Bill Fennelly

[Peter]

Those 3 numbers while Audi has played for ISU are telling and provide, by far, the biggest reason why the team hasn't been better over the past 3 seasons. Any perceived offensive issues or lack of athleticism/mobility (beyond Audi) were secondary to these defensive numbers.

Too late now given the roster attrition that has already occurred and perhaps to occur, but the only fix IMO was to play more zone to hide/cover Audi's lack of mobility (as well as improve her conditioning to be more mobile). And to successfully play zone, Bill needed a starter in the 6-2 or taller range to deploy it with Addy and Audi. Playing zone with Jada, AJ and Hare was never going to work.

This team was not well constructed and got exposed all year on D. IMO it starts with Audie giving zero ***** and just standing in the lane watching people drive to the basket. That's not a mobility thing, that's a want-to thing. I don't care if she is the nation's leading scorer. It's Bill's job to hold her to a higher standard and let her know that effort is unacceptable.

 

[Clone5]

I wanted to see how often Iowa State has actually “underachieved” under Bill Fennelly.


They’ve been ranked in the preseason AP Top 25 12 times during his tenure. In 8 of those 12 seasons, they finished lower than where they started, including 4 of the last 6 years. More concerning, those four times they fell completely out of the rankings, they opened in the top 15 twice and as high as No. 8 twice.


3 times in the last four years we have started off ranked top 14 and lost in the first round of the NCAA tournament.


To be fair, the program hasn’t just underachieved. Since 1995–96, they’ve outperformed expectations or jumped into the rankings 8 times, especially during that early-to-mid 2000s run when they consistently beat their projection. That version of Iowa State felt like it squeezed everything out of its roster. You just don’t see that as often anymore.


That’s the issue. The overall body of work is clearly strong, but since around 2021–22, the trend has slipped. And at a place like Iowa State, roster hits matter more than they do elsewhere especially now with our NIL situation. Losing impact players like Addy Brown, Donarski, Fritz, Bristow, and Feuerbach chips away at your margin for error. Add in the yearly injury issues, and depth becomes a real problem fast.


In almost every other situation all of these trends would point to major changes needing to take place urgently but I don't have much faith in Pollard to make any changes now.

Maybe if Audi stays we can manufacture 17-20 wins and have a fun last season for Bill but I don't see how that is going to happen with everyone leaving.

 

[dt82]

Low effort, lack of physical strength, not well conditioned, slow speed, slow reaction time, etc, etc.. - are all controllable variables!!! There is a direct correlation between high level athletic performance and lean body mass. Get Strong. Get Conditioned. Play Hard. Have Grit. - it's not rocket science Bill. Develop your athletes and they will want to stay!!

 

[Challenger06]

Low effort, lack of physical strength, not well conditioned, slow speed, slow reaction time, etc, etc.. - are all controllable variables!!! There is a direct correlation between high level athletic performance and lean body mass. Get Strong. Get Conditioned. Play Hard. Have Grit. - it's not rocket science Bill. Develop your athletes and they will want to stay!!

Is Addy leaving because the program isn’t “intense” enough? She and her sister Kennedy are fierce competitors.

 

[MyNameEhJeff]

Everyone's leaving because Bill is a horrible coach and staying at ISU, if he remains the HC, would mean sacrificing their careers. Can't blame any of them for leaving, they want to win, and that won't happen as long as Bill remains the HC

 

[Clonefan32]

The cost effective thing to do is to pay to keep Audi, have Comito grab 4-5 high school teammates, put them on scholarship and spend the entire summer working to perfect their post entry passes.

 

[awd4cy]

Two things can both be true:

• Iowa State women's basketball was a laughingstock until Bill came in the '90s, and he deserves a statue on campus for how he raised it out of nothing into something respectable.
• He is probably not the right person to be leading the program today.

Lol, bill hasn’t had near enough success for a statue.

 

[Clonefan32]

At a minimum can we get some staff change? I’m really unclear what any of them do.

 

[CycloneDaddy]

At a minimum can we get some staff change? I’m really unclear what any of them do.

No asst coach is going to come to ISU for 1 year.

 

[psycln11]

Bill won't retire early because he's bu##-hurt that JP hasn't named Billy the heirapparent.

He'll let his legacy burn instead.

 

[CyDude16]

As a casual Iowa State wbb fan, that still watches more ISU games than the “diehard” Iowa wbb fan, it’s time for Bill to hang it up. He’s been an amazing coach and ambassador for the university and deserves a statue, but it is time.

 

[CyDude16]

Lol, bill hasn’t had near enough success for a statue.

Compared to what the program was when he started? I think it could be warranted he deserves one.

 

[Jnecker4cy]

you're right, thank goodness I dont settle for vastly underperforming

Do you even watch women's games on a regular basis? Are you a season ticket holder?

 

[SerenityNow]

Two things can both be true:

• Iowa State women's basketball was a laughingstock until Bill came in the '90s, and he deserves a statue on campus for how he raised it out of nothing into something respectable.
• He is probably not the right person to be leading the program today.

This sums up my thoughts exactly. Well said.

