Hlas: Cyclones’ Monte Morris passes and surpasses

AMES — How can you win in a men's basketball conference as strong as the Big 12 when you get out-rebounded by 10 a game?

Your margin-of-error obviously is tiny. Which is where senior point guard Monte Morris stands tall for Iowa State.

Morris had another of those statistic lines Saturday night in Hilton Coliseum that would set off news alerts were they connected to almost any other college player. But with him, they're dog-bites-man.

Nine assists. Zero turnovers.

'Just think if we had a guy you were just going to throw it into the post every time,' ISU Coach Steve Prohm said after his team walloped Oklahoma, 80-64. 'He may have 12 assists. We score most from jump shots and drives.'

The Cyclones had just four turnovers. That, and hitting a dozen 3-point shots, is why they picked apart an uncommonly bad Lon Kruger-coached Sooners squad.

Here's how ho-hum Morris' 9/0 assists-to-turnovers was: After the game, ESPN's Fran Fraschilla interviewed the Cyclones' other two starting guards, Naz Mitrou-Long (23 points) and Matt Thomas (13). They also were the two guys Prohm brought with him to the postgame interview room.

Morris? Old hat. An old, perfect fit of a hat.

Players don't do what he's done, which is lead the nation in assist-to-turnover ratio as a freshman, sophomore, and again as a senior. His ratio this season is 5.83, 140 dimes to a mere 24 miscues.

'I've had some great point guards,' said Prohm, 'but I've never had an assist/turnover ratio at this rate. In conference play it's like 9-to-1, 8-to-1, I think. That's ridiculous.'

It's 8.22-to-1 to be precise. Seventy-four assists and nine turnovers in 12 games. Ridiculous is right.

'Yes,' Iowa State radio analyst Eric Heft answered emphatically before the game when I asked him if Morris was the best Cyclone point guard he's watched in his 38 years of being a broadcaster here. That covers a lot of standouts, like NBA players-to-be Jeff Hornacek and Jamaal Tinsley.

'Number one,' Heft said, 'Monte doesn't make bad plays. It's the Hippocratic oath. First, do no harm.

'But he's not just a caretaker. He has the ability to make big shots. He has no fear of taking the big shot, and he's OK living with it when it doesn't work out.

'I love the way he plays.'

Two years ago, Heft told Morris he wanted to see him break two ISU records: Career and single-game assists.

Morris, from Flint, Mich., got the career mark recently. He has 691. His single-game best is 12, four fewer than the school-record set in 1974 ... by Heft.

'I want somebody to break that record who's a good player,' Heft said, 'not a schlub like me.'

But there's more to Morris' game than passing. His 16.0 points per game tops his team. That's been essential after last year's graduation of another generational Cyclone player, power forward Georges Niang.

Also, Morris defends. He had six rebounds (he averages 4.8) and three steals Saturday, and is three more steals from tying Hornacek for the school's all-time lead in that category.

'That's big-time for me,' Morris said. 'It's a stat I take honor in.'

Iowa State hit the two-thirds mark of the Big 12 season with a 7-5 mark. That's the same mark it had at the same point a year ago, but even with a win at Kansas the Saturday before this season has felt like it's lacked something.

Like, duh, Niang. And, fellow NBA draftee/small forward Abdel Nader. And, post presence Jameel McKay.

But if this 15-9 team gets Iowa State to the NCAA tourney for the sixth-straight season, its first-round opponent will face a point guard who to this point has been part of 91 victories, four of them in NCAA games.

Talents of his kind seldom pass this way, pun intended.