When Dan McCarney was interviewed for the Iowa State football coach position last year, athletic director Gene Smith never mentioned the possibility of him facing four Top 10 teams in his first season.

“What’s life without a few challenges? This is the fourth Top 10 in the last five weeks,” McCarney joked at his weekly press conference on Tuesday. “No, that never came up in the interview, not one time did Gene ever mention that.”

The Cyclones take on seventh-ranked Kansas State this Saturday in ISU’s last home game of the season. The Wildcats are coming off consecutive routs of ranked teams. Kansas State, which boasts the nation’s top defense, dismantled then No. 6 Kansas, 41-7, and then No. 25 Oklahoma, 49-10, last week to improve to 8-1 overall. Their only loss of the season was to No. 1 Nebraska at Lincoln on Oct. 21.

“The most striking thing about their season to me is in the last two weeks when they’ve taken Kansas and Oklahoma back-to-back beating them 90-17 combined,” McCarney said. “They’ve blown them both out of the ball park.”

McCarney said Kansas State’s defense is one of the reasons they have succeeded.

“They really are an outstanding defense. Twelve points a game going into the 10th game of the season is all they’ve given up,” he said.

The Cyclones’ last major upset occurred against Kansas State at Cyclone Stadium on Nov. 6, 1993. The Wildcats were ranked 18th at the time.

“Our last upset over Nebraska was here in this stadium, and it didn’t help us much over in Lincoln Saturday,” McCarney said.

Iowa State suffered its worst loss ever, 73-14, to Nebraska last week.

“We’re going to have to re-group, and we’re going to have to work really hard because they’re a very good team,” offensive tackle Byron Heitz said. “I’ve seen no chinks in their armor. They’re a very solid team.”

Heitz, one of nine seniors on the team, said he hasn’t really thought about his last home game as a Cyclone, but that might change on Saturday.

“I say now that I probably won’t get emotional or anything, but once the time comes I probably will,” he said.

“I talked to the seniors individually. We’ve only got nine of them, eight of them are playing,” McCarney said. “They’re really excited about this game this week. They’re really excited about their last home appearance.”

Another ISU player who is happy to be playing at home is sophomore running back Troy Davis. The nation’s leading rusher did not receive a warm welcome at Nebraska last week.

“I saw all of these red shirts and every time I’d go back for a kickoff return, somebody just behind me would say, ‘Troy, you’re sorry, you’re sorry, Troy. Why don’t you go back home?'” Davis said. “I never heard that before.

“They’ll be behind me now supporting me, and they can call someone else sorry this week on the Kansas State team.”

McCarney said junior quarterback Todd Doxzon is still not 100 percent, but may be able to play Saturday. Freshman Todd Bandhauer has filled in well starting the last two games and throwing 20 completions on 37 attempts for 253 yards and four touchdowns.

“We’ll go with the quarterback that gives us the best chance to win the game Saturday. We’ll take a real good look at both of them,” McCarney said.

“Bandhauer is still stepping in there and playing with the maturity level way beyond his age. I’m very proud of him, and I’m very excited about the future of Todd Bandhauer, but Doxzon has been our starting quarterback. If he can ever get healthy and get back in there, he can give us some things Todd Bandhauer can’t.”