For much of the College Basketball season, the Iowa State Cyclones have been among the best teams in the country. At 21-5 overall and 11-4 in a brutally tough Big 12 conference, the Cyclones seemed to be well-positioned to, at worst, claim a top-two seed in the upcoming NCAA Tournament. Things have changed in that regard.
The Cyclones have taken back-to-back losses to the Houston Cougars and the Oklahoma State Cowboys to fall to 21-7 overall and 11-6 in conference play. Both records are still rock-solid, obviously, but losing two games in a row this time of the season is never ideal.
Losing to a Houston team ranked higher on the road, especially with the injuries that they are dealing with, is one thing, but losing to an Oklahoma State team that was below .500 overall and just 5-11 in conference play prior to their matchup is another. The Cowboys got off to an early 12-4 lead over Iowa State and never trailed in their victory. That's a loss for Iowa State that will impact where they are standings-wise and in Bracketology.
Iowa State has work to do after back-to-back losses
Standings-wise, Iowa State has fallen to fourth place in the Big 12. They were always behind Houston, but are now behind the Arizona Wildcats and the Texas Tech Red Raiders as well. Perhaps what's more alarming is that the Cyclones are just 0.5 games ahead of the BYU Cougars and 1.0 game ahead of the Kansas Jayhawks. They were once in a battle for second overall in the conference, now, they have to fight to remain in the top four and receive a double bye in the conference tournament.
All of a sudden, their upcoming games against Arizona and BYU are absolutely massive, especially considering they only have three more regular season games to go before conference tournament games commence.
The last two losses are pretty tough to judge since the Cyclones were without their leading scorer, Curtis Jones, for the Houston game, and were without their starting point guard and assist leader, Keshon Gilbert for both of the defeats. That's probably why even after the Houston loss Iowa State was still a No. 2 seed in Joe Lunardi's latest Bracketology update for ESPN. The Cyclones will still need a strong finish to their regular season and to the conference tournament to be ranked that high in March Madness.