Iowa State vs. TCU Preview: Thanks to the Seniors
Every year toward the end of the football season, I start to get a little melancholy and nostalgic.
The season goes so fast. Even as a fan, it can feel like such a grind. Typically there are six or seven home games, which means six or seven Saturdays dedicated to little else besides tailgating and watching football. Even for the die-hard fans like me, it can get tiring. I still have to go to work Monday morning, not to mention do all the other responsible adult things like get groceries, cook dinner and pay bills.
And then the end of the season arrives, and it’s just over until next September. I find myself wishing I had another month to watch college football, and particularly my favorite team. I find myself wishing I had more games to attend at Jack Trice Stadium.
That’s never been more true than this year. The TCU game will be the 12th game I attend in 13 weeks. As I looked ahead to the schedule that included seven games in a row to end the season and back-to-back November road trips, it was daunting. I’m so glad I committed to it, because I’ve had the time of my life.
And then there’s the reality of what the final home game means: It’s also the final time we get to see the team’s seniors at Jack Trice Stadium. That piece of it is definitely more bittersweet this season.
We’ve watched guys like Brock Purdy, Mike Rose, Charlie Kolar, Chase Allen, Greg Eisworth and so many others grow up in front of our very eyes and lead Iowa State to some of the biggest wins and the best season in school history.
When men’s basketball player Georges Niang graduated from Iowa State, and the following year when Monte Morris, Nazareth Mitrou-Long and Matt Thomas celebrated the end of their careers, I knew an era was over. It was an era that I’m sure people around my age will compare all other eras to, no matter how much success the program has in the future. Similarly, in the 2021 Major League Baseball season, the Chicago Cubs traded Anthony Rizzo, Kris Bryant and Javier Baez, the World Series heroes. That’s the group Cubs fans like me will compare all future groups to.
The group of players we will celebrate before Iowa State’s game TCU on Saturday are Iowa State football’s equivalent to the groups I’ve just mentioned. There will be more players we love. There will hopefully be more great teams. This group will always hold a special spot, and has created a standard others must live up to.
All of that makes the TCU game even more of a must-win in my mind. This group deserves to have one more shining moment in front of home fans, and selfishly I want one more shining moment to cheer my head off for these guys.
This game also feels like things have come full circle in some ways in my fandom. My first year of truly watching Cyclone football was 1997 – a miserable one-win season. The second year was 1998. Iowa State hosted TCU, which was at that time not yet in the Big 12, in the opening week of the season. I remember a decent amount of optimism that maybe this Cyclone team could begin to turn the corner toward relevance.
The Cyclones looked like they might get the season off to the right start. Quarterback Todd Bandhauer threw a 66-yard touchdown pass to Mike Brantley in the third quarter to give the Cyclones a 14-7 lead, and then completed a 1-yard run toward the end of the quarter to make it 21-14 heading into the fourth. I was 12-years-old, and full of opening day optimism. My young heart had its first heartbreak from the Cyclones as TCU completed runs of 29 yards and 43 yards to take the lead, and capped it off with a 23-yard field goal to win 31-21. I remember how quickly the sentiment seemed to go from maybe we can be good this year to here we go again.
For what it’s worth, we were a week off in our hopes for a better season. The next week, Iowa State broke a 15-game losing streak in the series against Iowa. It was a win that changed the trajectory of the program. Iowa State returned home the next week for a 38-0 win over Ball State, my first-ever game at Jack Trice Stadium. Iowa State ended up going 3-8, but had begun the ascent that would get the team to a 9-3 season in 2000.
These things are never black and white, but I can draw a pretty clear line in my mind. Iowa State was a fundamentally different program after that 1998 win against Iowa. The TCU games 1998 was the last where I (and probably others) could feel no sense of hope for the future of the program. Following the TCU game, I had pretty much nothing positive to associate with Iowa State football (keeping in mind I just missed the Troy Davis years as a fan). Following the win over Iowa, I did.
The next time Iowa State ran into TCU, I was a freshman in the Cyclone Marching Band. The Cyclones were matched up with the Horned Frogs in the 2005 EV1.net Houston Bowl. It was my first bowl trip. It was also, I believe, the first time I had stepped foot in an NFL stadium. What was then known as Reliant Stadium (now NRG Stadium) had me in awe. With three decks of seating, it felt like a palace. By that point of the season, I had gotten used to the fact that I got to march on the field at Jack Trice Stadium. This, however, felt different. I was pinching myself. This is real. You are really doing this.
The season had been somewhat disappointing with some close, gut-wrenching losses (sound familiar?). A bowl game win, in my mind, would have done a lot to make up for the disappointment. (I really hope I’m not foreshadowing as I write this.)
