No. 3 Iowa State has finally reached the Big 12 portion of the schedule, and it begins with a familiar opponent.
That opponent is Colorado, which is back in the Big 12 after the implosion of the Pac-12, where the Buffaloes spent 13 seasons.
Though the two are conference foes again, the Cyclones already faced Colorado, but it didn’t count towards the conference record. On Nov. 27, Iowa State won 99-71 in the fifth-place game at the Maui Invitational.
Since the in-season tournament was already planned before the Buffaloes rejoined the Big 12, that game counted as a non-conference game. It’s an oddity, but that’s the world of college athletics nowadays.
In that game, the Cyclones had six players score 10 points or more, led by sophomore forward Milan Momcilovic with 24. It was a day where not many shots were missed.
Colorado did have a few players grab buckets with ease, however. Guard Julian Hammond III led the Buffaloes with 20 points, and forward Andrej Jakimovski scored 18.
Those two will likely be the ones to lead Colorado again, along with center Elijah Malone, as all three score more than 10 points per game.
Since that game in Maui, a whole month has gone by. Iowa State went 5-0 to wrap up its non-conference slate and won each game at an average of 23.8 points. Two of those wins were over Power 5 schools in Marquette and Iowa, each ending in a nine-point win.
The Buffaloes have also gone undefeated since they faced the Cyclones. Their best win of those came in a 72-55 home win over in-state rival Colorado State.
“They’re undefeated at home,” Iowa State head coach T.J. Otzelberger said. “When you enter into league play, I think it becomes even more important when you go on the road that you’re a team that focuses on getting stops and on the defensive end of the floor.”
While Iowa State will be favored to beat the Buffaloes again, this game should be a bit more competitive. That’s because this game is at home for Colorado in Boulder.
In their only true road game so far, against Iowa, the Cyclones trailed for the majority of the game but found just enough in the end to win in Carver-Hawkeye Arena for the first time in 10 years.
The last time Iowa State played Colorado on the road was in the 2010-11 season, and the Buffaloes won that one 95-69.
Funny enough, the two teams played each other three times that season, and are currently slated to do the same this season. Iowa State hosts Colorado on Feb. 18, and if things work out, a Big 12 Tournament game can happen too.
“When we first came in and there’s 10 teams and a true round robin, that’s a different animal and I think everybody knows each other so well because there are fewer teams and you play everybody twice,” Otzelberger said. “In this game against Colorado, certainly we could end up playing them who knows how many times this year, for sure three and could go beyond that.”
Starting Big 12 play with a win is always important, and stealing a win on the road makes it that much more meaningful.
New for this season is the 20-game Big 12 schedule, up from 18, which was the usual total for a while. Every team will play five teams twice, five only at home and five only on the road.
Colorado is one of the five teams Iowa State gets at home and on the road. The others include Arizona, Kansas, Kansas State and UCF.
Over the next three months, each game will become more important than the last in a conference that boasts some of the best teams in college basketball.
Iowa State and Colorado tip-off at 8 p.m. Monday from Boulder. The game will be broadcast live on the CBS Sports Network.
