Iowa State built a lead to as many as 10 on Wednesday night against Kansas State, but the Wildcats were able to outlast the Cyclones en route to a 67-60 win. 

Here are three takeaways from Iowa State’s loss. 

Bride Kennedy-Hopoate 

When the Cyclones took on Kansas in their Big 12 opener on Dec. 28, junior forward Bride Kennedy-Hopoate exploded for a then-career-high 15 points. However, in her next three games, the points total dipped to six, four and two, respectively. 

Come Wednesday night against K-State, the Kennedy-Hopoate of Dec. 28 returned. The Australian native exploded for a new career-high 17 points. The amazing thing, all 17 points came in the second half. 

“I just felt like someone needed to step up [in the second half],” Kennedy-Hopoate said. “I knew that I could do something in the post. When I got the ball I just wanted to be aggressive.” 

Kennedy-Hopoate certainly did do it all for the Cyclones in the second half. She scored down low, drained three free throws and even stepped out for a few jumpers. 

The physicality of the 6-foot-4 forward was too much for the Wildcats to handle at times. Kennedy-Hopoate let her size be known on the defensive end as well. Despite the career performance, coach Bill Fennelly stressed that this type of play needs to come daily, not just once every four games. 

“I thought that [Meredith Burkhall and Kennedy-Hopoate] both were pretty good,” Fennelly said. “We haven’t been able to find the right rhythm for our post game yet, but today Bride was the best one. Unfortunately, our consistency there hasn’t been very good.”

Even Jeff Mittie, Kansas State’s coach, was quick to note the dominant performance Kennedy-Hopoate had. 

“She did everything,” Mittie said. 

The 3-point stroke returns, but still missing some touch 

Facing a Kansas State team that is known for its stout zone defense, the Cyclones knew that a hot hand from behind the arc was needed. The zone was going to force Iowa State to shoot 3-pointers and the Cyclones acted on that and implemented a brand new starting lineup. 

The cardinal and gold went with Madison Wise, Emily Durr, Bridget Carleton, Adriana Camber and Kennedy-Hopoate. A four-guard look that put the Cyclones in an excellent opportunity to break out of their 3-point shooting slump and exploit the zone. 

In four Big 12 games, the Cyclones had shot a miserable 21.5 percent from behind the arc. Tonight, they shot 32 percent on 8-of-25 from 3-point land. Better, but still not great. 

But shooting 15.9 percent in the last two games, the Cyclones were pleased to see any type of increase, albeit still below their season average of 33.4 percent.

“We’ve seen nothing but man-to-man defense all year,” Fennelly said. “We got the shots we wanted.”

That man-to-man defense is something Kansas State switched to after the Cyclones drained five 3-pointers in the first quarter. The change out of zone defense, like Fennelly said, was nothing new for the Cyclones, but rather it was just a problem of his squad going cold. 

“[Kansas State] played that 2-3, so we knew we were going to get open looks,” Carleton said. “It was just a matter of knocking them down.”

Second half blunder

With Iowa State up by as many as 10 in the third quarter, Kansas State never tapped out. The Wildcats even went on a 7:32 stretch in which they went scoreless. 

Once the Cyclones grabbed their largest lead of the game, Kansas State utilized a pair of trips to the charity stripe. They knocked down three of the four shots, but from then on they held the Cyclones to just three points. The Wildcats added three more points of their own to cut the score to 45-38 at the end of the third quarter. 

“I really thought we were pretty soft in the third only on the offensive end,” Mittie said. “We could have easily gotten blown out in that [third quarter] stretch.”

And then everything crumbled for Iowa State. The Wildcats went of fire, shooting 9-for-13 for 69 percent from the field in the fourth quarter. 

While Kansas State was flaming, the Cyclones went 6-for-17 for 35 percent. 

The problem? 

“Defensively in the fourth quarter we were non-existent,” Fennelly said. “Our attention to detail was awful and obviously I have to do a better job on getting them to understand that.”

Fennelly, attributed the problem to him not focusing his team for the little details. Those little details doomed the Cyclones and continue to push the NCAA tournament further and further out of the picture.