OMAHA Fast starts in both halves from Iowa State led to Cyclones defeating South Dakota State 82-65 in the first round of the NCAA Tournament on Thursday night.
No. 2 seeded Iowa State made its first nine shots and led 17-3 five minutes into the game. The No. 15 seeded Jackrabbits would cut the lead to 42-38 a minute and a half into the second half but the Cyclones went on a 17-4 run to push the lead to 59-42 with just over 13 minutes left in the game. That was enough of a cushion for them to cruise to victory.
Iowa State came into Thursday nights matchup with top defense in the country. SDSU head coach Eric Henderson said it was tough to replicate in practice what to expect from the Iowa State defensive pressure and SDSU junior guard Zeke Mayo said that led to the Jacks being shell-shocked in the first five minutes of the game.
Yeah, it’s something like coach said, you can’t simulate something like that. They fly to the ball like something we haven’t seen all season. Credit to them. They played fantastic on the defensive end. I mean, it speaks for itself. They’re a two seed. They came out and played how they have been, Mayo said.
Every time the Jacks had some momentum on Thursday night, the Cyclones took it right back. After falling behind 17-3, SDSU used a 10-0 run to cut the Iowa State lead to 22-17 with just over 10 minutes to play in the first half.
Henderson said he was proud of the way his team bounced back from the tough start and never gave up the whole game.
This is always tough when it ends like this. Our guys, I’m just so proud of the fight that we had and the compete that we had. They never succumbed to their pressure, Henderson said.
Iowa State shot 63% from the field and was 11-of-23 from beyond the arc. SDSU shot 43.4% from the field and was 10-of-24 from three. Sixth-year senior Luke Appel said he thought SDSU was right with the Cyclones for portions of the game but they proved to be too talented.
I would say we had a chance. They made a lot of shots. Credit to them. They played great, just like Zeke said, and there’s a reason they’re ranked No. 4 in the country and No. 1 defense in the country. They made everything really hard on all of us, and it was just a tough game. All credit to them, Appel said.
The Jacks were led by Mayo who had 19 points and four assists. William Kyle III had 14 points and seven rebounds. Charlie Easley had 11 points and Appel had nine points.
Iowa State was led by freshman forward Milan Momcilovic who had 19 points and five rebounds. Henderson said the Jacks had no answer for Momcilovic all game long.
I mean, he was pretty impressive, Henderson said. He has great poise, like you said, for him playing in his first NCAA Tournament, the poise that he had, the patience that he had, the size that he has, the touch that he has. That Dirk [Nowitzki fadeaway] shot is kind of unguardable. You have to double-team him, get it out of his hands, and just not let him shoot it because it felt like they all went in, Henderson said.
Tamin Lipsey had 17 points for the Cyclones. Keshon Gilbert had 15 points, five assists and three steals. Curtis Jones had 11 points and Hason Ward had 10.
SDSU had 15 turnovers and Iowa State had 11. The Cyclones had 17 fast break points and the Jacks had three. Each team had 28 rebounds. Iowa State was 5-of-8 at the free throw line and SDSU was 9-of-11.
The storyline going into Thursdays game was Henderson going up against T.J. Otzelberger, who was head coach at SDSU from 2016-19. Henderson was an assistant under Otzelberger in all three seasons at SDSU and he said it was tough beating a close friend in Henderson.
Yeah, I didn’t like the matchup when it came out. Didn’t want to play against those guys. I care about a lot of people on their side and dear friends. So, yeah, I mean, there’s that part of it that you don’t love, Otzelberger said.
SDSU dropped to 0-7 in the NCAA Tournament. Henderson coached his second NCAA Tournament game on Thursday and after the game he said there isnt anything that he could pinpoint that would get the Jacks over the hump and get their first tournament victory, but he wants his teams to continue to go into every game thinking theyre going to win.
I’ve said this a long time, Henderson said. I say this quite often. I feel like we’re going to win every game we play, so that’s not going to change. Whether that’s in the NCAA Tournament, that’s in the Summit League Championship or that’s the first game of the year when we opened up with Akron.
Like I said, it doesn’t always happen, but that’s what we believe. We’ve had some great teams here, and we’ve battled in the NCAA Tournament. We battled tonight. There’s a lot of different ways to measure success. Obviously winning, if I don’t win, I’m probably going to get fired. I respect that. But there’s a lot of ways to measure success. I wouldn’t trade this group for any just because we lost in the NCAA Tournament.
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