With just four games left in the regular season, the Texas Longhorns have the chance to be the first team not named Kansas to win an outright Big 12 title in the last seven years. Before losing to Nebraska on Saturday, that outcome seemed all but guaranteed for Texas. But with that pesky loss now on their record, the Longhorns have almost no margin for error down the stretch. Kansas has only one game left that seems like a possible loss, coming on the final day of the season when they travel to Columbia to take on Mizzou.

Texas, meanwhile, has a handful of tough games left on its plate. Road trips to Colorado and Baylor are certainly not guaranteed wins, and the Longhorns still have to host a Kansas State team that upset the Jayhawks last Monday. Tonight’s tussle with Iowa State is the only “easy” game left for Texas during these last two weeks, so they absolutely have to take care of business in this one.

By the numbers

Offensively, Iowa State ranks in the top third of Division I basketball, but it’s practically all thanks to their three-point shooting. The Cyclones are ranked 48th nationally with a 37.6% mark behind the arc, and they take nearly 38% of their shots from that distance.

Iowa State hardly ever gets to the line, and in fact the Cyclones have a team free-throw rate that is third-worst in the entire country. This is a product of their reliance on jump shots, particularly three-pointers. The low FTR for Iowa State is a welcome sight for the Longhorns, who suffered on Saturday when Gary Johnson had to sit with early foul problems. Against the Cyclones, very few Texas players should be in foul trouble tonight.

The Longhorns will also benefit from the lack of offensive rebounding by Iowa State. The Cyclones grab just 29.7% of their misses, and have struggled even more in conference play, where they have an offensive rebounding mark of just 26.4%. On Saturday, Texas allowed the Cornhuskers to have a field day on the offensive glass, despite the fact that Nebraska also had an offensive rebounding mark below 30% in Big 12 play. The Longhorns simply cannot fail to exploit this advantage in a second-straight game.

Although Iowa State has won just one game in conference play, they have competed in almost every contest. They have six conference losses by six points or less, and have been defeated twice in overtime. While Texas is certainly more talented than the Cyclones, don’t be surprised if Iowa State makes this a much closer game than most are expecting.

Meet the Cyclones

Fatigue is likely a big reason why the Cyclones have fallen short so many times this season. Iowa State has perhaps the thinnest rotation that Texas has faced all year, with only seven men seeing significant playing time. More importantly, the starting five accounts for 81% of the team’s minutes. If the bigger, more physical Longhorns manage to get the Iowa State starters into foul trouble, there isn’t much more in the cupboard for first-year coach Fred Hoiberg.

The Cyclones are led by Diante Garrett, a combo guard who can carry the team with his scoring when he isn’t dishing out assists. Garrett is really the only player on the Iowa State roster who can repeatedly break down opponents off the dribble, which allows him to both get to the rack and create openings for his teammates when defenses react.

Garrett is averaging more than six assists per game, best in the Big 12 by a wide margin. His 17.3 points per game is fifth-best in the league, but his eye-popping numbers are overshadowed by Iowa State’s poor record.

Garrett is joined in the backcourt by sharpshooter Scott Christopherson. The junior from Wisconsin has hit more than 45% of his three-point attempts, a mark that is tops in the Big 12 and 23rd-best in D-I basketball. Christopherson has had four different games in which he’s made at least five three-pointers — including two games in which he sank seven triples — and has made at least one three in every game he’s played this year.

Another scorer in the backcourt is senior Jake Anderson, who arrived in Ames after three years as a starter at Northern Illinois, where he played for former Colorado coach Ricardo Patton. Anderson is actually the team’s best rebounder despite being just 6’2″, as he averages 7.5 boards per game. He can make aggressive moves off the dribble and is smart enough to identify mismatches when he has smaller guards isolated on defense near the paint.

The only other guard to play significant minutes for Coach Hoiberg is Bubu Palo, a sixth man who brings energy off the bench. Palo redshirted his freshman season after being recruited to Ames as a walk-on, and is now providing nearly 15 minutes per game. He can take over ballhandling duties when Garrett needs a breather, as Palo was the starting point guard for his high school team, which won the Iowa state championship in 2009. You may have even heard of one of Palo’s Ames High teammates, a kid by the name of Harrison Barnes.

In the frontcourt, the Cyclones counter Texas’ Toronto connection with their own Canadian product, Melvin Ejim. At 6’6″, the freshman has already shown the ability to defend bigger, more physical players. Unfortunately, he’s also revealed a tendency to get beat by more athletic forwards who can take him off the dribble, like Tech’s Mike Singletary and the Morris twins at Kansas.

Even with that knock against him, Ejim is a solid defender and rebounder, and can score easily inside or with his smooth mid-range jumper. Although he doesn’t shoot it as often as his teammates, Ejim has even shown the ability to occasionally knock down the three.

Also in the frontcourt is Jamie Vanderbeken, an excellent three-point shooter who can pull opposing big men out of the paint with his long-range threat. His ability to score from the perimeter opens up the driving lanes for Garrett and Anderson, and the guards often find Vanderbeken wide open behind the arc when defenses collapse on them in the paint.

Thanks to his prediliction for playing on the perimeter, Vanderbeken’s offensive rebounding numbers are unimpressive for a 6’11” guy. On defense, though, he plays like a big man. His 1.8 blocks per game are 3rd in the Big 12, and he’s third on the team in defensive rebounding.

Off the bench, Iowa State has two frontcourt options in Calvin Godfrey and Jordan Railey. While Godfrey plays nearly twice as many minutes as Railey, the Cyclones will likely call on both of them for extra minutes against a bigger Texas team tonight. Both forwards have had major issues with foul trouble so far this year, so they will likely have a tough time trying to contain the Longhorn frontcourt in this one.

Keys to the game

The quickest way for Texas to put away the Cyclones tonight is to lock down the perimeter. Besides Garrett, Iowa State lacks any true creators, so the Longhorns must make sure that the Cyclone sharpshooters aren’t getting open looks from behind the arc. Garrett simply cannot beat Texas on his own, and as long as his outlets are being covered, he also won’t be able to kill the Horns with well-timed kick-outs for three.

The Longhorns also need to control the defensive glass tonight. They did a terrible job of this on Saturday, and it ultimately cost them the game in Lincoln. With the Cyclones guaranteed to take a lot of long-range jumpers tonight, Texas cannot afford to let the long caroms get away from them. The Longhorns have to grab those missed shots and limit the number of chances Iowa State has to do damage from three-point range.

Finally, Texas must abuse Iowa State inside. Kansas absolutely decimated the smaller Cyclone lineup behind great performances by the Morris twins, who averaged a combined 40 points and 23 rebounds in their two games against Iowa State. If Tristan Thompson and Gary Johnson can get going early against the Cyclones, the Longhorns will rack up the points and also hang some fouls on a thin ISU frontcourt.