Slow starts have been killing the ISU men’s basketball team all season.

So when Colorado jumped out to a 14-point first-half lead, it looked like game, set and match for the Cyclones.

Except this time the Cyclones clawed back, taking Colorado’s punches before delivering a knockout blow of their own.

Trailing all game, Iowa State took its first lead with just 2:36 to play when Wesley Johnson collected a loose ball from under the basket and took it straight up to the hoop to give the Cyclones a 53-51 lead.

Both teams scored one more basket, and Iowa State didn’t let Colorado star Richard Roby free as time expired, escaping with a 55-53 win.

It wasn’t pretty – not that looks matter to ISU coach Greg McDermott.

“I take satisfaction out of any win,” McDermott said. “Our guys play with a lot of heart. The one thing we do do, we don’t quit.”

Colorado had lost its last 11 Big 12 road games coming into Wednesday’s contest, dating back to last season.

Not only had it lost those games, it had been blown out.

In their six conference losses this season, the Buffaloes’ average margin of defeat was a whopping 20 points.

It looked like Colorado would snap that streak as it built a huge first-half advantage.

Iowa State was playing so poorly in the first half that McDermott benched Jiri Hubalek and Mike Taylor for an extended period.

It took the Cyclones more than four minutes to connect on their first field goal as Colorado built its lead.

With Taylor and Hubalek both off their game and in foul trouble, McDermott turned to his second string for a spark – which they provided.

With Mark Currie, Ross Marsden, Cory Johnson and Corey McIntosh on the floor, the Cyclones went on a 9-0 run to close the half, cutting the Colorado lead to four.

The reserves played so well that McDermott was prepared to start that same lineup after half.

“I told the guys at halftime, the starters have about two minutes to show me that they were going to play or we were going to go back with that group that did such a great job at the end of the half,” McDermott said.

“I really credit that group because I’m not sure, had we not gotten in foul trouble, that we would have won this game. [The reserves] were ready when their number was called.”

Not only did Iowa State get the win, McDermott got that extra scorer he has been searching for all season.

McIntosh, who came into the game averaging just 3.7 points per game, came up huge, scoring a career high 13 points to lead the Cyclones.

He hit a 3 in the closing seconds of the first half and hit two more coming down the stretch in the second.

“Someone has to step up, it could be me, it could be Rahshon [Clark], it just depends on who has the right looks at the right time,” McIntosh said. “Today it happened to be me.”

The win moves the Cyclones to 5-8 in the Big 12 and back to over .500 overall with a 14-13 mark.

The game also proved another point – and Missouri can attest to this – Iowa State is never out of a game.

“We never felt like we were out of this,” Taylor said. “We’ve been down before, we’ve been down big before. We came back and we fought back.”