Iowa State’s defense keys second-round win over Little Rock

DENVER — The Iowa State men's basketball team sat and watched the opening round as Arkansas-Little Rock's Josh Hagins hit bucket after bucket.

Stopping a mid-major point guard that just dropped 31 points in an NCAA tournament upset wouldn't be easy to slow down. Iowa State's Monte Morris knew attention to detail — particularly in the win-or-go-home situation of March — was critical.

Morris is typically an assist waiting to happen, but in 4-seed Iowa State's 78-61 win against 12-seed Little Rock, he was a cog in a team full of defensive stoppers.

Hagins averages more than 13 points per game, but was held to just eight points on 3-for-8 shooting. His final six points came on two 3-pointers with less than five minutes to go when the Cyclones (23-11) led by 13.

'I did my part of just denying the ball and not letting him be comfortable,' Morris, eight points and four assists, said. 'Like I told y'all before the game, if he would have had 25 points it was going to be a tough 25. I just tried to make it as tough as possible because he's a good player.'

'He's not a slacker,' Hagins said of Morris. 'He's not somebody you kind of pick on on offense, you know what I mean? He can really guard. They brought plenty of help side. They were always there. Even when I got by him, there was a 6'9' guy waiting on me.'

As effective as Morris was defensively as an individual, the Trojans (30-5) couldn't pick on any ISU players offensively. Little Rock shot just 37 percent from the field and had seven offensive rebounds for six second-chance points.

Roger Woods (19) and Lis Shoshi (10) were the only Little Rock players in double figures while the other four Trojans who played at least 20 minutes were a combined 8-for-30 from the field.

'From start to finish, we were terrific tonight,' 'That was what we challenged them at halftime. We've guarded well in the first half of many games this year, but our second-half defense has been very, very poor.

'Tonight we put it all together.'

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