AMES – The past two weeks were a grind for the Iowa State women’s basketball team. The Cyclones faced two in-state opponents, took on the reigning national champions and participated in a tough trip to Florida.

This week offers a little bit of a let-up and a chance for the Cyclones to regroup.

The 19th-ranked Cyclones took care of the first bit of business by dominating USC Upstate in a 92-35 victory at Hilton Coliseum on Tuesday night. Iowa State improved to 7-2.

Audi Crooks finished with a double-double, tallying 15 points, 13 rebounds and five assists for the Cyclones. Iowa State’s Addy Brown added 14 points, six rebounds and three assists.

It was just what Iowa State needed after a two-week stretch that included a rough road loss at Northern Iowa, a close call with Drake and an ugly setback to South Carolina in the Fort Myers Tip-Off.

The losses sent the Cyclones, once a top-10 team in the Associated Press and USA TODAY Sports Network Coaches polls, tumbling in the rankings. Iowa State certainly looked like a top-tier team Tuesday, however.

The Cyclones were in complete control over USC Upstate, which fell to 2-8. Iowa State made it clear from the start that it was the dominant team, opening with a 7-0 run.

The lead blossomed into a 25-3 advantage after an 18-0 run by the Cyclones later in the quarter. Kelsey Joens, who finished with 11 points off the bench for Iowa State, highlighted the run with a pair of 3-pointers.

Iowa State led 32-11 after the first quarter. But that was just the start.

The Cyclones opened the second quarter with a 9-0 run to take a 41-11 lead. USC Upstate, which managed just two points in the quarter, shot 1-for-13 in the frame.

Iowa State’s lead morphed to 48-13 at halftime. Brown hit a 3-pointer at the end of the third quarter buzzer to give the Cyclones an 81-30 lead.

USC Upstate never got on track offensively. Iowa State’s defense suffocated the Spartans, who shot just 31.3% from the field.

Iowa State, which has now won three of its last four games, closes out the week on Sunday by playing Central Michigan at noon at Hilton Coliseum.

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

Thanks to a three-game win streak to end the year, the Iowa State football team finds itself headed to Dallas for the Big 12 Conference championship game.

Awaiting the Cyclones (10-2) will be red-hot Arizona State (10-2), who has also caught fire as the temperatures after dropped. 

But where do both ISU and ASU fit in according to the Big 12 power rankings? Glad you asked, as we have compiled just that information for your reading pleasure.

Final Regular Season Big 12 Power Rankings

1. Iowa State (10-2)

2. Arizona State (10-2)

3. Colorado (9-3)

4. Kansas State (8-4)

5. BYU (10-2)

6. Baylor (8-4)

7. TCU (8-4)

8. Texas Tech (8-4)

9. Kansas (5-7)

10. West Virginia (6-6)

11. Cincinnati (5-7)

12. Utah (5-7

13. UCF (4-8)

14. Houston (4-8)

15. Arizona (4-8)

16. Oklahoma State (3-9)

The Cyclones showed their resilience, recovering from a two-game losing skid that could have ended the year for most teams. Instead, Matt Campbell got his team regrouped and refocused, winning the last three to secure the first-ever 10-win season in program history.

Iowa State is playing in the conference championship game for just the second time ever, as they lost to Oklahoma back in 2020. 

With a healthy mix of passing and running the football, the Cyclones are equipped to handle any weather or defense. Speaking of that, Iowa State has a defensive of its own that buckles down inside the red zone.

It is honestly hard to not make a case for the Buffaloes and Deion Sanders as not only the best team in the Big 12, but the best option to compete in the College Football Playoff.

Led by likely Heisman winner Travis Hunter, Colorado is explosive on offense with Shedeur Sanders firing the pigskin all over the field. The defense, though, has been the issue for the Buffaloes, which is surprising considering who their head coach is.

If you were to match Colorado up against Iowa State, Arizona State or BYU on any given week, the odds would likely favor the Buffaloes. But they were unable to get the job done when they needed to the most, and will watch from their homes this weekend.

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Just five weeks into the 2024-25 season, the Iowa men’s basketball team has faced its fair share of adversity in the injury department.

Josh Dix missed time with a wrist injury, Owen Freeman missed a game with an illness, Riley Mulvey and Even Brauns have had to sit out for a variety of health reasons, Chris Tadjo has missed games while in concussion protocol, Seydou Traore missed the first couple games of the season with a lower leg injury, sprained his ankle against USC-Upstate and is considered a “game-time decision” for Iowa’s matchup with Northwestern on Tuesday, and Cooper Koch is out indefinitely after an injury he sustained in practice.

Though Payton Sandfort hasn’t missed any time yet, he’s also been nursing a wrist injury that took place against Washington State. The senior forward hasn’t seen the injury bug bite this hard and this frequently in his four years with the program.

“It’s just super unlucky what’s going on with everybody,” Sandfort said. “We delt with it a little bit before Eastern Illinois when we got beat here [two years ago]. We had a lot of guys out. That would’ve been the last time we really delt with something like this.”

Sandfort recognizes the team-wide health issues have made it a little more difficult for him to bounce back, too.

“There have probably been times where I’ve been on the floor when I shouldn’t have been,” he said. “I was just trying to keep being the leader, even if I wasn’t 100%.”

Sandfort’s wrist injury reared its ugly head in Iowa’s 77-69 loss to Utah State just under a couple weeks ago. Regarded as one of the top shooters in the Big Ten — if not the country — Sandfort shot 4-of-18 from the field and 1-of-13 from three.

“I just wasn’t good enough,” Sandfort said following the loss. “If I’m myself tonight, we win. I take 100% responsibility for it. … I just can’t really do much, in life or in basketball right now. I’ve got to be able to make those shots anyway.”

In the meantime, players at the end of the bench have picked up some of the slack from regular rotation players — like him, Traore or Koch.

“I think a lot of guys on our team have done a really good job of stepping up,” Sandfort said. “Riley has played really good minutes. Carter (Kingsbury) is a really good player. He’s going to keep playing, he’s been playing well. A lot of guys have been waiting their turn for years. … I’m proud of the way the guys have stepped up.”

Going forward, Sandfort is framing the extra minutes at the end of the bench as a positive.

“It’s brought our team closer together,” he said. “A lot of other leaders have emerged from this. We’re more together because of it. Once everybody is back out there, we’ll have a lot of weapons that have had playing time this year and can contribute to winning games in the Big Ten.”

Now ten days removed from that woeful shooting performance against Utah State and currently at the tail end of a week off from playing, Sandfort said his wrist is “good” and that he’d “figured some things out” with the injury.

“I figured out how to get it better,” he said. “I feel comfortable, and I have my tools back. So I’m good to go.”

Fran McCaffery affirmed that the break over Thanksgiving was good for his team’s second-leading scorer.

“He’s had to deal with [the injury] for a while now,” McCaffery said. “I give him credit because he keeps grinding. A lot of guys would shut it down and make excuses. He just keeps plugging away.”

With Sandfort and potentially Traore in the lineup, Iowa will face off with the Northwestern (6-2) at 6 p.m. on Tuesday, December 3 in Carver-Hawkeye Arena. The game will be broadcast on Peacock.