MANHATTAN, Kan. — The women’s basketball teams of Iowa State and Kansas State both live and die by the three-pointer.

On Sunday afternoon in Brambage Coliseum, the Wildcat sharpshooters were the only ones left standing.

Plagued by 37.9 percent field-goal and 27.3 percent three-point shooting, the Cyclones fell to Kansas State 69-63, dropping to 18-4 overall and 9-2 in conference.

“Obviously, I am very disappointed in how we played,” said head coach Bill Fennelly. “Our perimeter game has been the strength of our team for a long time, and tonight it wasn’t.”

The Cyclones fell behind by as many as 13 in the first 10 minutes of the game, making only three of their first 14 shots.

“We dug ourselves a hole early, and we spent the whole day digging out of it,” Fennelly said.

In the second half, the Cyclones, led by Desiree Francis and Angie Welle, battled back to take their first lead since scoring the first bucket of the game.

With 5:22 left in the game, Francis hit one jumper to tie the score and another at 4:35 to put Iowa State up 60-58.

Iowa State stretched the lead to 63-59 on a Welle free throw and another Francis jumper. But at the two-minute mark, the momentum shifted back to the Wildcats.

After guard Stacy Frese missed a three-point attempt, Francis tipped an errant Kansas State pass into the open arms of Wildcat Kim Woodlee.

Woodlee hit the open baseline jumper to spark a 10-0 run, and the Cyclones never scored again.

The Cyclones missed five shots in the last 2:30, and Kansas State hit two jumpers and six of eight free throws to ice the game.

“We really had trouble making shots,” Fennelly said. “They made some big ones at big times, and we didn’t.”

Francis led all scorers with 20 points. Kristin Rethman had 15, and Woodlee finished with 12 to pace the Wildcats.

Welle, who recorded her eighth double-double of the season, was the only other Cyclone to score in double figures.

“Our posts obviously kept us in the game today,” Frese said.

The Wildcat defense held Frese to just three points on 1 of 13 shooting, her lowest total since scoring only two points against Western Michigan on Dec. 20. “Their defense, the way they change it up a lot they match up pretty well,” Frese said. “They make it tough.”

Fennelly said a lack of motion on offense and missing rotations on defense contributed more to the loss than just Frese’s low point tally.

“It is tough for us to win when Stacy gets three points, but that is when you have to get it from different places,” he said.

During the teams’ previous meeting in Ames on Jan. 25, a 64-61 ISU win, the Kansas State defense also wreaked havoc on Cyclone shooting, as Iowa State shot 36.8 percent from the floor and 29 percent from behind the arc.

“There’s nothing special about the way we play Iowa State,” said Wildcat head coach Deb Patterson. “I don’t know that we have a secret.”

After falling behind 19-6 with just over 10 minutes to play in the first half, the Cyclones went on an 8-0 run and ended the half down only two points at 31-29.

Eight seconds into the second half, Megan Taylor hit a lay-up to tie the score at 31-31, but the Wildcats, powered by 54 percent three-point shooting, took over. Kansas State led by as many as eight before the Cyclones tied the score at 58.

Patterson, who’s team is ninth in the Big 12 Conference with records of 10-14 and 4-7, said the Wildcats knew they would have to step up to beat the Cyclones.

“You have to have balance to beat Iowa State,” she said. “When you play Iowa State, you are playing a team that plays a very cerebral type of basketball.

“Coach Fennelly, in my mind, is one of the premier coaches to have ever coached the game,” Patterson said. “You just feel like you’re going into a room with a chess board. Fennelly is like Kasparov; he’s not like the computer.”