On Sunday, Iowa State hosted North Dakota at home in its first game since losing 73-70 against Iowa on the road.

“You always wonder how teams are going to react,” said coach Bill Fennelly. “I do think players move on really quickly from wins or losses, but I think obviously [the Iowa] game was different.”

The reaction from Iowa State was a strong first half, which allowed Iowa State to thrash the Fighting Hawks 87-35.

Iowa State dominated the turnover battle. North Dakota had 22 total turnovers with 13 of those turnovers came from Iowa State steals. Bridget Carleton registered a game-high seven steals — a career high.

During the game, Carleton said she was tasked with guarding North Dakota’s best player: Lexi Klabo. Klabo has been averaging 21.1 points per game this season.

With Carleton matched up against her, Klabo was held to six points on five shot attempts. Klabo was 0-2 shooting in the first quarter and didn’t shoot once in the second quarter with Carleton guarding her. All of Klabo’s field goals came in the third quarter.

“When I’m guarding their best player, I want to be able to do whatever I can to keep it out of her hands — not let her get the look she wants to get,” Carleton said. “I take that as a challenge.”

After the game, Fennelly said Carleton asked him for the opportunity to guard Klabo.

Carleton also led all scorers with 18 points and added seven rebounds.

After losing to Iowa State, North Dakota fell to 2-7 while Iowa State improved its record to 7-2.

Coming into the game, the Cyclones had been shooting an average percentage of 44.6 percent, while holding their opponents to a shooting percentage of 34.1 percent. On the other hand, North Dakota had been averaging a shooting percentage of 37 percent and holding other teams to 39.7 percent.

In addition, the Fighting Hawks had been terrible at turning the ball over, averaging 19.4 turnovers a game and allowing an average of 20.5 points scored off of those turnovers.

Because of its average shooting percentage and poor turnover margins, North Dakota had been averaging 57.8 points per game. Iowa State had a scoring average of 77.7.

Iowa State’s first half performance was nothing short of dominant as the Cyclones led 52-13 at half.

Burkhall said the team was able to score so well by being engaged offensively and pushing the ball up the court off rebounds and turnovers.

Iowa State was able to build such a large lead behind a strong first quarter and a second quarter where Iowa State outscored North Dakota 26-4.

In the quarter, Iowa State scored 12 points off seven Fighting Hawks’ turnovers. Iowa State had one turnover in the quarter.

Carleton said the team did a good job of being active on defense by deflecting balls and getting into North Dakota’s passing lanes.

North Dakota’s four points came from a shot from Julia Fleecs with 5:35 seconds left in the quarter to make the score 38-11. With 42 seconds left, Alaina Jarnot hit a two-point shot to make the score 50-13.

With the score so large at half time, Fennelly was able to rest most of his starters for the majority of the second half.

Carleton played four minutes in the second half, Alexa Middleton played three minutes and freshman Ashley Joens didn’t play at all.

Fennelly said Joens has been experiencing soreness in her knee in the last couple weeks and given the score of the game, Fennelly wanted to shut down Joens for the second half to rest as a precaution.

Fennelly said she had been limited during practice, but Joens still hasn’t missed any game time. Fennelly said he doesn’t expect her to be out or be on a minutes restriction going into Iowa State’s game against Drake next Sunday.

The other two starters, Madi Wise and Mere Burkhall, played seven minutes each in the second half.

Fennelly said it was nice for the Cyclones to have the opportunity to get everybody into the game but said there won’t be many games like the one against North Dakota left on the schedule.