Peterson: With Iowa State's shellacking of Iowa, Hilton Magic has emphatically returned

AMES — This Iowa State basketball team is for real. No if ands or buts. If beating Iowa by the Cyclones' biggest margin in the rivalry’s history didn’t prove it to you, look at the stats of the 73-53 victory at Hilton Coliseum. Up and down and sideways, the Cyclones won in new coach T.J. Otzelberger’s first season.

And they won big.

They did it with defense. They did it with Izaiah Brockington making his first nine shots, en route to scoring 29 points. They did it with a gigantic advantage on the boards, and hustle from one end to the other.

And, oh yeah, they did it in front of so much fan enthusiasm that Otzelberger’s voice cracked as he reflected on what he had just experienced after the game.

"It’s pretty special," Otzelberger said. "It’s pretty cool. I love this place. I love being here and being here with 14,500 of your family members. I don’t know how I could be any luckier."

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It'd only be partly accurate to say Iowa State gave Iowa its worst beating in the history of this rivalry thanks to that maybe-grander-than-ever "Hilton Magic." It was part of the story behind the 9-0, 19th-ranked Cyclones’ epic win, but certainly not all of it.

What happened was part defense, part quick and to-the-point ball movement, part basically every winning contributing factor you can imagine. And yes, it was part magic, too, because Thursday was, well, deafening inside Hilton.

The big picture includes a real opportunity to be 12-0 heading into the Jan. 1 Big 12 Conference opener against defending national champion Baylor at Hilton Coliseum. That’s special, considering these guys won just two games last season.

Yes, these guys are playing at a very high level this early into the season, and it's not been against a bunch of Cupcake States. The Cyclones have defeated Oregon State, Xavier, Memphis, Creighton and the Hawkeyes by an average of 13.4 points, these guys that didn't even know each other until showing up to campus last June. It makes you wonder how good they’ll be as the season continues.

"Iowa State has one of the best fan bases in the country," said Iowa veteran guard Jordan Bohannon, the fans’ verbal target throughout the evening. "They’re rowdy, and up into you.

"Iowa State has a phenomenal team this year. I’ve got to give them a lot of credit. I have the utmost respect for their head coach. I have nothing but great things to say about that coaching staff and the players they assembled this year."

It’s a special bunch that’s brought the fun back to watching Iowa State basketball.

When you hold the nation’s top scorer, Keegan Murray, scoreless for the game’s first 28 or so minutes — that’s for real.

When you hold the nation’s No. 3 scoring team 37 points below its 90-point average — that, too, is for real.

And when your rebounding statistics show Iowa State 50, Iowa 32 — that’s as for real as the raw emotion inside the building.

"It was crazy. The echo, the noise," Brockington said. "You could feel the energy right before the game. Definitely, you could feel Hilton Magic."

That was evident while watching Iowa State’s women beat Iowa Wednesday, and fans brought it again a night later.

The passion has returned, after going 2-22 last season. I can’t imagine a team playing any harder. I can’t imagine many players having a better statistical line than Brockington, who played against the Hawkeyes last season before transferring from Penn State.

"His activity is infectious to the rest of the team," Iowa coach Fran McCaffery said. "It always has been."

Everything Iowa State did was infectious Thursday night. Watch the replay. Find the spot in the second half when the Cyclones scored on three dunks in a row.

Special?

Absolutely.

"The character and how hard they work every day came out in this game," Otzelberger said. "Nothing surprises me with this group, because of how they play with each other. They care about each other, and every single day, they bring it out there on that practice court."

Caring about each other is one thing ... but a defense that forced Iowa into 27% shooting? Get used to it, Cyclones fans, because that’s what this team lives by.

"They have a defensive identity that is working," McCaffery said. "It’s creating offense with their defense. It’s brought a camaraderie to their group. They’re playing together. That’s what every coach wants."

It’s what every player on Otzelberger’s first Iowa State team wants, too. They get more excitement out of a big-time defensive stop than a 3-point swisher in transition.

"We made them uncomfortable," Brockington said. "We watched film. We noticed that they never saw ball pressure like ours. They never really saw intensity like ours.

"They were free to do whatever they wanted, run up and down the court and get shots off. We knew we had to make them uncomfortable, and we had to rebound."

Otzelberger’s team did that with its exclamation-point performance. A national message was sent:

His team is for real, and Hilton Coliseum is rocking like it used to rock.

Iowa State columnist Randy Peterson has been writing for the Des Moines Register for parts of six decades. Reach him at rpeterson@dmreg.com, 515-284-8132, and on Twitter at @RandyPete.