AMES, Iowa — A living room has broken out along the east sideline in the Sukup Basketball Complex. One massive gray sectional couch, with various pieces of gear draped upon it, occupies a conspicuous spot near the nutritional snacks and the table with the scoreboard controls. Usually, it’s stationed behind locker room walls. But that space is undergoing major renovations in mid-June, so the sofa is now an accent piece in a practice gym.
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For most of the last 28 years, Iowa State women’s basketball has traded in reliability. Known quantities and personalities. Now newness has washed into just about every cranny of the operation and nothing — especially not furniture — can stand against it. “When you have this many new pieces coming in, it’s hard to get everyone on the same page,” says All-Big 12 guard Emily Ryan, one of the few same-olds left. “But I like the saying: It doesn’t matter what page you’re on, as long as you’re on the same page.”
It’s a summer and a season that are absolute page-turners in every way, particularly the one where you don’t know what’s coming next.
In the lab 🌪️ pic.twitter.com/Ohcg9pepGy
— Cyclone Basketball (@CycloneWBB) June 29, 2023
Even for the ever-transient world of college hoops, it’s been a whiplash. Less than a year ago, a preseason top-10 team with the future conference player of the year, a future WNBA first-round pick and two other future all-league performers occupied this space, sizing up a run at a first-ever Final Four appearance.
When these Cyclones gathered in June, building toward an overseas exhibition tour that begins Monday, just one of them — Ryan — had logged more than 15 starts in an Iowa State uniform. Departures included two 30-game starters from the 2022-23 squad transferring away. Incoming talent features three top-60 freshmen and a Division II All-American guard. A 6-foot-5 center from the Czech Republic, a two-time All-Big Sky performer at Sacramento State, hadn’t even yet made it to campus when the summer practices commenced.
There’s also a new strength and conditioning coach. And video coordinator. And media relations representative. It all leaves Bill Fennelly, closing in on 900 games as the head coach here, to ponder the last time he’d confronted this much change. After a laugh, he goes with his first year in Ames. Which was 1995. When the program was still in the Big 8. “I completely understand what’s ahead,” Fennelly says. “You gotta live through it. And we just have to make sure that we handle it the right way. The newness is not exclusive to the court. So we’re all going to want to learn together.”
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The composition of this group effectively demands that a coaching staff look forward. But there’s surely at least a little looking back for ways to ensure it’s the outlier it seems to be.
Some of it is not the stuff of existential crisis. Ashley Joens, the program’s all-time leading scorer with 3,060 career points, couldn’t play college basketball forever. Fennelly likens her impact and the amount of oxygen she consumed to that of ex-Gonzaga star Drew Timme, and it was just time for everyone to move to the next thing. Stephanie Soares, meanwhile, transferred to Iowa State to be the missing post-presence piece to the 2022-23 squad, tore her ACL after 13 games, didn’t get a waiver from the NCAA and ran out of eligibility. Even starting guard Denae Fritz transferring to Baylor after averaging 8.5 points across two seasons isn’t altogether universe-shaking. It’s college basketball. These things happen.
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Lexi Donarski, though, was a little different. Started 95 games out of 95 games in three seasons. Was a Big 12 Defensive Player of the Year. Averaged 13.2 points and 11.8 shots per game during her time in Ames. Would’ve been the primary option for Iowa State as a senior. Instead, in late April, the 6-foot guard entered the transfer portal and eventually landed at North Carolina.
“I was surprised, yeah,” Fennelly says. “I wouldn’t say shocked by any means. But I was surprised.”
Fennelly guesses Donarski’s desire to play as more of a traditional point guard prompted the move — “I thought she was better at coming off the screen and then making the play,” he says — and it’s probably not far off the mark. “I want to be able to play on a team that’s a little less structured, and pushes the ball in transition, and runs a lot, and just plays fast,” Donarski told WFBZ-AM in April, shortly after entering the portal. “The system at Iowa State fits some other people really well. For me, my strengths don’t show as well. It’s just time for me to find that right fit basketball-wise.”
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The man in charge of Iowa State has bolstered his rosters with players who started careers elsewhere. And this isn’t the first offseason Iowa State suffered personnel attrition outside of graduations. It’s nevertheless a very meaningful loss on a lot of levels, though, and might make a coach reevaluate. Sitting at a conference table in his office, Fennelly paraphrases an unofficial U.S. Marine credo that’s one of his favorites: Adjust, adapt, overcome.
“I don’t want to do the core things differently,” Fennelly says. “The Iowa State way of doing things really means a lot to us and is the foundation of what we’re about. And I’ve always said we’re going to believe in who we are, and not apologize for what we’re not. The kids that left, that’s their choice, that’s their right, I respect that. Wish them the best. But my focus is who’s here and who wants to be here. We’re a very big ‘we over me’ (team). We talk about that daily, and that’s what we’re going to do now.”
With a crop of newcomers, coach Bill Fennelly hopes to make adjustments but keep the Iowa State tradition alive. (Sarah Stier / Getty Images)There’s certainly no choice regarding adjustments, and no shortage of them to make. Fennelly reminded his staff before summer workouts began: You can’t assume they understand. What they probably didn’t grasp was how far that extends beyond terminology for ball-screen coverages.
