Grill heats up, Cyclones sear Lions

AMES — “Sorry, coach.”

Those words from Iowa State reserve guard Caleb Grill after one of his four missed 3-pointers Sunday found the ear of Cyclones head coach T.J. Otzelberger.

The response?

“I said, ‘There’s no need to apologize,’” Otzelberger told Grill, who scored a season-high 20 points to lead No. 11 ISU to a workmanlike 77-54 win over Southeastern Louisiana at Hilton Coliseum. “‘You’re gonna make the next one.'”

Grill laughed, then swiftly complied.

The 6-3 sixth man from Wichita, Kan., drilled a season-high six 3-pointers while grabbing five rebounds and five assists. Tyrese Hunter led the Cyclones with six assists and Grill added five.

Izaiah Brockington notched his fifth double-double of the season (17 points, 11 rebounds) and Aljaz Kunc swished all three of his 3-point tries to propel ISU (11-0) past the outmanned Lions (4-8).

“It starts with energy and effort,” said Grill, who is shooting 45.4 percent from 3-point range this season. “Coach has always told me if your energy and effort is high you’ll just play better on both ends of the floor.”

Grill and Kunc combined to shoot 9 of 13 from long range. The rest of the Cyclones made just 1 of 10 from beyond the arc, but continued to shine defensively, limiting Southeastern Louisiana to 37 percent shooting.

“We weren’t putting them in as tough of a spot to adjust the concepts that they were putting out there,” Otzelberger said. “At the same time. we have really high standards and demands for the way we’re going to play defense and that involves a lot of physicality. I thought there were more possessions, even though they shot a better percentage in the second half — I felt like we had some more physicality, caused them to play faster and get us in transition.”

ISU turned 13 Lions turnovers into 18 points and crafted a 36 to 12 edge in points in the paint.

Brockington scored his 17 points on just 12 shots and help the Cyclones shoot a sizzling 77 percent (20 of 26) in the second half.

“I feel like we just trusted our offense and trusted ourselves,” Brockington said. “And Caleb was hitting, so we had guys that stepped up, made big 3s and just really gave us momentum. That helped spread the floor out and get easier paint touches and stuff like that led to a higher percentage.”

Grill has hit multiple 3-pointers in six of the Cyclones’ 11 wins. He started his career at ISU but transferred to play for Otzelberger at UNLV last season. In his first stint as a Cyclone, Grill struggled shooting the basketball, draining just 31.4 percent of his long-range shots. Now he’s ISU’s biggest spark off the bench — and never needs to apologize if he misses an open look.

“He cares about others around him and he wants to play well,” Otzelberger said. “You heard him say that he just wanted to play really hard with energy and effort, and then the reality of the game sets in and you’re not thinking about offense, but it comes to you.”

It sure did Sunday.

“I knew he had it going and when it gets like that we really just keep giving him confidence,” Brockington said. “Just keep giving him the ball.”