Updated at 9:50 p.m. CST Dec. 27

SHREVEPORT, La. — Cyclone fans gathered downtown here Monday night to cheer on their football team on the eve of a bowl game.

Just like always.

“The more hardcore fans are here,” said William Yungclas, himself something of a hardcore fan, better known to ISU women’s basketball rooters as “Wild Bill.”

Iowa State (6-5) played in the Independence Bowl here in Shreveport just three years ago. The Cyclones’ last game in 2004 was a blow to the gut, an overtime loss to Missouri that kept Iowa State from taking a shot at a conference title and a Bowl Championship Series berth.

Those factors were supposed to keep down the numbers of cardinal-and-gold-clad to trek south. Jeff Johnson, president of the ISU Alumni Association, said that number of people who showed for the spirit rally (2,500 by an Alumni Association estimate) proved that Iowa State’s bowl travel is quite healthy.

“We’ve never been disappointed once we got on site,” he said, adding that the Alumni Association sold out its travel packages to the game.

“We’re not surprised. We’re just excited.”

John Walters, ISU radio play-by-play announcer, eyed the crowd at the start of Monday’s rally and yelled, “So much for the pathetic turnout!” before yielding to a succession of ISU dignitaries reminding receptive fans that this is Iowa State’s fourth bowl game in the past five years.

Carrol Schwaderer of Ankeny, who graduated from Iowa State in 1960, said this was his second trip out of those four opportunities. He attended the Insight.com Bowl in Phoenix in 2000 but didn’t make it to Shreveport in 2001 or the Humanitarian Bowl in Boise, Idaho, in 2002.

“I just wanted to come,” he said. “I didn’t want to go to Boise.”

So what about that Missouri game, which Iowa State had multiple opportunities to win and earn a showdown against Oklahoma for the Big 12 title?

Schwaderer said it didn’t bother him that much.

“I’m happy with it,” he said. “Let Colorado go down there and be embarrassed.”

The Cyclones just might still win a Big 12 North division soon, he said.

“I think they got a better chance next year,” he said.

ISU head coach Dan McCarney said he was proud of Iowa State’s status as “one of the most improved teams in America” after a 2-10 campaign in 2003.

“No one outside this football family thought we’d be standing here tonight, and here we are,” he said.

Well, maybe no one except Wild Bill.

“I start every season thinking we’re going to be 14-0,” he said. “I always predict we’re going to win.”

For his part, Yungclas said the final two weeks of the regular season were the highest and lowest of times for a Cyclone fan.

“I was literally in tears during that Kansas State game,” he said, referring to Iowa State’s 28-point fourth-quarter outburst and 37-23 conquest of the Wildcats in Manhattan on Nov. 20.

Then the Cyclones hosted Missouri.

“That was about one of the toughest losses I’ve ever taken in my life,” he said. “All we needed was for that ball to be two inches over …”

Yungclas said he thought the bowl turnout likely would have been better if Iowa State had gone to a “new” location instead of a 2001 retread.

Iowa State takes on Miami of Ohio at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday.

After that, despite temperatures in the 60s and Shreveport hospitality, Yungclas is jumping town, and fast.

“There’s a women’s game Wednesday night at 8 o’clock,” he said.