No late heroics can bail out Arizona this time: Iowa State hands Wildcats 84-67 loss

AMES, Iowa – Even in the afterglow of a 60-foot buzzer bomb from Caleb Love that led to an Arizona victory over Iowa State on Jan. 27 at McKale Center, UA coach Tommy Lloyd was already bracing himself.

“Rest assured,” he said later that night, “they got something coming for us when we go to Ames.”

That might have turned out to be an understatement. Getting four 3-pointers from a player who missed that Jan. 27 game because of a hand injury, forward Milan Momcilovic, the Cyclones buried the Wildcats with nine first-half 3s and held UA to just 33.3% shooting in their 84-67 win over Arizona on Saturday at Hilton Coliseum.

“They beat us at their place and it was kind of a crazy ending,” Momcilovic said. “Definitely got some revenge.”

They did so in a game that was much less suspenseful than the Jan. 27 edition, in which Iowa State led for most of the game and held Love to 1-for-10 shooting before he unleashed his buzzer-beating bomb at the end of regulation, then hit two 3s in overtime to lead Arizona to an 86-75 win.

This time, Iowa State led for the final 35 minutes, took a 43-30 halftime lead and led by up to 24 points in the second half. It was an answer both to the Cyclones’ surprising loss at Oklahoma State on Tuesday and the Jan. 27 game at Arizona.

“Obviously, our guys are well aware of what happened in the last encounter, and we let it slip away,” Iowa State coach T.J. Otzelberger said. “I think that adds another layer of intentionality to focus and what you're doing out there on the court.”

Five Iowa State players scored in double digits while the Cyclones hit 50% overall. Momcilovic led the Cyclones with 17 points while making 4 of 7 3-pointers. He was 4 of 5 from 3 with 14 points in the first half, though he suffered a bloody nose midway through the second half and briefly exited the game.

Jaden Bradley led the Wildcats with 18 points while UA coach Tommy Lloyd also played him alongside seldom used point guard Conrad Martinez in the second half.

Arizona’s loss dropped the Wildcats to 19-10 overall and 13-5 in the Big 12, where they are again tied for second place with Texas Tech, which won at Kansas earlier Saturday. The Wildcats’ loss had no impact on Houston’s outright Big 12 title, which the Cougars clinched by beating Cincinnati earlier Saturday in Houston.

Iowa State improved to 22-7 and 12-6.

It could have been even worse for the Wildcats. The Cyclones, 3-6 when at least one rotation player is missing, had everyone available Saturday and a crowd of 14,267 that was basically a sea of gold sitting in cardinal-colored theater seats.

Not only was Momcilovic back after having missed seven games earlier in Big 12 play, but so was leading scorer Curtis Jones, who missed the Cyclones’ Feb. 22 loss at Houston and point guard Keshon Gilbert – who missed the Houston game and Iowa State’s loss at Oklahoma State on Tuesday.

Iowa State is now 19-1 when it has its full eight-player rotation available.

“It definitely makes a difference,” Iowa State guard Tamin Lipsey said. “You don’t want to say it does but it does. We feel like we’re all connected.”

That it wasn’t worse for the Wildcats was one of the few things Lloyd appeared upbeat about.

“I'm really proud of our guys for battling back,” Lloyd said. “I mean, that could have been a 30-piece right there, and our guys hung with it. We got pride. We're here for it.”

Lloyd also praised Martinez, who helped steer UA's late efforts over his 11-minute appearance, saying the Spanish guard “really, really, really impacted the game.”

But in the end it wasn’t enough. That’s what happens when, the way Lloyd explained it, you let a team take 3-pointers they shouldn’t have been allowed to take.

Both teams were mired in a defensive struggle for the first six minutes of the game, before Iowa State hit three 3-pointers over two minutes and 11 seconds to take a 23-11 lead and then hit another three over the next four minutes. That put the Cyclones up 32-17 with 6:17 to go.

Momcilovic had three of Iowa State’s six 3-pointers over that six-minute stretch, then added another 3 with four minutes left to put the Cyclones up by 17, saying afterward that Arizona was protecting the paint in the first half and “tagging the roller,” leaving him more open on the weak side.

But that wasn’t how the Wildcats were supposed to be defending, Lloyd said, saying some of Momcilovic’s 3s were off actions such as fake ball screens that Arizona players could have handled better with more awareness.

“And that's good execution by them but it had nothing to do with us keeping them out of the paint,” Lloyd said. “I mean, we’re trying to keep them out of the paint. They’re trying to keep us out of the paint, and they just made some 3s during that stretch that allowed them to get a lead at home, which was too much to overcome.”