Welp, that sucks.

Through all the ups and downs that Iowa State has had this season, it all comes to an end eventually and that just happened to be against an Ole Miss team that shot lights out.

It makes me think of what would’ve been the result if the Cyclones had played North Carolina instead, but then again, that’s just a hypothetical that never was.

A team that was once projected to make a deep run into March fell flat in the round of 32, largely due to a season plagued with injuries and inconsistent play.

I honestly thought that this would be the team to finally break past the Sweet Sixteen and make its first Elite Eight since 2000, and potentially make its second-ever Final Four appearance, but that unfortunately did not come to fruition in the end.

The talent was not lacking when this team was fully healthy. From top to bottom, we saw how this Cyclones team rolled through non-conference play with ease, and their only loss was a blown lead and buzzer-beater tap-in to the best team in the nation on a neutral site.

Even to start Big 12 conference play, Iowa State demonstrated the same force that it showed during the non-conference slate by easily taking down Colorado, Baylor and Utah before having an overtime win against Texas Tech.

But after the thriller in Lubbock, Texas, things began to really fall apart for the Cyclones. When sophomore forward Milan Momcilovic went down with a hand injury before the game against Kansas, that is where the doubt slowly started to creep into the minds of Iowa State fans, even despite beating the Jayhawks without him.

That doubt became prevalent when the Cyclones were upset in Morgantown by West Virginia, which gave Iowa State its first conference loss of the season and second overall loss.

Now, while the Cyclones would go on to throttle UCF at home the very next game by scoring a season-high 108 points, it was still left to be determined if Iowa State could right the ship and begin to build a big winning streak like it did during the non-conference slate.

That began with a trip to the desert when the Cyclones faced Arizona State and Arizona to end the month of January.

The weekend trip did not start as planned for Iowa State, as it found itself down at halftime to a Sun Devils team that was far from perfect, to say the least.

If not for the heroics of senior guard Curtis Jones, the Cyclones could have dropped that game to Arizona State, and who knows what would’ve happened after that.

Luckily that did not become a reality, and Iowa State pulled out a 15-point win heading into Tucson to face the Wildcats.

In one of the toughest places to play in not only the Big 12, but in the entire country, the Cyclones battled their way to a late lead in the McKale Center and it looked as if Iowa State would pull out another key win on the road.

I don’t think I need to mention what happened next. It still hurts to this day.

This one moment in Tucson has been debated as the true beginning of the Cyclones’ downfall, but while I do believe it played a part in it, I think it began when Momcilovic went down long-term.

Following the trip to the state of Arizona, Iowa State dropped its first game at home to end a 29-game winning streak – that sat as the second-longest home winning streak in the nation – to the other Wildcat team in the Big 12, which is Kansas State.

This loss was truly shocking in the sense that such a big winning streak at home had fallen to a team that happened to catch fire around that time of the season. And had been infamously known for what happened in Ames the previous year, with Wildcats head coach Jerome Tang accusing the Cyclones of spying on his team.

From there, the loss to Kansas State snowballed into an underwhelming showing in Lawrence, Kansas against the Jayhawks. This loss, however, gets somewhat of an excuse because Kansas head coach Bill Self never loses on Big Monday. And I mean never. Like 38-0 never.

Luckily for Iowa State, its next game against TCU would have the team back at full strength, as Momcilovic would make his re-appearance for the first time in nearly a month.

Especially with College GameDay in town, the Cyclones got to put on a show and took down the Horned Frogs by 30 points, which sparked a new winning streak.

With a win at UCF and home wins against Cincinnati and Colorado, Iowa State faced a new challenge by going to Houston to play against the top dogs in the conference with the Cougars.

But, again, this is where the Cyclones faced another form of adversity, as they would be without their top two scorers in Jones and senior guard Keshon Gilbert due to an illness and injury.

What had looked to be an all-time classic between Iowa State and Houston resulted in the Cyclones playing down once again, but they still ended up showing some fight in a nine-point loss on the road.

However, that fight wouldn’t be shown in Iowa State’s next game, even with Jones back, as the Cyclones were embarrassed in Stillwater, Oklahoma, against a lesser Oklahoma State team.

While Iowa State would go on to get revenge against Arizona at home and Kansas State on the road, the losses against the Cowboys and the double overtime thriller against BYU at home single-handedly cost the Cyclones a double bye heading into the Big 12 Tournament.

But once again, injuries took over with Iowa State seeking back-to-back Big 12 Tournament champions, as Gilbert and junior guard Tamin Lipsey dealt with groin injuries that held them out of the Cyclones’ quarterfinal loss to BYU.

While Iowa State did go on to not get immediately defeated in its first round matchup against Cincinnati, its championship hopes were cut short by a blazing hot Cougars team and the injury bug.

Now, all that was left was to find out where the Cyclones would be placed in the NCAA Tournament. Iowa State would obviously find itself as the No. 3 seed playing in Milwaukee, but this result may not have occurred if the news about Gilbert being out for the season had been announced before Selection Sunday.

And just like in the Big 12 Tournament, the Cyclones made it out of the first round and then fell in the second round to a team that caught fire on the offensive end, resulting in the 2024-25 season ending.

On a quick side note, the loss to Ole Miss made me wonder if Iowa State would ever make it past the Sweet Sixteen under the rule of head coach T.J. Otzelberger, as this is now the fourth straight season falling short of that achievement.

Granted, that’s still four straight NCAA Tournament appearances that the Cyclones have made under Otzelberger, so I’m not trying to make it sound like something negative, but it’s definitely something to think about as each season comes to an end.

But back to this season, it just sucks that after all that Iowa State has accomplished this season and all the high hopes it had heading into the season, it ended up being crushed by either the injury bug or just catching the wrong team at the wrong time. It truly ends up being the storybook season that never was.