 

[NWICY]

Lol, bill hasn’t had near enough success for a statue.

Agree with that but he will get a banner in Hilton.

 

[ZorkClone]

Agree with that but he will get a banner in Hilton.

I dunno what Bill did was at least on par with Johnny.

 

[NWICY]

I dunno what Bill did was at least on par with Johnny.

He has never had the charisma of Johnny IMO. But as far as creating a program I agree with you. Those late 90s early 00 years were peak ISU WBB from both attendance (actual butts in the seats) and results wise.
Personally I'm good with a banner if someone funds a statue I won't argue.

 

[IceCyIce]

If they played defense like the men's teams, we would have won this conference every year. We are like in the top 10-20 in offense every year. If we could even get to the top 50 of defense it would have been a game changer.

So were having the same conversation here that Iowa was having with Fran McCaffery

 

[Clone5]

So were having the same conversation here that Iowa was having with Fran McCaffery

Our defenses under Bill were usually statistically better especially the last few years of Fran’s tenure when he only wanted to play his sons, Sandforts and similar players. Fran actually started off his tenure with some decent defenses somehow.

 

[CYdTracked]

I wanted to see how often Iowa State has actually “underachieved” under Bill Fennelly.


They’ve been ranked in the preseason AP Top 25 12 times during his tenure. In 8 of those 12 seasons, they finished lower than where they started, including 4 of the last 6 years. More concerning, those four times they fell completely out of the rankings, they opened in the top 15 twice and as high as No. 8 twice.


3 times in the last four years we have started off ranked top 14 and lost in the first round of the NCAA tournament.


To be fair, the program hasn’t just underachieved. Since 1995–96, they’ve outperformed expectations or jumped into the rankings 8 times, especially during that early-to-mid 2000s run when they consistently beat their projection. That version of Iowa State felt like it squeezed everything out of its roster. You just don’t see that as often anymore.


That’s the issue. The overall body of work is clearly strong, but since around 2021–22, the trend has slipped. And at a place like Iowa State, roster hits matter more than they do elsewhere especially now with our NIL situation. Losing impact players like Addy Brown, Donarski, Fritz, Bristow, and Feuerbach chips away at your margin for error. Add in the yearly injury issues, and depth becomes a real problem fast.


In almost every other situation all of these trends would point to major changes needing to take place urgently but I don't have much faith in Pollard to make any changes now.

Maybe if Audi stays we can manufacture 17-20 wins and have a fun last season for Bill but I don't see how that is going to happen with everyone leaving.

I'm definitely leaning towards "Bill it's time to retire now" if we lose Audi. I just don't see how you can rebuild any kind of competitive team without her and AJ at this point. We're already facing a massive reload situation right now, losing Audi would be a complete rebuild and there is no point doing that with Bill at this point because there is no long-term plan with him. The coach in waiting is not on this current staff, they are just as responsible for this as Bill is. And I don't see Bill getting rid of 1 or more assistants to allow Pollard to seek out a "coach in waiting" situation to bring onto his staff that may bring a few of their players with them too if we hired them. The next HC at ISU is not going to retain anyone on this staff at this point.

As for your statement of "Losing impact players like Addy Brown, Donarski, Fritz, Bristow, and Feuerbach" let's review how well that worked out for all of them. TBD for Brown but she is by far the highest profile player we've lost now. Donarski played on some good UNC teams but statistically she wasn't even as good as she was in her 3 years at ISU although they weren't huge drop off in numbers she definitely did not take a step forward statistically by transferring. I want to laugh at the mention of Fritz as she is the poster child for the grass is not always greener. Her best season was her first full season with ISU when she started 31 games and averaged 31.1 minutes a game. She went to Baylor where she was an afterthought on their bench at just 8.2 mpg, then went to TT and still never achieved the level she played at ISU. She was in line to take on a bigger role when Donarski transferred so I always find that odd why she didn't stick around another year. Bristow played less her first season at TT than she did her freshman year at ISU but she did take a nice step forward this season. Not sure she would have cracked our starting lineup because of Audi and Addy but I would not consider her a huge loss by any means. Feurbach did do much off the bench her 1st 2 years at Iowa but has been a good role player for them as a starter the last 2 season. Statistically she doesn't put up anything special.

Outside of that bunch of players I can't even really name you any players that left that I would say "I wish they had stayed" as most of them went to smaller schools and haven't done much of note. I guess you can look at the Joens sisters that left as another exhibit, Kelsey's stats and minutes are almost identical to her 2 years at ISU and Aubrey never started a game at Oklahoma. Her last season she only played 5.6 MPG. If it was a playing time or coaching or scheme issue then why didn't any of these players take a big step forward in production at their next stop(s)? I'm not giving Bill and his staff a free pass either as he recruited them and got first crack at their development. I'm curious if there were other toxic issues going on beyond possible issues with the staff for some of these to leave. We've heard some rumblings that the locker room may have become toxic this season which amazes me because I have seen this group of players off the court and they seemed like a tight knit bunch in public so it's just bizarre how quickly this thing unraveled.