As the ISU women’s team continues to roll on in conference play, one begins to wonder if they have reached the level that they were on at the end of last season.

With a few more games like Saturday’s blowout 89-66 win over Nebraska, there will be no doubt.

Using a 27-4 run in the second half to blow things open, the Cyclones moved to 12-2, including 4-0 in the conference.

Iowa State was led by Angie Welle, who scored 20 of her game-high 24 points in the decisive second half. She also grabbed eight rebounds.

“I really felt that at the start I wasn’t ready for the physical style that Nebraska was playing. But I got used to it, and in the second half I changed my game and it worked,” Welle said.

The first half was a real struggle, as Iowa State entered the intermission with a scant 33-32 lead behind Megan Taylor’s 11 points.

“I thought this was the best game Megan played all year. Her intensity and emotion I thought were very important to our team,” head coach Bill Fennelly said.

After Nicole Kubik nailed her fifth three-pointer of the game to give Nebraska a 54-51 lead with under 12 minutes to play, it appeared that this game would go down to the wire.

However, that’s when the Cyclones showed the explosiveness that was a trademark of the Elite Eight squad of a year ago.

This year, though, instead of it being a perimeter attack that buried the Huskers, it was an inside assault that spelled doom for Nebraska.

Welle had 10 of the 24 points in the run that turned a three-point deficit into a 20-point lead, and Iowa State into a bona fide well oiled machine.

There were a number of theories as to how the game got out of hand, and Kubik said that the crowd of 12,134 (third largest in ISU history) had an effect.

“Anytime you get 12,000 people cheering in your favor, it’s going to have a big effect on the game. In the run, they really got the crowd into it, and we couldn’t stop it,” Kubik said.

When a reporter asked Nebraska coach Paul Sanderford on what to do after a 27-4 run, he replied “Start the bus.”

Stacy Frese, who added 19 points, said, “We had a lot of confidence in our game plan, and we just kept working it, and eventually it paid off.”

Taylor, who finished the game with her second double-double of the season (17 points, 10 rebounds), said the run may have come down to conditioning.

“I didn’t think that I was in that great of shape, but maybe I am. We also showed a lot of patience, and got key rebounds during that time,” Taylor said.

But the main topic of discussion was Welle, who is averaging a team-high 19.8 points and 10.8 rebounds in conference play.

“She played a great game. She was running the floor well, and she really wanted the ball. She was scoring every time, so we kept giving her the ball. Makes sense to me,” Frese said.

Desire‚ Francis was also a key factor for the Cyclones, scoring 14 points in 23 minutes.

The Cyclones will travel to Oklahoma State tonight. The Cowgirls, who have won all five of their home games, are 10-5 overall.