CEDAR RAPIDS — Three years ago, Iowa State offered its fans a popular, familiar face as the new men’s basketball coach, and a blank slate beyond that. How would Fred Hoiberg, who had never coached at any level, be able to swim with the sharks of the Big 12 Conference and the rest of major-college [...]

If Iowa State men’s basketball coach Fred Hoiberg chooses to opt out of his recent 10 year/$20 million contract, he’ll forfeit a lot less money if he leaves to join an NBA team. Exactly $1.5 million less. Iowa State released details of Hoiberg’s contract — reworked in late March — this week. His buyout clauses [...]

AMES — Iowa State shooting star Tyrus McGee will let it fly anywhere, against anyone. Notre Dame? Sure. At Dayton, Ohio? That’s the plan. “Certain people wanted different locations but I really don’t care,” said McGee, the Big 12’s sixth man of the year. “I didn’t really care who we’d face. I just want to [...]

KANSAS CITY — How tough an out could Iowa State be in the early stages of the NCAA Tournament? So tough that Kansas coach Bill Self drew his only two technical fouls of the season against the Cyclones — including one in the Jayhawks’ dominant 88-73 Big 12 Championship semifinal win Friday at the Sprint [...]

AMES — Will Clyburn’s key corner 3-pointer helped quash an Oklahoma State run, but who’d made the pass? “I don’t know who it was that found me,” the Iowa State guard/forward started to say. Then teammate, roommate and fellow senior Korie Lucious raised his hand to laughter. “I just wanted to stay aggressive, try to [...]

AMES — You could write a book about Monday night’s Kansas-Iowa State basketball game. What did it lack? It had start-to-finish, wall-to-wall intensity on the court, on the sideline, and in every row of sold-out Hilton Coliseum that often sounded like a locomotive with 14,376 lungs. It had plot twist after plot twist. It had [...]

AMES — As Kansas’ Ben McLemore released the shot, a pleasant thought crossed Iowa State point guard Korie Lucious’s mind. “I was, like, ‘That’s off,’” said Lucious, who saw happiness turn to horror as the basketball smacked the the glass and found the bottom of the net, forcing overtime in the ninth-ranked Jayhawks’ eventual 97-89 [...]

AMES — Statistics told the grim tale of Iowa State’s early-Big 12 season loss at Texas Tech. The Cyclones snared a season-low three offensive rebounds. They eked out an also season-low 51 points. They only made six 3-pointers in 23 tries. “I think it was our worst game,” ISU guard Tyrus McGee said. Ancient history? [...]

AMES — Iowa State has a solution to its one-game turnover outburst of 20 that helped lead to Saturday’s 79-70 loss at No. 13 Kansas State. It’s found in three familiar little, but significant words: Simple. Easy. Plays. “Whenever you have that many turnovers on the road, you can’t really win that way,” said Cyclone [...]

AMES — Dazzling dunks? Check. Torrid early 3-point shooting? Affirmative. A Big 12 beatdown? And how. Iowa State tore into Oklahoma early Monday and kept digging, burying the suddenly reeling Sooners 83-64 before a late-arriving crowd of 13,178 at Hilton Coliseum. “We just wanted to keep playing, staying aggressive,” said Cyclone senior Will Clyburn, who [...]