How a small detail makes a big impression for Iowa State basketball

KANSAS CITY – The Iowa State men have played 4,100 minutes of basketball over the last three seasons.

T.J. Otzelberger has been standing for every single one of them.

It’s not merely a quirk or nervous energy at work, but an intentional and considered choice by the Cyclones’ head coach.

“We talk about playing the full 40 minutes,” Otzelberger told the Register, “and I want our guys to know I’m engaged with them the whole 40 minutes.

“What I want our guys to know is regardless of what the situation in the game is, every possession matters. If I’m going to say that every possession matters, then how I carry myself for every possession probably should also reflect that.”

More: 'They do what they do:' How Iowa State basketball's defensive identity unlocked success

It’s certainly a small detail, and Otzelberger isn’t alone among his peers for preferring standing and moving versus a seat on the bench.

It's a choice that could even be branded as trivial, but when Otzelberger took over a program that had bottomed out by going winless against the Big 12 and 2-22 overall in 2020-21, nothing was too minute to be used to communicate a very specific message.

“I want to uphold the things I say matter and are important and are standards,” Otzelberger said. “What we’re trying to do is make sure our actions speak louder than our words, and I feel like that is on the court, off the court, in practice, in games.”

That mentality has played a critical role in Iowa State’s resurgence, which will reach a new milestone on Selection Sunday, when the Cyclones are expected to land a coveted top-two seed that would allow them to play their first- and second-round NCAA Tournament games a short trip down Interstate 35 and across Interstate 80 to Omaha. The men's selection show is at 5 p.m. on CBS (the women's show is at 7 p.m. on ESPN).

Iowa State crushed Houston, the nation's top-ranked team, 69-41 in Saturday's Big 12 Tournament championship game to add another brick to Otzelberger's incredible rebuild. The Cyclones have been ranked in the top-10 for the last month and posted their best league finish in nearly a quarter-century. Otzelberger's team finished second in the Big 12 regular season to Houston and takes a 27-7 record into the NCAA Tournament.

The Cyclones are poised for a Big Dance that realistically could produce the most memorable March for the program in at least a generation.

Much of that success can be traced back to their almost maniacal attention-to-detail mentality.

Otzelberger has never addressed or acknowledged his standing habit, but it hasn’t gone unnoticed.

“That was one of the first things I noticed being here,” Tre King, a senior with previous stops at Eastern Kentucky and Georgetown, told the Register. “That shows how into it he is, how focused he is and how badly he wants to win, as bad as we do. It’s easy for us to get behind that and play even harder.”

It’s a small expression of the mentality Otzelberger promised at his introductory press conference three years ago.

“We’re going to be relentlessly competitive on the court,” Otzelberger said in March of 2021. “I’m somebody that the work ethic, the work capacity, the level of intensity and accountability that we approach each day, that’s going to come through on the floor of Hilton Coliseum and everywhere that the Cyclones play.

“We’re going to compete on every possession.”

More: By preparing for adversity, Iowa State basketball has largely avoided it

That vision has been reality for nearly every moment of Otzelberger’s tenure at Iowa State. The Cyclones have boasted one of the most physical, most disruptive and best defenses in the country in all three years, leading to three consecutive NCAA Tournament appearances.

That brand of basketball could very well be closely associated with an adversarial relationship to officiating, with physical and ball-hawking basketball often allowed or curtailed by the way the whistle blows.

That, though, represents the other half of Otzelberger’s sideline demeanor. While he is always up, always stalking the sideline, that demeanor rarely – if ever – involves demonstratively hunting down officials.

For Iowa State, poise is the flip side of their aggressive posture.

“You see how the officials react to him,” Iowa State assistant coach JR Blount said. “He’s calm and composed, and I think (officials) give us those calm and composed responses.

“They’re human beings. He interacts with them like humans, and they give him that same respect. That’s why we can be able to tell our guys in timeouts, ‘They said this or that,’ because their communication is so good.”

More: Iowa State basketball, with a mostly unheralded roster, continues as a Big 12 contender

The true motivation for Otzelberger’s standing routine, though, is consistency.

“(Players) notice how he interacts throughout the whole game,” Cyclone assistant coach Kyle Green said. “It doesn’t matter what the score is. He’s pretty consistent with his demeanor. He’s pretty consistent with his communication, with how he communications, his attention to detail.

“They take notice of those things. That’s important to the consistency of our success.”

Players also can pick up on when that isn’t exactly the case.

“There are a lot of coaches out there, they want their team to play (a certain way),” assistant coach Nate Schmidt said, “and then they don’t act how they want their team to be.

“Our guys are always watching. Not just in practice. Not just on the court. All day, every day – they're always watching, seeing everything he does. Probably even more than hearing what he’s saying. For him, it’s living that out through the whole day. Not just at game time, but with everything he does.”

That is something Otzelberger remains vigilant about.

“It doesn’t mean I feel any way about anybody that does (sit),” Otzelberger said. “It leans far, far more into that everything I’m doing, nobody can look at anything that I’m doing and say, ‘Hold on. You say you’re about this, but you’re not,’ or, ‘You tell the players to do this, but you don’t.’”

Perhaps most crucially, Otzelberger’s choice to stand for every minute of game play – he does sit down to address the team during timeout huddles – is a manifestation of his mantra that everything the Cyclones do matters. There is no detail too small to be considered.

“Even though it is a small thing,” King said, “I think it’s huge. It speaks to what we’re about and what we do.

“When you see that from your head guy, your leader, it’s easy for us to follow behind and follow suit.”

Otzelberger remaining upright during a game has had more than a symbolic effect for the Cyclones.

It’s made the bench a little roomier, especially for Schmidt, who often occupies both his assigned seat and the one Otzelberger is designated for but never utilizes.

“He’s chilling,” King said with a chuckle. “He'll be over there sprawled out. He basically could kick up and take a nap.”

Schmidt, though, said the benefit is shared across the staff, which would otherwise be separated between those leading the defense (Blount and Green) to Otzelberger’s right and those on the offense (Schmidt and Erick Crawford) to his left.

“We try to space it out sometimes,” Schmidt said, smiling, “but I know coach Crawford appreciates he and I aren’t hugged up.

“It makes my life easy. I’ve got a bunch of room over there.”

The Cyclones are likely now headed to the CHI Health Center in Omaha to start the NCAA Tournament on Thursday or Friday. But it could be the FedEx Forum in Memphis. Or Gainbridge Fieldhouse in Indianapolis.

Next could be TD Garden in Boston or the American Airlines Center in Dallas for the Sweet 16.

Then could come State Farm Stadium in Glendale. The Final Four.

Wherever the Cyclones go, though, Otzelberger will be there on the sideline – standing, walking and communicating to his players.

“I want them to feel confident,” Otzelberger said. “I want them to feel poise. I want them to know we’ve done the hard work.

“Everything I’m saying to them, I want my body language, my disposition, the way I communicate to reflect all those same things.”

Travis Hines covers Iowa State University sports for the Des Moines Register and Ames Tribune. Contact him at thines@amestrib.com or  (515) 284-8000. Follow him at @TravisHines21.

This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Why T.J. Otzelberger never sits during Iowa State basketball games