Iowa State Media Relations

AMES, Iowa – Iowa State women’s basketball players Audi Crooks and Emily Ryan have been added to the 2024-25 John R. Wooden Award Top 50 Preseason Watch List. This marks the first time either has appeared on the award’s Top 50 watch list.

Crooks enters the 2024-25 season following one of the most impressive freshman campaigns in Iowa State women’s basketball history. The 6-3 center broke the ISU single-season record for made field goals with 258 makes. She also broke Cyclone freshman records for points (635) and made free throws (114). The Algona, Iowa native opened the season on Monday, scoring 16 points on 50 percent shooting from the floor and going 6-of-8 from the free throw line. She also pulled down four rebounds and handed out two assists.

Ryan is one of the most prolific point guards in women’s college basketball. She is the NCAA active career leader for assists with her 788 dimes and holds the Iowa State all-time record with the total. The Claflin, Kansas native also holds Iowa State single-season (259) and single-game (17) assists records. The 5-11 guard posted a career-high against fourth-ranked and No. 2-seed Stanford in the second round of the 2024 NCAA Tournament, scoring 36 points with six 3-pointers. On Monday in Iowa State’s season opener, Ryan was efficient in 19 minutes played, dishing out a game-high six assists while scoring nine points to help the Cyclones to a 96-56 win.

Iowa State is back in action on Thursday night in Hilton Coliseum as it meets Indiana State for the first time in program history. Tip-off is set for 6:30 p.m.

Iowa State Media Relations

Ames, Iowa – After leading the Iowa State wrestling program to its first Big 12 Conference title since 2009 and its highest NCAA Championship placement since 2010, head coach Kevin Dresser has been rewarded with a four-year contract extension thru June 30, 2029, ISU Director of Athletics Jamie Pollard announced today.

“We are excited that Kevin has agreed to a contract extension through 2029,” Pollard said. “Kevin and his staff have done a tremendous job revitalizing our wrestling program and we look forward to continued success under their leadership. The success and excitement surrounding the program is exactly what we expected when we hired Kevin to lead our program. It is very important to Iowa State University and our athletics department that our wrestling program be successful. Kevin has more than delivered in helping us achieve that goal. I could not be more pleased with the direction of our wrestling program.”

A two-time Big 12 Conference Coach of the Year (2019, ’24) and the 2019 National Wrestling Coaches Association Coach of the Year, Dresser begins his eighth season leading the Cyclone program on Nov. 8 when his sixth-ranked team takes on No. 20 Stanford in a 7 p.m. match at Hilton Coliseum. The eighth head coach in program history has reinvigorated the tradition-rich Cyclone program since returning to his native Iowa for the 2017-18 season. He owns a 241-79 (.753) record in 18 years as a head coach, including an 81-28 (.743) mark at Iowa State.

“On behalf of my staff and our team, I want to thank Jamie (Pollard) and everyone in this department for helping us get to this point,” Dresser said. “College athletics are becoming more challenging each year and this staff is committed to putting a great product on the mat every season. This will be a fun team to watch in 2024-25! We look forward to the future in Ames with great anticipation and we look forward to the challenge of winning at the highest level.”

His efforts have seen Iowa State climb on the national stage, highlighted most recently by a 2024 Big 12 title and fourth-place finish at the NCAA Championships, ISU’s best since 2010. Dresser inherited a program that had scored just one point and finished tied for 57th at the 2017 NCAA Championships. Since then, Iowa State has finished T-45th, 16th, T-13th, 17th, 11th and 4th at the national tournament and qualifying eight or more individuals to the NCAA Championships in six of seven years.

Iowa State had no conference champion in 2017 and failed to have a wrestler reach All-American status. Since then, Dresser’s program has produced 10 Big 12 Champions and 13 NCAA All-Americans. One of Dresser’s top priorities when arriving on campus in 2017 was bringing blue-chip recruit and Cyclone legacy David Carr to Ames. A catalyst in turning the program around, Carr won four individual Big 12 titles and a pair of NCAA titles in 2021 and 2024.

Fan support has been crucial to Dresser's program revival and Cyclone fans are once again turning out in droves to watch wrestling in Hilton Coliseum. Iowa State averaged 6,690 fans per dual at home during the 2023-24 season, which ranked third nationally and was its highest average home attendance in the Big 12 era.

The 2023-24 season was ISU’s best under Dresser’s direction, as four Cyclones - Evan Frost (6th, 133), Anthony Echemendia (5th, 141), Casey Swiderski (7th, 149) and David Carr (1st, 165) - earned All-America honors. It marked ISU’s most All-Americans since 2009 and Iowa State’s 68.5 team points and fourth-place finish were both its best at nationals since 2010. Carr won his second NCAA title to become the 17th Cyclone to win multiple national titles and the first since 2010 (Jake Varner, 2009-10).

