WBB: No. 6 Cyclones will forget the film, focus on rematch with No. 14 Texas

One player can mean a lot in the sport of college basketball, especially when that player is set to become the leading scorer in program history the next time she touches the floor.

That couldn’t hold more truth for No. 6 Iowa State, which was without Ashley Joens in an 18-point loss to No. 14 Texas in January.

“When you’re playing these kind of games – ones that mean something to a lot of people – it’s fun,” coach Bill Fennelly said. “I think our players understand the moment and they respect the moment, but they’re excited about it, too.”

Joens is set to surpass Angie Welle’s record 2,149 career points – needing just 12 to break it – when the two teams face off in a rematch in Austin Wednesday (7 p.m. Longhorn Network).

It’s certainly fun for the fans, but make no mistake, the vibes around the locker room put more into focus than fun.

“We’re all really focused. You can kind of tell in practice, we’re all really focused on the scouting report and what the coaches are saying,” Joens said. “It’s not as loud. No one’s really messing around – it’s very businesslike.”

That’s for good reason, too. The Cyclones will travel to Texas to face one top 15 team before returning to Ames for a game against another in No. 14 Oklahoma on Saturday.

As the team is in the driver’s seat for a regular-season conference championship, there’s a lot to play for.

All eyes are focused on the next 40 minutes, though, and this Wednesday’s game will look different on both sides. With the circumstances that surrounded the last set against Texas, the takeaways were slim.

“No, not really,” Fennelly said of what he gathered from it. “I think there’s always a couple of things. For us, we need to do a better job of handling their pressure. I put way too much on Emily Ryan’s plate. I think I made a big mistake in that game (thinking) we didn’t have (Joens) to help handle the ball so we’ll let (Ryan) do it. That was the wrong thing to do.”

Iowa State’s offense turned the ball over 15 times in the game and shot 27.9 percent from the field.

They’ve all but thrown away the film.

“I think it’s more about how they matched up and how they guarded us, but we haven’t really talked much about it. It was a completely odd, unique and crazy situation and I don’t know that it impacts this game a lot,” Fennelly said. “We haven’t really focused on this game – we’ve moved on.”

For Iowa State, that means it’s just a normal week.

As odd as that may seem given the circumstances, if there’s anything this team has proven this season, it’s that it knows how to win.

“I’m excited and our team’s excited,” Joens said. “It’s just another opportunity that we have after this great start that we’ve had. We just have to keep extending that and learn from our mistakes in the past.”

The team already knows it can beat OU, securing the road win against the Sooners earlier this year in comeback fashion.

It strongly believes, for lack of a better term, that it can win the next game, too.

“We were in a really good rhythm going into our bye week,” Ryan said. “It was nice to have a little break there and refocus and work on things in practice. I thought after our first quarter against TCU, we got back into that rhythm we were in prior.”

Now, the first team with 21 wins in its first 24 games under Fennelly will take the court again.

“We aren’t going to focus too much on who it’s against,” Ryan said. “We’re just going to do what we do best.”

Big 12 WBB Standings

Position	Team	Ovr.	Conf.	GB
1	Iowa State	21-3	10-2	–
2	Oklahoma	20-4	9-3	1.0
2	Baylor	19-5	9-3	1.0
4	Kansas	17-5	8-4	2.0
5	Texas	17-6	7-5	3.0
6	Kansas State	17-8	7-6	3.5
7	West Virginia	11-11	4-8	6.0
8	Oklahoma State	8-14	3-10	7.5
9	Texas Tech	9-14	2-10	8.0
10	TCU	6-15	2-10	8.0