Cole Netten leaving his mark in the Iowa State record books

AMES — In the days leading up to Iowa State's road trip to Texas, head coach Matt Campbell gave an assessment of his kicker.

Senior Cole Netten had converted every field goal attempt this season with each kick extending a school-record streak for makes. On his longest attempt of the season, that streak came to an end last week.

After making field goals of 39 and 25 yards to help the Cyclones (1-6, 0-4) to a 6-3 lead against the Longhorns, Netten attempted his first 50-yarder of the season as time expired in the first half. It fell short, stopping his consecutive-makes streak at 15.

'It's a game of inches, a lot like golf,' Netten told the Cyclone Radio Network after the game. 'You've got to have everything right. If your plant foot is off a little bit, it's not going to work out.

'That's the most important thing is the focus on the detail, remind yourself what you need to do to complete it and it'll go from there.'

'Cole's been great all year,' quarterback Joel Lanning told the CRN. 'That was a long kick, too. He was fine. I came in and told him at halftime, 'Hey keep your head up because we're going to need you at the end of the game.' Unfortunately it didn't come down to that.'

Before his miss at Texas, Netten hadn't failed to connect on a field goal since the fifth game of last season and had continued his climb toward the top of the record books.

He's scored 257 career points with 45 field goals, second all-time at Iowa State to Jeff Shudak, who had 266 points and 58 field goals from 1987-90. Netten owns a 76.2 field goal percentage (45-of-59) for his career, a program best.

ESPN.com listed Netten as its selection for the midseason All-Big 12 team Wednesday, making him the only ISU player recognized.

'Cole's got such an explosive leg and he's done a really good job this year for us,' Campbell said last week. 'Again, my challenge to him after the spring was consistency. I think that's what we've seen in practice and his attention to detail to his craft has been really good. I'm much appreciative and he's having a really good senior year.'

While Netten has continued his rise in the record books, punter Colin Downing has put together a productive season in his own right.

At Texas, Downing averaged 46.3 yards on seven punts and pinned two kicks inside the Longhorns' 10-yard line. He has 42 punt attempts this season for 1,754 yards — a 41.7 average — with a long of 67 yards.

'One of the big things we've been focusing on is our process, not the outcome,' Netten said of the specialists. 'If you focus on the outcome then you allow fear to come in. What we're doing is focusing on what we do and the outcome will come after that.'

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