Marcus Jefferson left the ISU men’s basketball team last Thursday to be with his sick mother in Chicago and didn’t see his teammates, or even think about basketball for that matter, until late in the day on Tuesday.

“He walked in, it was like everything stopped, everybody went and hugged,” Tim Barnes said about Jefferson’s arrival. “We knew we had to pull it out for him.”

His presence proved to be a key factor in Iowa State’s 81-55 triumph over Colorado, as he came off the bench with a burst of energy that ignited his team, his coaches and Hilton Coliseum.

“It was great. He played maybe his best game of the year, that’s the amazing part,” Jake Sullivan said. “It was just a great performance, and you get that off the bench that’s a huge help. It keeps everyone fresh.”

Jefferson played 23 minutes and scored 13 points on 4-of-6 shooting from the field and drained five of six from the charity stripe.

“I thought it was huge,” head coach Larry Eustachy said. “The team was really happy that he was back. I just told him, ‘We couldn’t have done it without him,’ I thought he gave us a huge lift.”

Along with the scoring, Jefferson was a magnet for loose balls. He grabbed four rebounds and had a team-high three steals along with one blocked shot. He also played sound defense as his team held Colorado to just 31 percent shooting on the night.

“He’s one of our best defenders, if not our best defender, and we needed him to stay on [Michel] Morandais tonight and he did a great job,” Jackson Vroman said. “He meant a whole lot. He’s been really facing some adversity this last week and it was amazing to see him not practice with us this week and come in and play that well.”

“I wasn’t nervous at all; I just felt comfortable,” Jefferson said. “After seeing the things I’ve seen the last couple days and having my health, I’m real thankful so I felt I might as well go out and play to the best of my ability and do all I can to make my team win. God deals us many things, he doesn’t give us nothing we can’t deal with so I’m dealing with it, that’s all I can do.”