Iowa State without Seanna Johnson in cold loss to Kansas State

AMES - Iowa State coach Bill Fennelly was passionate in saying Seanna Johnson's absence against Kansas State wasn't the reason for his team's latest loss.

Not having her on the court certainly didn't help matters though.

Johnson has been away from the team since Sunday and is with her family in Minnesota after her father suffered a stroke. Without her versatility, the Cyclones struggled to get much going in a 68-53 loss to the Wildcats.

'We're not a very good team as it is and when you take a first team all-Big 12 (type) player off your team, it's pretty hard,” Fennelly said. 'Certainly our focus is with her and her family and we wish her the best. That had nothing to do with the outcome of the game.”

It's not known when Johnson will return to the team.

Shooting woes continued to plague Iowa State (13-14, 5-11) as the team shot 27.7 percent from the field and 19.3 percent in the second and third quarters combined. Nicole 'Kidd” Blaskowsky led the Cyclones with 12 points - all on 3-pointers - while Bridget Carleton and Emily Durr added 11 and 10, respectively.

As cold as Iowa State was shooting, the rebounding numbers proved to be as big of a challenge. The Wildcats (18-9, 8-8) outrebounded the Cyclones 50-29 with a monster performance from Breanna Lewis with her 25 points and 16 boards.

'I try to go in there as a shooter and scorer,” Durr, who started in place of Johnson, said. 'I try to do what I do best and unfortunately a lot of shots didn't fall tonight, but I can always do better. I don't think I did very well tonight. The scoreboard kind of tells you that.”

Iowa State finished the night with only one turnover, which was committed in the final minutes, and even found a bit of a shooting stroke early. The Cyclones jumped out to a 17-10 lead after a 14-0 run, hitting four straight buckets. But the Wildcats were able to climb back in less than two minutes to knot the game at 17-all.

Kansas State ended the first half on a 19-4 run while holding Iowa State to more than six minutes without scoring to blow the game open

'We don't have a turnover for the whole game which means you get a shot every single time down the floor,” Fennelly said. 'They're playing a zone and you've got to make a 3. It's been the same thing all year. We can't make shots. We can analyze that in a million different ways, but this is a team that needs to make open shots. We didn't tonight and haven't all year.”

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