Hold onto the football.

That’s a common phrase used by football coaches across all levels from high school to college to professional leagues.

It’s been a phrase that Iowa State coach Matt Campbell has used throughout this entire season. But, he hasn’t just said the phrase, he’s utilized it through his practices.

This utilization has allowed Campbell and the Iowa State football team to be the only FBS Division I football team to not lose a fumble this entire season.

“We preach ball security in practice, during the game and even during meetings,” Campbell said. “It’s great to see that our practices lead to successes during games because that’s an important stat to me and my coaching staff.”

Campbell and his coaching staff don’t just say it to the players, they run drills to make sure fumbles never occur and, if they do, to jump on the ball right away to avoid turnovers. Those ball security practices started back in the spring when new players were taking roles from graduating seniors.

For about 10 minutes during each spring practice, Campbell would get offensive players onto the line and in front of them were obstacles they had to run through. Most of the obstacles were similar to each offensive position, but some were specialized for wide receivers, running backs or quarterbacks.

The same structure for all positions included football managers and coaches holding strong mats at different points in the obstacle. The player would run around cones cutting left and right when, all of a sudden, a manager would pop out and smack the player with the mat trying to catch him off guard.

“It’s harder than it looks to maintain control of the ball after being hit by one of those mat things,” said redshirt senior linebacker/quarterback Joel Lanning. “Once you do it a few times, you start to learn the hang of it, but it definitely prepares you for the real games on Saturdays.”

Then, after the cones, the player would run through an Arm PowerBlast, which is a piece of equipment that has foam arms sticking out and the goal is to run through the foam pieces without having the ball pop out of your hands.

Once they reached the other side of the PowerBlast, they would be met by another manager hitting their arm region to try and knock the ball loose. Then, at the very end of this obstacle, the player would have not one, but two managers hitting each side of the players’ arms to see if that loosens the ball.

After all of that, the player would throw the ball to the coach and run back to the back of the line and do the exercise over again. If the player dropped the ball during their turn, he would stop and grab the ball, then give it to the coaches. After the drop, a coach would come over and talk to them about what happened and how to correct the mistake, so it doesn’t happen again.

“It’s a good way to practice fumbling,” said sophomore running back David Montgomery. “I take that drill very seriously because I don’t want to be the first person on the team to lose a fumble on the season.”

The Cyclones have fumbled the ball six times, but each time they have recovered, not allowing the opponent to get a turnover. Campbell said the number he focuses on most when it comes to fumbles is fumbles lost.

Senior wide receiver Allen Lazard said the team not only practices ball security, but how to recover fumbles. Those six fumbles the offense has had could’ve been six turnovers for the opponent, but instead were recovered by Iowa State.

“Not allowing a turnover is huge for our team,” Campbell said. “We always want to win the turnover margin because it leads to wins as a team.”

Iowa State was a perfect 7-0 this season when the team won the turnover battle, but were 0-5 when it fell short or tied the opponent. Not losing a fumble on offense is huge for the Cyclones to not only win the turnover battle, but also have an almost 100 percent chance to win the football game.

It’s been a collective team effort to keep that fumbles lost number down to zero because the defense is helping the offense just as much as the coaches. The offense doesn’t just practice ball security during those obstacles, but also in scrimmages with the defense.

Lanning said the defense is always looking to create turnovers in practice, so they’re prepared for games. These scrimmages help the offense to know how to carry the ball and also what they need to look for when it comes to their opponent.

Campbell is hoping to end this season with zero fumbles lost in Iowa State’s last game against Memphis in the AutoZone Liberty Bowl on Dec. 30. If the Cyclones can end with zero fumbles, they will set an NCAA record.

Iowa State is without a lost fumble this season. No team in NCAA FBS history has gone through a season without losing a fumble. #Details #RaiseTheStandard pic.twitter.com/2kQ5KXzUYX

— Cyclone Football (@CycloneFB) November 13, 2017

Never in NCAA FBS history has a team never lost a fumble in an entire season. Northern Illinois, Miami (Ohio) and Bowling Green are underneath the Cyclones, but all with one lost fumble.

“I just want our team to continue to grow,” Campbell said. “Our mission is to set goals and this was one of our goals throughout the season.”

Going from eight fumbles lost in 2016 to zero this season, mission accomplished.