AMES – It is Cy-Hawk basketball week and it begins with the No. 18 Cyclones taking on the No. 21 Hawkeyes at Carver-Hawkeye Arena at 8 p.m. Wednesday. 

The Cyclones improved to 8-2 with a win over Central Michigan on Sunday, extending the winning streak to three heading into one of the most anticipated games of the season for both players and fans. 

Iowa State trails the all-time matchup against Iowa with a 20-29 record. The Hawkeyes have dominated the past 10 years of the matchup, winning eight, including the past two. 

A year ago, Iowa State battled the Caitlin Clark-led No. 4 Hawkeyes at Hilton Coliseum and lost by nine points. Losing by less than 10 to a team led by the all-time leading scorer in Division I college basketball taught the Cyclones much about who they were as a team, especially playing with their leader, senior guard Emily Ryan.

“We had a lot of fight as a team,” sophomore forward Addy Brown said. “We hadn’t had a lot of experience yet, especially last year’s team. All the hype was around them and it was a really fun game just to see what we were made of. That’s kinda what the in-state games tell you.”

The freshman duo of Brown and Audi Crooks led the scoring in that game and both tallied a double-double. Brown talked about the experience that they lacked in the game a year ago, but they still lack experience in one aspect, playing at Iowa.

“The only one who has actually played a game there right now is Emily [Ryan], so none of us have actually been there, real life in that experience,” sophomore guard Arianna Jackson said. “I think we can all kind of get a picture of what it is supposed to be like. Definitely a tough environment, a tough game, it’s an in-state game, there’s going to be lots of excitement, lots of rivalry.”

The Hawkeyes started the season 8-0 and had jumped the Cyclones in the previous rankings. However, they most recently lost to Tennessee, a game where Iowa turned the ball over 30 times.

Iowa State will want to capitalize on the poor ball control by forcing turnovers against the Hawkeyes at a high rate, just like Tennessee did. 

“I think just applying pressure is the main thing,” Jackson said. “I think if we can have our defensive plan in place and apply pressure, do the things we need to do, we can get the stops we need to.”

Iowa State cannot totally replicate what Tennessee did because the Cyclones are composed of very different players and styles of play.

“Tennessee plays a completely different game than we do,” head coach Bill Fennelly said. “There’s things that you have to identify where you want to defend a little more aggressively. When you play on the road it changes things a little bit. Tennessee’s pressure is something we don’t do.”

Although Iowa turned the ball over at an alarming rate against the Lady Volunteers, it is not very indicative of who they are as a team. The Hawkeyes have three players averaging over 13 points per game and shoot nearly 50% as a team.

“They’re old, they’re experienced in a lot of places,” Fennelly said. “They added one of the most dynamic scorers in the country at point guard. They have winning experience, and those kids are used to winning at a very high level.”

The point guard Fennelly refers to is Lucy Olsen, a Villanova transfer. She was third in the country with 23.3 points per game a year ago and was a unanimous first-team All-Big East selection. Olsen is averaging 18.1 points per game to start the year for the Hawkeyes.

With a team that has scorers like Olsen and was in the national championship less than a year ago, the Cyclones need to be on their game. Fennelly has talked about how locked-in and on top of its game the team needs to be in order to compete in a game like this.

“We’re gonna have to do some things that we haven’t done yet,” Fennelly said. “That’s a little bit more scouting report focused on defense, gotta keep scoring, gotta make some shots. When you play a really good team on the road, you better clean some things up.”

The Cyclones will travel to Iowa City to take on the in-state rival Hawkeyes with a chance to win for the first time since 2021. The game starts at 8 p.m. Wednesday and will be televised on FS1.