Fighting off second-half struggles yet again, the Cyclones (6–2) lost a back-and-forth battle with in-state rival Northern Iowa (5–1) at Hilton Coliseum on Wednesday, falling 63–60.

The game saw a frenzied finish between the two tightly connected schools, and the outcome was still up in the air until ISU forward Craig Brackins’ prayer from outside the 3-point line with two sets of hands in his face clanged off the underside of the rim. Unfortunately for the Cyclones, this is their second straight loss by one basket, but ISU coach Greg McDermott doesn’t attribute the loss to any one play in the exciting contest.

“It was pretty obvious to anybody that watched the game that Northern Iowa was the tougher team,” McDermott said. “That’s disheartening.”

With 6:21 left in the ballgame, the Cyclones held a 57–52 advantage over the visiting Panthers, but the road team worked its way back. With a one-point lead and less than 50 seconds to play, the Cyclones started a possession that could have put the game away. Instead, leading scorer and point guard Diante Garrett passed to forward LaRon Dendy, who — in his third game in action for the Cyclones — popped up a mid-range jump shot early in the shot clock and gave the Panthers the ball.

UNI guard Ali Farokhmanesh knocked down a 3-pointer on the opposite side of the floor just seven seconds after the miss, and the Panthers didn’t trail again.

Calling this one an interesting finish might be a bit of an understatement.

“This team doesn’t know how to win yet,” McDermott said. “We have to make better decisions on offense, we need to be a little tougher on defense and I think we have to compete harder.”

McDermott now falls to 1–3 against his alma mater and former employer, but current UNI coach and former McDermott-assistant Ben Jacobson isn’t gloating about knocking off his former boss.

“I don’t like it. I like it from the fact that our guys played hard —but if you take the conversation to the two of us, I don’t like it,” Jacobson said.

Rebounding set the tone for this one, as the Cyclones were beat on the glass 38–31 overall, and allowed a season-high 15 offensive rebounds.

“I thought our guys did a good job of digging and coming up with a couple stops,” Jacobson said.” There are things we talk about every basketball game: We’ve got to defend, we’ve got to rebound and play with a lot of toughness.

“That was our best 40 minutes of basketball this year — as you saw, we needed every bit of it on both ends of the floor.”

Northern Iowa was paced by both Jordan Eglseder and Adam Koch, a center and forward duo that each scored 20 points on the Cyclones.

Eglseder managed to dominate the paint for the Panthers, as the 7-foot, 280-pound senior finished with 20 points and 14 rebounds, including seven on the offensive glass. The effort came on just 9-of-21 shooting, but the senior was the difference in the middle of the floor.

“It was a big step forward for [Eglseder] — there have been times where he allows a couple missed shots to get to him,” Jacobson said. “He feels like he’s letting our team down and that bothers him, and tonight he stepped up.”

Brackins, Lucca Staiger and Marquis Gilstrap were non-existent for long stretches of the ball game, and the Cyclones three leading scorers scored a combined six points in the second half. Gilstrap was the only one of the trio to make a field goal attempt in the latter period, as Staiger was locked up defensively and Brackins faced an endless stream of pressure.

“It seemed like whenever I caught the ball … they’d come form the guard side,” Brackins said. “A couple times they brought big to big. They just played hard defense.

“Those are some plays that you wish you could have back.”

McDermott came into the ballgame wanting to return to the quick tempo his team had embraced early in the year, but against Northern Iowa, the Cyclones came away with zero fast break points, a sign that pointed to success for the half-court oriented Panthers. Even in the half court, though, Iowa State struggled to find its leaders, leaving Brackins out of much of the offense in the second half.

“Coach Jacobson wasn’t born last night. He knows how important Craig is to our team,” McDermott said. “I thought we missed him some, but there were times Craig could’ve worked harder to get it. It’s tough to ask him to do more than he is doing.”

Wrapped up in a tight one against the second in-state opponent of the year, the crowd of 14,376 at Hilton Coliseum was on its feet for the last three minutes of the game.

Close throughout, the largest lead of the game for either team was nine points, and the contest included five ties and eight lead changes.

“I’m disappointed we lost at home,” McDermott said. “Our fans were fantastic. They tried to jump-start us several times, but we just couldn’t sustain it.”

Iowa State and Northern Iowa have traded road victories the last two seasons, and the Cyclones had a chance — for the second straight game — to tie it in the final ticks. The last shot didn’t fall, but even Jacobson wasn’t sure which way the game would end.

“I just hoped they didn’t make it,” Jacobson grinned.

The Cyclones are now 1–1 in their quest for the “state championship” of Iowa, but face another tough test  Saturday, heading west to take on California. The game tips off at 10 p.m. CST from Berkeley, Calif.