Yet another conference loss for Iowa State, in a very heartbreaking fashion. This was their 4th conference loss in which they had either a lead or were tied with 1 minute left in regulation, and ended up losing.
Iowa State was up 85-81 with 1:00 left. Pullen knocks down a big three (he's only a 33% 3 point shooter) to make it a 1 point game. Then with 46 seconds left, the Cyclones try their pick and roll with DG and Vanderbeken, in which a floater put up by DG was no good. Pullen with 12 seconds left, takes it to the rack, gets temporarily stripped by DG, only to recover and put up the layup with 2.6 seconds left. Iowa State called a timeout, and tried the same play they did against Creighton, only to have Vanderbeken shoot off the mark.
My big question, was with Jamie catching it about 35-40 feet out, why not call a timeout? Iowa State had one left. They would have had around 1.7 seconds or so to draw up something better than a desperation shot. I thought that was a huge mistake.
Jacob Pullen showed us why he was the Big 12 preseason POY. He has his ups and downs, but he seems to thrive in those high pressure situations. Over the years, it seems like he's always knocked big shots against Iowa State.
Kansas State also got a ton of help from their bench, scoring 44 of the team's 86 points. K-State played 11 guys, and that wore down the team I think. Still though, there is no reason why the Cyclones should be allowing over 80 points a game. If we play better defense, we aren't in the position to lose these games.
I will give Iowa State some props for their effort though. They came out and played today. They have no given up, despite how rough it has gone. They have a much needed week off, before heading down to Lawrence to take on the Jayhawks.
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