TUCSON – One of the best ways to evaluate a team’s NCAA Tournament fortunes, I think, is to consider their reasonable range of possibilities. What is a team capable of at its best? What do things look like at its worst?
The smaller the gap between those two possibilities, the more consistent a team is, for better or worse. The wider that band is, the more inconsistent – and untrustworthy – a team is.
When you’re in a single-elimination tournament, you never know which end of the spectrum you might end up on any given day. Teams with high ceilings can get hot for two or three games and, poof, you’re in the Elite 8, regardless of where your floor may be.
The reverse is true, too, though. If your worst is bad enough, you’re ousted against a double-digit seed, and who the hell cares who you were capable of beating at your best?
Seventh-ranked Iowa State has a ceiling high enough for the Cyclones to stride tall and proud into Indianapolis and the Final Four. But, after another loss to a high-level team, it’s becoming increasingly clear that the Cyclones aren’t going to be able to bully, grind and will themselves there.
They’re going to have to catch fire.
The Cyclones’ 73-57 loss March 2 to No. 2 Arizona wasn’t particularly notable for the ultimate outcome, but for how the Wildcats were able to keep Iowa State at arm’s length for most of the evening.
Iowa State at 75 percent of its ceiling wasn’t good enough to beat Texas Tech at Hilton Coliseum last weekend. The Cyclones at something less than three-quarters full got them handed a beating by Arizona, which is, clearly, at the absolute apex of college basketball right now.
“That is as good of a team as we’ve played against,” Iowa State coach T.J. Otzelberger said, “in the time I’ve been the head coach at Iowa State.”
That’s not hyperbole, and Otzelberger’s teams have faced off against future Final Four teams and national champs. So the performance against these Wildcats – who are huge, skilled and bulging with NBA talent – should be graded against that curve, but, so too, should the Cyclones be evaluated on their Final Four aspirations.
This just wasn’t good enough, and we’ve seen ‘not good enough’ from the Cyclones frequently enough against the exact type of teams we should expect them to see in the Sweet 16 and beyond that it’s worth considering.
This is just not a team playing consistently near its best at the moment. They’ve touched it at home against Kansas and Houston in recent weeks, but it’s fallen apart on the road and at home against Tech since.
Iowa State was actually solid enough in a number of phases of the game against Arizona to make the night competitive. The Cyclones claimed 15 offensive boards, forced 15 turnovers and held the Wildcats under their season average for points per possession.
The offense, though, was abysmal.
The Cyclones shot 29.2 percent from the floor, 23.3 percent from 3 and saw its top-two scorers, Joshua Jefferson and Milan Momcilovic, combine to go 4 of 25 from the field.
“They didn’t make it easy for us,” point guard Tamin Lipsey said after a gutsy team-high 17 points, playing through a rolled left ankle.
“They impacted our shooting ability, but we can control other things. I felt like we did a great job rebounding on the offensive side. I feel like we could have done a better job moving the ball. Didn’t have many assists as a team. That’s credit to their defense.”
Jefferson, who very well may earn first-team All-American honors, simply had no answers for the Arizona defense. He was 2 of 17 from the floor, including 0 of 5 from deep, while committing four turnovers.
“Tonight wasn’t his night,” Otzelberger said. “It was physical on some of those drives, and I think Joshua will be better for it.
“Any time you have the gifts that he has, you get better from adversity. This is one game. He’s shown over 30 games what a great player he is. I know he’ll bounce back quick from this.”
Momcilovic, the country’s best 3-point shooter, was only marginally better, if only for not matching Jefferson’s volume. He was 2 of 8 from the floor and 1 of 5 from 3, getting consistently pushed off his spots and run off the 3-point line.
The bottom line is Iowa State will have trouble against the middle of the Big 12 when two of its three best players struggled as much as they did this night. Against a team like Arizona, on its home floor and on senior night, you get trounced.
“Our compete and our fight and our physicality was in a great place,” Otzelberger said. “Now we’ve got to do those things offensively.”
Iowa State is still the team that ran off 16 straight wins to start the season. The Cyclones ran through the Players Era Festival, won at Purdue and have toppled top-10 opponents. They’ve got three tier-1 college players in Jefferson, Momcilovic and Lipsey, plus a supporting cast that has been critical in the success of this season.
All of that is true. All of that means Iowa State absolutely, without a doubt, can make its way back to the Final Four for the first time since 1944.
What we’ve seen in recent weeks, though, is that there’s enough inconsistency – or at least not enough consistency at the elitest of levels – to believe this will be a team skipping into the Elite 8, let alone that final magical weekend of the best event in sports. A middling performance against the type of team we’d expect them to see in the Sweet 16 and beyond probably means there’s no next game. It gets scarier if you’re an Iowa State fan when you acknowledge that when the Cyclones lose, they don’t really even give themselves a chance.
I think Iowa State will probably become a trendy upset pick next weekend when folks start filling out their brackets.
“Overrated,” they’ll say, pointing to the losses.
“Can’t win the big one!” they’ll shout, ignoring the victories.
That’s not fair nor is it the whole story, but it’s true enough that people will lean into it. Everybody wants to be the smart one to pick the No. 2 or 3 seed who gets ousted early.
The reality for Iowa State is that if it is to make it to the Final Four, the Cyclones are going to have to play their best basketball for four straight games, with the last two potentially coming against some of the nation’s best teams.
I think they can do it. I just can’t count on it.
Iowa State columnist Travis Hines has covered the Cyclones for the Des Moines Register and Ames Tribune since 2012. Contact him at thines@amestrib.com or (515) 284-8000. Follow him on X at @TravisHines21.
This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Iowa State basketball fails to be at its best in Arizona rout | Hines
Reporting by Travis Hines, Des Moines Register / Des Moines Register
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