Dresser was named the 2024 Big 12 Coach of the Year as Iowa State won its first league title since 2009 aided by individual championship performances from Echemendia (141) and Yonger Bastida (285). The Cyclones put 152.5 points on the board at the Big 12 Championship, the fourth-most in a tournament in league history and the most-ever by an ISU team in the Big 12 era. The Cyclones finished with a 13-2 overall dual record, a 6-1 Big 12 record and an 8-2 mark against ranked foes, losing only to No. 4 Iowa and No. 5 Oklahoma State, teams they would go on to finish ahead of at the NCAA Championships.

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The Cyclones and Red Raiders kick off a few minutes after 2:30 p.m. today in Jack Trice Stadium. The game will be carried on ESPN. I'll have all the in-stadium updates for you throughout the day in the thread below.

They were riding sky-high after their dominating win in an exhibition game over Kansas, but they looked pretty ordinary tonight against Lipscomb, who had cut Arkansas' lead to 4 points with about 7 minutes to go in the game. Arkansas wound up winning 76-60, but it was closer than that for much of the game. To be fair, Lipscomb was picked to win the ASUN conference, so they're not a bad team, but after an 85-69 win over No. 1 Kansas, I expected more from Arkansas, not the same margin of victory.

what’s the parking like at Arrowhead? First come first serve or assigned spots when buying a pass in advance?

TIA for any help here.

Does anyone know if we are going to a pregame pep rally or something at Kelly’s this weekend?

#1 It was simple. We continued to run the ball on first down, all game, when the defense was obviously trying to stop our running game on first down. This was the story of the game. Come on coach... how did you think this game was going to end up? Mouser/Campbell better learn how to be in attack mode from play one (reason we most always get behind and have close games) . I would love to see our average yards per play today on first down, and I bet it isn't pretty. Did we throw on first down at all? It is wrong for our coaches to think our running game will carry us to victory. I'm not saying our running backs aren't great. I'm just saying we need to put our running backs in a position to succeed. Throw the ball downfield for heaven's sake. Your have two elite receivers itching to get the ball. We never went to a deep pass beyond their safeties the entire game! No team in history has been able to win consistently using our coaching philosophy!

#2 Mouser...Maybe he can explain to the fans as to why we run the QB straight into the clogged line on third and 5 when the game is on the line. Congratulation to our offensive players. They deserved to win based on their play. It is obvious to me our offense suffers due to our play calling. This is true for all of our games. I feel like our coaches think getting a first down is great. Try doing that 5 times in a row. Odds are that you fail to score. Getting a first down is fine but scoring should be their first priority on every play.

#3 Our offensive players and our defensive players gave their hearts out this game. It's sad to see our players' not rewarded because our poor coaching. GET YOUR SHIT TOGETHER COACHES!

#4 I officially announce that I would like to be the offensive coordinator for ISU. I have the credentials to take that position and I guarantee we would score on our first possession 90 percent of the time. Not hard for me. I am Gore!

Give Rocco a little more time to throw and a consistent running game and we would be really good. We don’t have good enough offensive linemen

This is why she lost........ among a crap ton of others, but if you can't answer questions, you can't pass the test...... do your research before the test. Login to view embedded media

The decision by Biden has now done such great harm to the Democrats. Biden calls for an EV summit, then f#cks over Elon, the guy that made EVs possible, and the world changes. Elon finds out that being liberal will not even help you, they still can f#ck you over. So Elon buys Twitter, joins team Trump, completely embarrasses NASA, and now will have the chance to butcher the worthless agencies in Washington DC, he will do like Twitter, and get rid of the 80% dead wood in DC. And now other Billionaires are fleeing the democrats because of the courage of Elon and Trump.

Just something to think about.

The electoral college will dramatically change in 2030, and it is a democrats worst nightmare. Because the population is "self sorting", people are moving to red states in record numbers. This means that the EC will be reapportioned for the 2032 election, and 13 votes will move from Democratic States to Republican states. Texas and Florida are going deep red, they are not going purple like democrats hope. What this means is that the magic 270 votes to win is almost locked in for the GOP going forward. After the 2040 apportionment, I would expect another 10-15 votes will move to red states. And the democrats clearly have no idea how to stem the tide. They literally need to bring in millions of illegals, and actually dump them into Blue States to try and stem the tide of apportionment. If you live in a blue state, welcome to your next nightmare. Something you might want to think about.

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His race hasn’t been called, but he’s ahead no doubt thanks to the Liberal Deep Staters living in his district.

If it’s you, you’re a Sissy! Or Stupid! Or both!

There are four remaining CCG contenders. WVU is now essentially out of contention.

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So since this is Cyclone Report, it is also sorta sports related.....Time to kick out Colorado, LOL

Fox news just called the Senate. Already at 51.

I was going over Big 12 freshmen and newcomer transfers and ran across a Colorado transfer from Washington State named Andrej Jakimovski. I mean, say that last name to yourself three times real slow. I bet he got picked on a lot in grade school and junior high.