On Dec. 10, the 10th-ranked nationally Iowa State Cyclones faced off at Hilton Coliseum against the 11th-ranked Iowa Hawkeyes for the 2025 rendition of the women’s basketball Cy-Hawk series.
The game was an absolute nailbiter. Entering the half, the Cyclones and Hawkeyes were tied at 35 points apiece, but the Cyclones came out of the half with a 26-to-13 point run. The Hawkeyes weren’t going to give up yet, though, cutting the lead down to just three points, making the score 65 to 62 with just four minutes remaining.
The Cyclones persisted through the Hawkeyes’ run, though. Junior center Audi Crooks and junior forward Addy Brown, going 3-for- 4 on free throws, allowed the Cyclones to close out the game, defeating the Hawkeyes 74 to 69 and taking the win in the 55th rendition of the Cy-Hawk series.
Through this impressive bout between two college basketball powerhouses, something came to my mind: Cyclone fans really showed out and made the Hilton Coliseum a packed house.
Maybe it was just Hilton magic, or maybe Cyclone fans just wanted to feel something after the departure of former Iowa State Head Coach Matt Campbell.
But the next morning, that thought stayed on my mind, so I did a quick Google search. I wanted to know the attendance number of the game.
It was 14,009, a near sellout of the 14,267-seat Hilton Coliseum. The game was also nationally televised on ESPN, not ESPN+ or ESPN2, the main ESPN channel. The same channel that broadcasts Monday Night Football for the NFL, as well as Wednesday and Friday night basketball for the NBA.
With all of that knowledge coming to me, it really hit me. Iowa is a state that’s leading the nation in women’s sports and, more specifically, women’s basketball.
I think part of the credit has to come from the fact that former Iowa women’s basketball player Caitlin Clark, one of—if not the most—recognizable name in women’s basketball, came from West Des Moines and took her talents to Iowa City to play for the Hawkeyes. But the credit deserves to go elsewhere as well.
The Cyclones have no affiliation with the Hawkeyes other than the fact that they play once a year and the schools are in the same state, yet, on Wednesday night, the Cyclones still nearly filled Hilton to capacity.
Part of that comes down to how dominant Iowa State is nationally. The Cyclones have college basketball phenom Crooks.
Crooks has also made a name for herself online as she is on pace to become the third player in college or professional basketball history, whether that be men’s or women’s, to average more points than minutes. The only other players to ever do this are Philadelphia 76ers center Joel Embiid and Hall of Famer Wilt Chamberlain.
That stat makes Crooks the current leading scorer of college women’s basketball. But she also currently averages an absolutely baffling 27.8 points per game and leads the NCAA for most points per game for either men or women.
The rest of the Cyclones squad deserves praise as well.
Against the Hawkeyes, Brown got herself a double-double with 20 points on 7-for-11 shooting and 12 rebounds. For the 2025-26 season, Brown is just 0.6 rebounds off of averaging a double-double.
Another strong performer against the Hawkeyes was junior guard Jada Williams, who got a career high 12 assists as well as a double-double. Williams currently leads the Cyclones this season in assists with 7.2 per game.
This attention to women’s basketball has come from a small source as well.
In the 1986-87 Iowa State women’s basketball season, the average attendance at Hilton was a mere 427; meanwhile, the men’s team averaged 14,024 the exact same season.
For the 2024-25 season, Iowa State led the Big 12 in average attendance for women’s basketball, with a grand total of 9,998 per game, 23 times more than 38 years ago in the exact same stadium.
As for the University of Iowa down south, they were second in average attendance for the 2024-25 season, only behind the University of South Carolina.
Iowa also had nine games listed at over 17,000 fans and has been ranked in the top 10 nationally for the last five seasons (not including 2020).
Notably, Iowa’s women’s team had just over 6,700 more fans per game than the men’s team during the 2024-25 season. The men averaged 9,200, whilst the women averaged 15,908.
As much as I don’t want to credit the school down in Iowa City, its growth of women’s basketball alongside Iowa State has been impressive and has been incredibly beneficial for women’s sports all across the board.
At the rate that women’s basketball is growing nationally, Iowa and Iowa State have both positioned themselves to become powerhouses in the future. Their matchup on Wednesday was the first time the two teams had faced off while being undefeated since 2004.
As for Cyclone fans, this is only another reason to show up and show out for the women’s basketball team. They continue to grow, and each and every person participating only allows that growth to prosper.