TCU jumped out to a 14-0 lead. In the stands, I decided to forget everything else, stop worrying and enjoy myself. I cheered on the defense, and cheered as Bret Meyer threw a 48-yard pass to Todd Blythe to cut it to 14-7 in the second quarter. Iowa State forced a safety to make the score 14-9, and took a 17-14 lead a few minutes later. The Iowa State portion of the crowd was loving every minute. Unfortunately, it didn’t last. TCU regained the lead with an 84-yard touchdown pass. Iowa State tied the game at 24 late in the third quarter with another Meyer to Blythe connection, but TCU’s field goal with 5:25 left was the difference.
Oh well, I thought. This is only the first bowl game I’ll get to go to in the band. I was wrong. Iowa State didn’t make another bowl game until after I graduated.
In 2012, TCU joined the Big 12 and became a permanent fixture on Iowa State’s schedule. The Cyclones played their first conference game against the Horned Frogs in an October road game. TCU was ranked #15 in the country and was 4-0. Iowa State was 3-1 and coming off a loss to Texas Tech.
The way the game played out was one of the more random fun games I can remember. Iowa State took the lead on a 51-yard touchdown pass from Jared Barnett to Josh Lenz and eventually went up 10-0 and 16-7. TCU kept battling back, but couldn’t quite take control. I cheered with dozens of others in a Des Moines bar as Lenz took the ball on a reverse and surprised everyone by throwing it to Ernst Brun for a touchdown to take a 30-20 lead. It was a classic trick play by coach Paul Rhoads. Iowa State sealed the win when David Irving intercepted a pass and ran 21 yards for a touchdown, followed by members of the Iowa State sideline mobbing him in celebration. Iowa State pulled off the 37-23 upset.
TCU had the upper hand the next four years, which was no surprise considering they were all losing seasons for the Cyclones. In 2017, a newly ranked #25 Iowa State team, experiencing its first season of success under Matt Campbell, hosted a 7-0 TCU team ranked #4 in the country. It was as electric of a crowd as I could remember in quite some time at Jack Trice Stadium. The Cyclones gave us plenty to cheer about as upstart quarterback Kyle Kempt, making his fourth start after taking over in the upset win at Oklahoma, completed a pair of first half touchdown passes to Matthew Eaton and Hakeem Butler to give the Cyclones a 14-0 halftime lead. The Iowa State defense was lights out, forcing five straight punts.
A fair amount of the crowd wasn’t even back in their seats yet as TCU began the third quarter with a 94-yard punt return for a touchdown to cut the lead to 14-7.
“We’ve played so well,” I said in exasperation. “How can you let that happen?”
A few possessions later, Kempt threw an interception at the Iowa State 43. TCU was in business, and looked poised to tie the game. We came to our feet as the Horned Frogs faced a 3rd-and-6 from the 7-yard line. Quarterback Kenny Hill overthrew his intended receiver, and we roared as Brian Peavy picked off the ball and ran the other way. It looked like he was going to score, but he was tackled at the TCU 30 after a 70-yard gain. It was beginning to feel like our day the longer the team could just hold onto the lead.
A few possessions later, TCU was again in scoring range. On 2nd-and-goal from the 3, we cheered as ISU defenders stacked up Hill for a loss, and almost couldn’t believe our luck when he fumbled and Iowa State recovered. Sometimes I still go back to watch the replay and see the television cameras shaking.
Iowa State was unable to put the game away on offense, and TCU had one more chance taking over at its 46-yard line with less than 2 minutes to play. On 2nd-and-10, Hill went back to pass, and Marcel Spears Jr. jumped the route to come up with the interception. Iowa State was going to win. We took selfies in the stands and cheered as we watched fans rush the field in celebration after the game. Not only was Iowa State football fun again, these Cyclones were really good.
After the game, in a locker room video that was shared publicly, Campbell told his team “If you fall in love with the process, then eventually the process will love you back. But here’s what’s crazy about that. You don’t know when it’s going to love you back. All you have to do is you’ve got to be prepared for your opportunity when it’s ready to love you back.”
I had bought into Campbell’s coaching philosophies a few weeks prior when the Cyclones upset Oklahoma. When I heard the speech after the TCU game, I couldn’t get enough of it. It turns out, I still can’t.
The Cyclones lost a close game at TCU in 2018 before winning in 2019 and 2020. The TCU program is not the same one we thought we knew even at the beginning of this season, as it parted ways with its coach of the last 20 years, Gary Patterson. The Frogs responded with an upset win over Baylor before being dominated by Oklahoma State in a 63-17 loss. Last week, TCU hit a field goal in the final seconds to hold off an improving but still last place Kansas team. All this to say, despite Iowa State’s recent struggles, it should win Friday.
Sometimes individual games take on meaning beyond the season, and sometimes the individual game itself takes a backseat to the larger meaning. The larger meaning for Friday’s game is that we are celebrating the careers of a group of seniors we love. It will be an emotional day at Jack Trice Stadium. We want this win not because it really means anything in the standings, but because it means so much to all of us who have followed this program, and especially this group, to see the team get one more win at home.
In 1998, Iowa State football was irrelevant when it lost to TCU. In 2021, Iowa State is relevant largely because of the current seniors, and I really want a win over TCU.