No. 5 Iowa State staged a 20-2 run just before halftime Saturday vs. No. 9 Kansas and never looked back in a 74-56 blowout inside Hilton Coliseum, handing the Jayhawks their first loss in more than a month to shake up the Big 12 title race. The Cyclones’ defense held KU to its second-lowest field goal percentage in a game all season while also forcing 13 turnovers, and their offense was equally as potent in a balanced beatdown.
The win is Iowa State’s largest by final margin vs. Kansas ever in a game played in Ames, Iowa, and tied for its second-largest over KU by final margin with a February 8, 1955 (!!) 18-point win. The only other bigger beatdown of the Jayhawks by the Cyclones was on March 10, 1973, when they defeated Kansas in Lawrence 89-65.
Both teams entered the game as No. 3 seeds in the latest CBS Sports Bracketology with the model suggesting the Cyclones could move up to a No. 2 seed with the victory.
Iowa State star Milan Momcilovic spearheaded the spectacular day on offense with 18 points and four made 3-pointers, and the quartet of Tamin Lipsey, Joshua Jefferson, Jamarion Batemon and Blake Buchanan each added 11 points of their own. Buchanan set the tone early with nine first-half points on a perfect 4-for-4 shooting, and Momcilovic closed it down with 14 of his final 18 points coming in the second half – including going 4 of 5 frame from beyond the arc.
At one point Momcilovic nailed a fadeaway 3-pointer from the corner over KU defensive star Flory Bidunga and could do nothing but smile at his hot hand.
Peterson plays just 24 minutes in lopsided loss
Defensively was where Iowa State really shined as it held KU, averaging 78 points per game entering the day, to a meager 56 points in the losing effort. That tied for the fewest it has scored in a game all season, and was executed by holding Bidunga, the Big 12 field-goal percentage leader shooting 68.6% on the season, to a 5-of-13 (38.5%) outing – his second-worst shooting performance by percentage in a game he’s taken five or more shots in all season.
The Cyclones also held Darryn Peterson, KU’s star freshman to10 points on 3-of-10 shooting with three turnovers and no assists. Peterson played just 24 minutes in the loss and was not part of its closing lineup, which Kansas coach Bill Self said was due in part to game flow but also in part because of his conditioning. Peterson missed KU’s victory vs. Arizona on Monday with an illness, and Self said that illness lingered throughout the week, cutting into his ability to practice and prep for Saturday’s game.
“I tried to sub him because he’s been sick,” Self said. “So when he needed to come out there at the end, I was thinking, ‘What do we do to give us to have the best chance to have success on Wednesday.’ So that was me making that decision.”
It was a rough game for the projected No. 1 pick, but as Self noted, that was true of almost every KU player — not just Peterson.
“I didn’t think he was great,” he said. “But he hadn’t practiced much. I don’t think he was bad, I just don’t think anybody, except Elmarko [Jackson], was great today.”
Big 12 race tightens-up
Iowa State and Kansas had diametrically different weeks leading into Saturday, which made the outcome all the more stunning. ISU fell in an ugly 62-55 road loss at TCU on Tuesday despite being 7.5-point favorites, and Kansas knocked off No. 1 Arizona 82-78 on Monday.
It says a lot about the Big 12 that Iowa State – even with Saturday’s outcome – is even within one game of league-leading Arizona and Houston. The Cyclones and Jayhawks are both 1.5 games back in the standings behind the Wildcats and Cougars, though there are more than a half-dozen regular-season games remaining.
We could and should learn a lot about that race soon as Houston makes its way to face Iowa State in Ames on Monday, and Arizona hosts ISU in Tucson on March 2 for its penultimate regular-season game.
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