on fourth down and goal from the NDSU 6, Rittenhouse scrambled right and threw to a leaping Sobkowicz for their third TD connection of the day to bring the Redbirds to within a point.

“I’m not the best at rolling to the right, throwing it back, and I found that good touch and Dan went up and made the play,” Rittenhouse said.

“The play (call) didn’t plan out how we wanted it to, but when you have Tommy at quarterback and he’s got his legs and scramble drill, you gotta make sure you’re doing everything you can to get open,” Sobkowicz said. “The scramble drill is the biggest thing in football that gets overlooked, and that a big thing that our team does really well, is the scramble drill, especially because we have Tommy.”

Rather than try a PAT kick and potentially send the game into overtime, Spack opted to go for 2. Rittenhouse fired a dart to Scotty Presson Jr. in the end zone to put the Redbirds on top.

Spack said he and his coaching staff had no hesitation about going for 2.

“I thought myself earlier in the week, we gotta for 2,” Spack said. “We met as a staff and I said, listen fellas, if it gets to that down here we need to go for 2. Lo and behold, it came up and we did. So, there was really no waffling. Everybody knew.”

REDBIRDS WITH A 2PT CONVERSION🤯🤯

📺ESPN+#ValleyFootball x #FCS x @RedbirdFB x @NCAA_FCS pic.twitter.com/llBWjZmnVm

— Valley Football (@ValleyFootball) December 6, 2025

Taking over at quarterback for the injured Payton, Nathan Hayes got the Bison to their own 44 but couldn’t convert on fourth down with 12 seconds left.

Illinois State will play the winner of the UC Davis-Rhode Island game in the next round. The FCS bracket is shown here.

In a sign of changing times, AT&T, the nation’s largest wireless provider, will be switching from traditional landlines in favor of a more modern option.

Customers have received letters explaining the utility will be pulling the plug on landlines in March of 2027 across Illinois. AT&T previously announced its intention to eliminate copper-based phone services across all of its service areas in the United States by 2029.

The phasing-out process will take multiple years, a spokesperson said, and no customers will be left without access to voice or 911 service.

While the company claims customer interest has dipped in recent years, others maintain there’s still a need for traditional landlines.

Here’s what you need to know about the upcoming chance, what opponents say and how the replacement option will work.

What is happening and why?

The utility is phasing out landline use and upgrading its copper-based service to “newer, less expensive options ” including fiber optic networks.

According to AT&T, orders for traditional landline voice services have decreased 96% since 2014 and less than 2% of eligible customers are still using the legacy landline technology.

Citizens Utility Board response

The Citizens Utility Board, which opposes the shift, said the organization is of the belief that “there are still a significant number of people–many of them AT&T’s longest-standing and most loyal customers–who could benefit from the reliability and affordability of traditional phone service.”

“Traditional landline service was once the most reliable and affordable option for many customers who just wanted no-frills phone service,” Communications Director Jim Chilsen said. “It is sad and frustrating how AT&T in recent years has increased the price of traditional landline service, pushing many customers to more expensive and less reliable options–and now the phone giant is ending the service altogether.”

What is replacing traditional landlines? How does it work?

A digital home phone service that operates similar to a traditional landline – AT&T Phone — Advanced, also called AP-A, is offered at a comparable or sometimes lower cost, a company spokesperson said.

Customers who make the switch can keep their existing number and can even use their current hone, according to AT&T. It also works with a number of other technologies, including fax machines, alarms, elevators and medical monitoring devices.

Unlike the traditional landlines, AP-A uses AT&T’s wireless network and allows customers to stay connected during an outage by tapping into broadband connection as a backup, the utility explained.