The Cyclones came up short on Saturday in their aim for the rare football — women’s basketball — men’s basketball season sweep over Iowa, falling 74-54.

After hanging with the Hawkeyes during the first half, despite committing 11 turnovers, Iowa State couldn’t maintain its focus for the second 20 minutes.

In a scrappy, physical game that would see Cyclone post players Martin Rancik and Klay Edwards in constant foul trouble, not to mention the benching of star forward Marcus Fizer, Iowa State couldn’t match up against an Iowa squad still high after defeating Kansas just days earlier.

Coach Larry Eustachy attributed the loss to a highly-talented Hawkeye team and his own team’s lack of toughness.

“We really collapsed in the second half,” Eustachy said. “Iowa was the much tougher team, both mentally and physically.”

Iowa jumped out to a quick 15-5 lead, aided largely by constant Cyclone turnovers.

The Iowa State defense, however, stifled the Hawkeyes early, forcing a halftime field goal percentage of .357 and a three-point percentage of .125.

This defense, coupled with hot Cyclone shooting, were the only things that made the game as close at is was at the half, with Iowa leading 26-22.

Iowa State hit on over 52 percent of its first-half shots, including four of five attempts from behind the three-point stripe.

The feeling for Cyclone fans at the break, however, was one of frightened anticipation.

Iowa State, as a team, does not shoot .529 from the field, and they certainly don’t shoot .800 from three-point range, so maintaining their percentages was going to be hard.

In addition, the Cyclones had been badly outrebounded in the first half, and Fizer had been held scoreless.

Iowa State came out of the locker room intent on putting together some consistent offense, obviously a strategy to be spearheaded by Fizer, who took the team’s first three shots.

The 6-8 sophomore had been frustrated all day by the physical inside play of Iowa’s Jacob Jaacks, J.R. Koch and Guy Rucker.

With 15:15 remaining in the game, Fizer and Jaacks became entangled after a whistle and Fizer gave his opponent an obvious shove. The resulting technical foul bought Fizer a benching for the remainder of the game.

“I don’t believe in players getting technical fouls,” Eustachy said after the game. “Coaches get technicals, not players.”

Eustachy went on to say that Fizer had just suffered a disappointing evening.

“It was not his night,” Eustachy said. “He got frustrated, so we called it an early night for him.”

After the game, Fizer saw the situation a little differently than the official on the scene.

“We got mixed up down low while going for a rebound,” Fizer explained. “He came down on top of me after the play and he was still on me, so I was trying to get him off. That’s when the referee called the technical.”

Without Fizer, and with Rancik and Edwards rotating after each picked up an early fourth foul, the Cyclones could not contend with the Hawkeyes down low in a very physical game.

Iowa exploded out of the gates in the second half and consistently built its lead until the final buzzer.

Michael Nurse led the Cyclones with 14 points, 10 of which led to the Cyclone comeback in the first half.

Lee Love was one of few bright spots for Iowa State, contributing 11 points on four-for-five shooting, including hitting all three of his long-distance attempts.

Eustachy referred to Love as one of his only players who did not seem to play afraid.

Fizer’s four first-half rebounds led the Cyclones for the game, as Iowa State was beaten badly on the glass, 31-18.

Nurse put into words the feelings of his team’s frustration after the game.

“We got our butts kicked. We didn’t compete,” he said. “That wasn’t Iowa State out there. That was somebody else. We were too soft. They basically ran us off the court.”

Eustachy noted the obvious after the game — a team’s opponent and their location will have a lot to do with the game’s outcome.

“If we would have come here and played a local high school team, maybe we would have played better,” Eustachy said. “Maybe not.”