Iowa State Cyclones quarterback Rocco Becht (3) celebrates with his team on the sideline during the fourth quarter in a week-4 NCAA football game at Jack Trice Stadium on Saturday, Sept. 21, 2024, in Ames, Iowa. © Nirmalendu Majumdar/Ames Tribune / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images
AMES — When the stars seemingly align early in a football season, it’s tantalizing for fans to look ahead. Wistful wishes meet flights of fancy and suddenly, daydreams alight.
For example, Iowa State (3-0) enters Saturday’s 6 p.m. (FS1) Big 12 season-opening game at Houston (1-3, 0-1) as a 13-point favorite.
The Cyclones seek their first 4-0 start in 24 years — and a panoply of possibilities accordingly arrange themselves in connect-the-dots fashion if they beat the struggling Cougars.
But therein lies the rub: The word “if.” ISU head coach Matt Campbell’s program is built on the word “now,” where a dogged commitment to details and precision dictates the nature of future scenarios, and the path to success always perilously traverses what he calls “the rough side of the mountain.”
“College football is hard,” said Campbell, who is currently tied with Dan McCarney as the Cyclones’ all-time wins leader with 56. “The mentality to sustain success, it’s hard in our business, it’s hard in your business, it’s hard in anybody’s business. And that’s why it’s hard to win. Will we, can we continue to have a winning mentality? I don’t know. You hope that you continue to pound away at the fabric of what we’ve built ourselves on and that’s really great habits every day and great focus and coming in and trying to get better, but to say you can do that, or how easy is it? It’s exhaustingly hard.”
That’s true today. It will remain true — win or lose — on Saturday. The Cyclones are 3-0 for the second time in the past three seasons, but that’s no guarantee that those stars stay aligned instead of falling from the sky. ISU started 3-0 in 2022 and proceeded to lose eight of its nine conference games, with six gut-wrenching outcomes determined by one score.
That unsavory experience isn’t lost on ISU’s sophomore starting quarterback Rocco Becht, who redshirted that season. He’s not thinking about potentially being 4-0. He’s simply utilizing every moment in practice to improve — and assisting others in the same mission.
“I actually didn’t even know about that stat,” the reigning Big 12 freshman offensive player of the year said. “I would say that we’re just going into every single week playing our game and not thinking about who’s playing us. … So, just playing our game each and every Saturday and, you know, we’ll worry about the record and the stats at the end of the year.”
Speaking of stats, ISU rates markedly better than Houston in virtually every measure. That’s one reason the Cyclones have won every game so far, while the Cougars have found ways to lose each game outside of a rout over winless Rice. Depth and talent usually win out — but a lack of focus can negate that edge quickly.
“I think last week in the Big 12 (there were) seven games and only one team won on the road,” said Campbell, who remarkably led his team to four straight conference road triumphs toward the end of last season. “Like, it’s hard. It’s hard to win football games anywhere. It’s hard to win in this conference, (and) hard to win on the road. So, it’s all (about) great lessons that you’re trying to teach and I think the one benefit that our kids do have, is we have some veterans who have been through ‘hard.’ They’re been through success and failure and hopefully have the wisdom to be able to learn from it and grow from it and be able to share that wisdom with their teammates along the way.”
So ISU’s younger players would be wise to seek the counsel of one of the team’s three permanent captains this season, senior safety Beau Freyler. He’s not gazing at the stars. He’s grounded in the grit-based work that eventually forms clusters of them.
“Just taking it one game at a time,” he said, leaning on that well-worn, but apropos cliche. “I think it’s huge to create momentum for ourselves going into Big 12 play — starting off strong. So being able to practice and prepare to put ourselves in the best possible situation for Saturday, that’s really the mindset right now.”
