Iowa State Cyclones head coach Matt Campbell high-fives fans as he takes the field with his team before the game against Iowa at Jack Trice Stadium on Sept. 6, 2025, in Ames, Iowa. © Nirmalendu Majumdar/Ames Tribune / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images
AMES — “Keep it simple.”
If there’s one overarching mandate among Iowa State head coach Matt Campbell’s staff, this is it.
Scheme matters. The playbook’s deep and diverse. But from moment to moment, Campbell wants his players to mine their inner football IQ, melding it with instinct to play with a free and fast sense of abandon. It’s not mindless. It’s fully repped and unfiltered mindfulness that produces clarity in a variety of situations.
“I just like to have fun,” said sophomore wide receiver Brett Eskildsen, who hopes to continue to produce big plays in the passing game when the No. 14 Cyclones face Arkansas State at 3 p.m. Saturday (ESPN2) in Jonesboro, Ark. “It’s a child’s game at the end of the day.”
That’s why Campbell urges his players to approach their individual journeys to mastering the game with a child-like sense of curiosity. He stresses finding the “why” — and occasionally, asking, “why not?” It’s a strategy that led to a program-record 11 wins last season and has the Cyclones on track to enter its first bye week this season with a 4-0 mark.
“We knew the physical and mental challenges that would come with, you know, in my mind, we’re in the second quarter of our football season as we looked at our calendar,” said Campbell, whose team is a 21-point favorite against the host Red Wolves (1-1). “What would the challenges be last week (in the 16-13 win over Iowa)? What would the challenges be with this week? And not even from an opponent standpoint, (but) more so internally.”
So the plan is not to overthink. Gazing either at the past or an imagined future becomes the enemy. Focus on football and nothing else — the day-to-day study that leads to that aforementioned free and fast play on Saturdays.
“I’d say it’s instincts,” said sophomore safety Marcus Neal, the Cyclones’ leading tackler with 22 stops. “Just, like, trying to get to the ball and make plays and just doing your job. The coaches try to put you in spots to make plays. You’ve just gotta go make (them).”
Sounds simple, right? It is and it isn’t. Understanding “situational football” helps eliminate guessing games and keeps instinctual play front and center.
Case in point: Yale graduate transfer Tamatoa McDonough’s back-to-back sacks that helped seal ISU’s first Cy-Hawk win since 2011 last Saturday. Scheme didn’t necessarily allow him to get to the quarterback when it mattered most. His familiarity with the situation — via practice reps and his innate skills — made that happen.
“We knew it was gonna be a passing situation,” said the 6-5, 265-pound McDonough, who’s seeking a graduate certificate with ISU’s entrepreneurship and innovation program. “They needed to get down the field, so they just sent us out there with the mindset of, ‘Go get after the quarterback,’ and on the back end, they had good coverage, so it gave us the time to get home.”
Sounds simple, right? It is — and notice how McDonough said “us” and not “me.” He echoed Neal in noting that producing big plays came as a matter of course. He simply “did his job” and trusted that would be enough.
“This has always been my dream to be at this level,” McDonough said. “There are so many resources here, so there are no excuses that I could have on my end to not perform.”
Now ISU’s simple approach will be tested by extreme heat and an Arkansas State opponent that would love to spring a shocking upset on the top-15 Cyclones. It doesn’t take an Ivy League education to know that a lack of focus could lead to a too-close-for-comfort situation. That’s why Campbell preps his team to fail as much as possible in fall camp — and dispassionately dissect what went wrong to help identify simple solutions.
“I do appreciate our leadership’s curiosity,” Campbell said during fall camp. “I think they’re echoing a lot of the same messages that (I) and our staff are, and the biggest thing is, not only are they echoing it, they’re showing that in their actions — at least so far.”
