Peterson: Iowa State men's basketball facing an early-season defining stretch of the schedule

AMES – Villanova, No. 15 North Carolina and No. 6 Connecticut last week. St. Johns (8-0) at 2 p.m., Sunday. At Iowa on Thursday.

Welcome to the unrelenting continuation of No. 23 Iowa State’s non-conference men’s basketball schedule.

Power opponent after power opponent – with a couple supposed freebies in between, before opening Big 12 Conference play on New Year’s Eve against No. 10 Baylor at Hilton Coliseum.

If we don’t already know just how good T.J. Otelberger’s second Cyclones team is, then by golly we’ll have a decent gauge late next week when this grueling stretch of six games (including five against power-conference opponents) in 14 days is history.

Ready or not, the round-robin Big 12 Conference schedule is nearly upon us. Will Iowa State be ready?

From listening to coach T.J. Otzelberger after Wednesday’s 63-44 victory against North Dakota at Hilton Coliseum and a couple days later, you could get the impression he doesn’t even know who’s coming when. He knows St. Johns is Sunday’s 2p.m., opponent, and I’m pretty sure he knows the Hawkeyes are sometime next week.

More:Iowa State men's basketball overcomes slow start to ground North Dakota

He’s a coach. He doesn’t look too far ahead, and with the makeup of this team, that’s all right.

This 6-1 team is still learning. Defense is still solid, the shooting is just as streaky as we figured. Freshman reserve Demarion Watson has shown signs of being very good. Another freshman, Tamin Lipsey, continues to run the team.

“His confidence is growing,” Otzelberger said. “He’s commanding the team more every day.”

He’s a rookie, one year removed from facing Ankeny, Cedar Rapids Kennedy, Christian Brothers of St. Louis, and Waukee when he was at Ames High School. Now he’s facing Villanova, North Carolina, Connecticut and Iowa.

Not only is he running the point, he’s doing it during a somewhat defining pre-Big 12 early-season stretch.

“It’s all about our daily habits,” Lipsey said. “In the games, it starts on defense. We preach pressuring the ball — get steals and runouts. The offense will take care of itself.”

St. Johns is No. 17 nationally with an average of 76.7 possessions a game, compared to Iowa State’s 69.3. St. Johns averages 83.5 points, which is good for No. 15 in the nation, while the Cyclones opponents have averaged just 56.3 points.

“Last year, this year, they probably have the fastest pace,” Otzelberger said Friday. “What does that mean? They fly it at you. They want live-ball turnovers. They want long rebounds. They want quick shots and they want to turn them into points.

“That means we’ve got to do a great job sprinting back on defense. That means we’ve got to do a great job on the offensive boards, because when we’re getting the offensive rebound, it doesn’t allow them the opportunity to run.”

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The Red Storm are part of what could be a resume-padders, and yes, that’s notable despite this just being the first week of December.

Going 12-0 before opening the Big 12, was a springboard for reaching the NCAA tournament last season. Beating the likes of Oregon State, Xavier, Memphis, Creighton and Iowa put the Cyclones on the map. At one point, they had more Quad 1 wins than anyone.

This team isn’t to that point, but what happened in Portland, shows there’s at least a path to an NCAA Tournament return.

“Honestly, we’ve been ready for this since August,” said senior guard Jaren Holmes. “We’ve had the same habits. We just continue to develop those same habits. I would say we’re ready.”

That includes the true freshman from Ames who will run the Cyclones’ point.

“Everybody works hard, and then when you get here, you realize it’s the cumulative of every single day being in that process,” Otzelberger said. “Sometimes with guys, it can break their spirit a little bit. Tamin’s got tremendous mental toughness. He’s been through adversity with some injuries and knows how to battle coming back from an injury, which also helps him from game to game to turn things around quickly.

“It goes back to his character and what an awesome young man he is. His confidence and court demeanor are reflective of that character.”

Iowa State columnist Randy Peterson embarked on his 50th year of writing sports for the Des Moines Register in December 2021. Reach him at rpeterson@dmreg.com, 515-284-8132, and on Twitter @RandyPete.