It’s a trademark of Bill Fennelly-coached teams. The Cyclones have done it in 612 consecutive regular season contests, dating back to February 1995, and it was on display Nov. 9 at Hilton Coliseum.

The ISU women’s basketball team continued its tradition of draining 3-pointers by shooting 7-of-16 en route to a 64-29 exhibition win against Winona State.

During Iowa State’s first three-point attempt of the game, guard Nicole “Kidd” Blaskowsky knocked it down and opened the ISU floodgates. The Cyclones went on to hit 6-of-11 3s in the half, led by Blaskowsky’s 4-of-6 showing from beyond the arc.

Blaskowsky, who finished the game 5-of-8 from distance, led all scorers with 17 points in 23 minutes played. She was joined by ISU guard Brynn Williamson and 6-foot-5 freshman center Bryanna Fernstrom as the only Cyclones to cash in from downtown.

Once the second half rolled around, the Cyclones shifted focus to the paint, where two freshmen post players — Fernstrom and Claire Ricketts — are still working on not only developing confidence but also improving their skills to compete at the college level.

The looks didn’t come easy for Fernstrom and Ricketts, who combined shot 4-of-17, contributing to Iowa State’s 40.8 percent shooting on field goals. ISU guard Seanna Johnson admitted things are coming along a little slowly on the interior.

“They are, but we’re focusing [on it],” Johnson said. “In practice we’re working on it. Games like this, this is where we need to work. No matter how many times they miss, keep getting it to the post, trust them and have faith in them.”

Though the Cyclones shot just 1-of-5 on three-point attempts in the second half, the cushion from the opening half proved enough for Iowa State to ride out the win comfortably.

“It’s good, getting that good lead,” Blaskowsky said. “I think the main thing was just executing what we needed to get done. Regardless of the score, [Fennelly] has certain things that we as players have to withhold and take an understanding of, and tonight was definitely an example of that … Just staying focused and not getting bored.”

While the Cyclones’ attack from deep proved lethal, the Warriors’ was just the opposite.

Winona State also came out firing in the first half but failed to register a make on 10 attempts, almost half of which were air-balled. The Warriors went on to miss their first seven such tries in the second half as well, before WSU guard MaKena Panning hit a triple for her only basket of the night.

“I thought we defended well,” Fennelly said. “We made them take some tough shots, and then we made some good looks … When you’re making shots and court opens up, and you defend the way we were defending, making them take some tough shots, keeping them off the free throw line, that was good — very good.”

As the Cyclones excelled in both shooting and defending at the arc, another staple of Bill Fennelly’s era was lacking.

Following up a 14-of-26 showing from the charity stripe against William Penn on Nov. 4, the Cyclones only attempted six free throws against Winona State and made just half of them. Though neither percentage was near where Fennelly wants it to be, the low number of trips to the line may be an even more troubling statistic.

“That’s not good,” Fennelly said. “We’re a team that, historically, we’ve always taken great pride in the fact that we make more free throws than the other team shoots.”

To Fennelly, the solution is obvious but not necessarily easily attainable.

“If you’re not shooting a lot of free throws, that shows you’re not very aggressive,” Fennelly said. “As many touches as our big guys got inside, we’ve got to get to the free-throw line more, which means you got to go at ‘em, you got to create contact, you got to want that kind of thing.”