This has been arguably the weirdest week in Iowa State football of the last decade.

The program canceled its first game of the 2018 season after four minutes of play due to weather issues. The last time Iowa State canceled a football game was 1963, due to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

In 2005, Iowa State played Colorado through a tornado after a brief delay.

Clearly, canceling a game is unusual.

And that’s why Iowa State should do everything it can to find a 12th opponent this season.

Athletic Director Jamie Pollard said after the “game” Saturday that Iowa State was looking into finding another opponent to fill the schedule.

“We began working late [Saturday] night to identify other opponents we could play during our bye week [Oct. 20] or during championship week [Dec. 1],” Pollard said in a letter to fans. “The challenge is the opponent would need to be available to play [not scheduled to play on one of those dates] and eligible to play [either experienced a cancellation or did not schedule a full slate of games this year.]

“Needless to say it will be difficult to find an opponent that meets those requirements and is interested in coming to Ames.”

As Pollard pointed out, lining up the dates won’t be easy. Teams in the Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) — like South Dakota State — can only play 11 games this season due to NCAA rules.

But it’s still possible.

And don’t forget the fans, either.

Fans were, frankly, outraged by the game being canceled. Can you blame them? If you’re coming from out of state for the first game of the year, and it’s a night game like the South Dakota State game was supposed to be, you probably had to get a hotel room in Ames or nearby.

A hotel room on top of tickets, parking, food and more, adds up quickly. Iowa State hasn’t yet announced a refund plan for fans who spent money on tickets, but anything other than a full refund would be absurd.

From a football perspective, things change too.

“Having had the ability to go through that before, certainly a different situation, but I do think there were some positives from Saturday,” said coach Matt Campbell. “Getting the opportunity for preparing for a game, getting the game started, some of those young guys getting some snaps, getting out in front of our fanbase — I thought there were certainly some positives that we were able to take from it.”

It’s tough for players like freshman Mike Rose, redshirt freshman O’Rien Vance and redshirt sophomore kicker Connor Assalley, who made their debuts in the canceled game. Iowa State can’t make that experience up between now and the Cy-Hawk game, but to really capitalize on last year’s momentum I think Iowa State needs a game sometime to get those young guys more reps.

That’s only made bigger by the new redshirt rule, which allows players to play in four games without it counting against their eligibility. Iowa State almost certainly would have used the South Dakota State game to get true freshmen experience, so even from a football perspective it only makes sense for the Cyclones to find another opponent.