Lost in Austin: Cyclones Drop Nail-Biter to Texas, 86-69

This has not been a good day for Iowa State. We started the day off finding that Cameron Lard was suspended for a violation of team rules. He did not make the trip to Austin, and neither did the rest of the team.

Iowa State started off looking pretty good, in fact they led by 9 points around the 12 minute mark. Shots were falling and they looked engaged on both sides of the court. However, something changed right after that. Iowa State stopped moving the ball, took some bad shots, and that resulted in a 9 minute field goal-less drought.

Texas also got unconsciously hot from three, they finished the half on a 15-3 run and went into the break with a 38-26 lead. To make matters worse, Nick Weiler-Babb suffered a right knee bruise. He did return. No one on Iowa State was in double digits at half, Conditt was the leading scorer with 7.

The Cyclones looked worse in the second half. They played with no sense of urgency, no effort, and no ball movement. This resulted in a massacre. Jase Febres was super hot from three and scored 26 points, all eight of his threes were uncontested.

Iowa State tried to bounce back, but they couldn’t get the Texas lead less than 15 points. Marial Shayok turned it on in the second half offensively and finished the day with 22 points. But the defensive effort never came and they allowed Texas to do whatever they wanted when they had the ball.

Texas ended up winning the game 86-69, the largest margin of defeat for Iowa State this year. This was clearly one of ISU’s worst performances of the season.

With tournament season coming up and only two games remaining, this team has a lot to figure out. Matthias and I will discuss what that it is on our live call-in show, You Call We Drink. Check Twitter and Facebook for the number to call in.

Iowa State travels to Morgantown on Wednesday to take on West Virginia before returning home to face Texas Tech in the regular season finale.