Sep 28, 2024; Houston, Texas, USA; Iowa State Cyclones quarterback Rocco Becht (3) celebrates with wide receiver Jayden Higgins (9) after a touchdown reception during the third quarter against the Houston Cougars at TDECU Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Thomas Shea-Imagn Images
Iowa State’s offense might have played its worst half of the season on paper during the opening 30 minutes on Saturday in its 20-0 win over Houston.
After the opening drive ended in a field goal, Iowa State’s next four series ended in punts. That won’t fly in most games the rest of the way, if any, but it wasn’t like the Cyclones were far off.
Nonetheless, they escaped Houston with a win, looking overwhelmingly like the better team, and move to 4-0 for the first time since 2000.
“I think some of the maturity of this football team is that there was no panic – and there has not been panic,” coach Matt Campbell said. “I think our coaches did a really good job of teaching through the football game. I thought we made some really good adjustments throughout it. To me, it felt like we were in control of the game, we were just off by a hair. We’d like to start a little bit faster, and we’ve got to figure out ways to do that better, but I think our ability to just hang in there and keep playing is the mark of our team so far.”
Despite the lackluster halftime score, Iowa State was the only FBS team to shut out its opponent this week, earned its first shutout conference win since 1971 and won its fifth-straight Big 12 road game.
To put that into perspective, the Cyclones won seven Big 12 road games total from 2005 to 2015 – the year before Campbell, who is now the all-time leader in program wins – arrived. Let’s get in to what happened.
Iowa State has been a running back-by committee team so far this year.
That’s not to say that these numbers won’t change, but the Cyclones have been regularly running their trio of guys in the backfield to compliment its passing game one third of the way through the regular season.
Abu Sama leads the way with 40 carries and 225 yards after picking up his 77-yard touchdown Saturday. Carson Hansen has rushed it 26 times for 114 yards, but leads the team with two rushing touchdowns to his name.
And then Jaylon Jackson is there, seemingly forcing his way into the mix since arriving on campus, with 188 yards on 33 rushes. Even after Sama’s big run, Jackson is averaging the team-high 5.7 yards per carry so far.
Each of those guys took a handoff during the first seven plays of the Cyclones’ opening drive Saturday.
The young linebacker core continues to impress.
True sophomore Kooper Ebel led the way for Iowa State with nine tackles and 1.5 tackles for loss. True freshman Cael Brezina was up there, too, finishing with 2.5 TFL’s and seven tackles on the day.
The group limited Houston’s pair of quarterbacks to 9-16 with 72 yards on the day – Donovan Smith contributed 71 of those through the air.
Those two were flying around and it kept Houston at bay for 60 minutes.
Although, an already thin linebacker room may have gotten thinner. John Klosterman went down with an injury in the first quarter and didn’t return to the field.
“We’re dinged up,” Campbell said. “We’ve been dinged up. For me, the most impressive piece of it is those next guys up. They keep stepping up and making critical plays.”
We’ll have more on Klosterman Tuesday at the weekly press conference.
A-players made A-plays
The 3-0 lead going into the second half only transpired to its final 20-0 number because of Iowa State’s stars stepping up.
Whether it was the pair of interceptions from Jeremiah Cooper and Jontez Williams, Sama’s big run or Higgins’ sixth straight game with a touchdown, the big-name guys did what they were supposed to do: stand out.
“I think, for me, the fun thing tonight is man, all the A-players made critical plays in critical moments,” Campbell said. “You talk about on defense – the play Malik (Verdon) makes… Those are the guys tonight that stepped up. And I thought Rocco (Becht) did a really great job. There were some things that they didn’t do that maybe we thought they were going to do and his ability to adjust within the game was great to see.”
Around the Big 12
The Big 12 is living up to its billing as the conference with the most parity.
If Baylor’s last two games are any indication, there will be nothing normal about Saturday’s game at Jack Trice Stadium where the Cyclones will try for their first 5-0 start since 1980.
The Bears allowed BYU to get out to a 21-0 lead before they came storming back, trimming their deficit to 34-28 early in the fourth quarter.
Down the stretch, Baylor failed to execute moving the ball down the field, ultimately dropping its third game of the year. Don’t take the Bears lightly, though. They’ve been right there all year.
KU football takes Arrowhead pic.twitter.com/xMcGAr30Kj
— 𝙏𝙝𝙚 𝙈𝙖𝙣𝙝𝙖𝙩𝙩𝙚𝙧 🌾 (@TheManhatterKSU) September 28, 2024
Kansas’ nightmare season saw another chapter as the Jayhawks fell to 1-4 in a loss to TCU.
Quarterback Jaylon Daniels continues to look less and less like the player he was in previous seasons. He finished 15-34 for 179 yards with one touchdown and a pick in the 38-27 loss.
This isn’t the same KU that was winning 1-2 games a season for a decade, but the record isn’t pretty and its running out of room for error to salvage anything about this year at 1-4 through five games.
The Jayhawks run into Arizona State, who’s coming off of a bye week, on Saturday.
Colorado played its most complete game of the Deion Sanders era in a dominant win over UCF — in the Bounce House.
Quarterback Shedeur Sanders was great again throwing 28-of-35 for 290 yards, three touchdowns and a pick.
It’s asinine that Travis Hunter isn’t higher in the Heisman rankings right now. He again forced a turnover with an interception on defense and finished with 89 yards on nine receptions on the other side. Maybe some day that award will be what it used to be, but I’ve grown more sour on it during the last few weeks.
Colorado gets a bye week out of this game – and sits in a tremendous spot at 4-1 before Kansas State’s in town. UCF, meanwhile, will prep for an in-state rivalry against Florida in a game I’m very excited to watch.
Utah was handed it’s first loss of the season while Isaac Wilson and Co. were stifled at home by Arizona.
After that big win over Oklahoma State, I thought the Utes had figured out their formula without Cam Rising heading the reigns, but it looked more like the team we saw in the weeks leading up to that one. They aren’t the same without Rising. Who knows what’s going on with his health.
Arizona used its bye week following the loss to Kansas State well, and gets its inaugural Big 12 season back on track. They’ll get Texas Tech at home this week.
…
This has been Monday Musings and I’ll leave you with this – the No. 16 Cyclones will host their first white-out game on the gridiron on FOX prime time in six days going for their fifth-straight win to start the season. It’s a good time to be a Cyclone.