Hannah Belanger scored 1,882 points across four seasons at Division II Truman State, a do-everything guard for whom the “everything” included washing her own practice gear on a daily basis. After Iowa State fatefully reached out just before Belanger made her decision, she traveled to campus and was stunned by what she learned: Someone does the laundry for the players. And get this: Assistant coach Latoja Scaben told Belandger there’s even someone to rebound for her when she wants to shoot on her own. “They have people for everything,” Belanger says, still sounding somewhat awed. “That’s not what I’m used to at all.”
And nevermind pace of play. Pace of warmups initially confounded the newcomers. “It’s like go here, go here, go here — I didn’t even get to stretch,” freshman forward Addy Brown says. “It’s from one spot to the next spot to the next spot.”
Still, take a look at change from a certain angle, and you can see opportunity. Players who accounted for 68 percent of the total minutes logged in 2022-23 are gone. Someone, then, has to play basketball for Iowa State this winter.
It’s what cinched the arrival of Belanger, who shot 46.5 percent from 3-point range for Truman State a year ago. “I didn’t want to spend my last year on the bench, and I hope I don’t, and I’m going to work really hard to make sure I don’t,” she says. “But that opportunity was a big part of coming here.” It’s what galvanizes a recruiting class long on both reputation and the confidence they can be the core of a late-career run for their 66-year-old head coach. Brown was the nation’s No. 31 prospect in the Class of 2023, per HoopGurlz, a 6-2 forward who Fennelly calls “one of the best incoming kids we’ve ever had” in terms of feel for the game. Coaches sold Brown on playing multiple positions throughout the recruiting process … and now there’s pretty much no choice but to do so, immediately and often. “I’m not going to be stuck in one position,” Brown says. “That was a big thing for me, because I think I’m way more than just one position.”
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There’s also 6-2 freshman Jalynn Bristow (No. 47 prospect nationally), who has the ability to step out beyond the 3-point arc. There’s 6-3 post Audi Crooks (No. 57) and 5-9 guard Arianna Jackson, who Fennelly says has a “toolbox” full of a lot of abilities. There’s even yet another Joens: Kelsey, a 5-10 combo guard. The quintet arrived without any get-to-know-you awkwardness, thanks to the group text chat that occupied them once their commitments had been made. (Brown and Bristow, in fact, have played on the same club team since middle school.) And if their approach in the gym skews a bit bold, no one flinches. “Every day they’re bringing great energy,” Ryan says. “Just an excitement to get better.”
It’s welcomed, because it has to be.
“They’re gonna play, and this year we’re gonna have our moments,” Fennelly says of his first-year group. “We all know it. I completely understand what’s ahead. You have to live through it. And we just have to make sure that we handle it the right way. You know, it might not happen in the short term, but I think there’s possibilities moving forward.”
Among the many things to figure out, the broad strokes of a basketball identity are set. Fennelly figures the playbook will shrink. (“I say that every day and my staff, especially my son, just laughs at me,” he says.) There won’t be a bail-out scorer like Ashley Joens. He doesn’t anticipate being as good on the ball defensively. That may mean being more multiple with the looks to keep opposing offenses off-balance. But Iowa State for the most part will look like Iowa State typically looks.
It’s certainly difficult to tell much of a difference on a midsummer weekday at the Sukup Basketball Complex, long before even a game against some exhibition opponent in Italy, let alone a viable Big 12 squad. A group of wide-eyed grade schoolers shuffle in and sit along the far wall to observe, completely rapt, despite barely knowing anyone they’re watching. (As for how they scored the view: It helps when grandpa has his name on the building.) They see a lot of shooting. Lots of skill work. A competitive four-on-four period. They hear lots of noise.
To nobody’s surprise, Ryan’s voice rises above all others. She calls out encouragement for everyone in the space — “Let’s go Kels!” and “Good, AJ!” and “Here we go, Nye!” — even while she’s in the middle of a free-throw routine on the side. “That was new for me, too,” Brown says. “She’s just yelling at everybody while shooting.” The senior from Claflin, Kan., is a tempest, and she likely would be this way even if she was surrounded by contemporaries and not an overhauled roster. Ryan has posted the second-highest Win Shares total among Iowa State players in each of the past two seasons, trailing only Ashley Joens. She takes charge of group texts and reminds everyone where to be and reminds them how to act when they get there. Her coach desperately wants to find a way to take some pressure off her, because anything that goes wrong for the Cyclones finds its way onto his point guard’s shoulders. “She’ll take it all on,” Fennelly says.
It would be understandable, though, if Ryan saw just one remaining teammate from her own touted five-player freshman class in the gym and felt a little bit cheated going into her final season. And she’ll concede the reality: As a senior, you expect more familiarity. But when some might mourn, Ryan talks about a nice change of pace. A fresh start. A breath of fresh air.
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“It’s all about perspective,” Ryan says. “You could look at it as, oh, man, it’s my senior year, there’s so much different, and look at it in a negative way. But I think the right way to look at it is all the opportunities it presents. We get to be here and teach a new group how to do things, and I find a lot of joy in teaching the younger ones, and just trying to lead them the right way. Seeing the process through their eyes is really fun for me.”
No guile detected. At Iowa State, change is a chance. Has to be. Only way to look is straight ahead.
Which is why, after chatting for about eight minutes and then disappearing into the under-construction locker room for a few more, Emily Ryan is back on the floor. She approaches a shooting gun parked in the corner of the gym. She grabs hold with two hands, wheels it out and positions it under one of the main rims by herself. She flicks it on and starts hoisting jumper after jumper from the corner. The day’s work is already done, but so much of her work is only beginning. Some things never change.
(Top photo of Emily Ryan: David Jensen / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
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