PETE: And the best player on Iowa State’s basketball team is . . . ?

Ten games into Iowa State’s so-far, so-good men’s basketball season, and we still don’t know everything – like, just who is T.J. Otzelberger’s best player.

I could have asked 10 different fans that question after Sunday’s 83-51 victory against Omaha at Hilton Coliseum, and they’d give me at least five different players -- and a valid reason for each.

Tamin Lipsey.

No, it’s Curtis Jones . . .

But what about Keshon Gilbert?

Yeah, but have you seen Joshua Jefferson’s versatility?

He’s right up there, too, but what about Milan Momcilovic?

Three different players have led the 9-1 Cyclones in scoring. Three have led rebounding. Four have been a game’s top distributor. Five players average within five points of one another, so there’s also that. Who’s the one player opponents try to take out of the game?

Still perplexed about who’s the best?

The Sweet 16 team’s best player last season was Gilbert. Or was it possibly Jones? And Lipsey was pretty dang good, too, despite playing hurt toward the end of the season.

That’s the beauty of Cyclones basketball. Aside from Izaiah Brockington in Otzelberger’s first season, scoring has been balanced. That was especially evident last season, when four players averaged between 10.9 and 13.7 points. This season, three are making between 38% and 49% of their three-point shots.

Let’s look at it this way:

If you’re coaching shot-a-plenty, no-D pick-up ball, which Iowa State player would you select first?

Even if you’re looking strictly for shooters, your choice wouldn’t be a slam dunk.

**

Thoughts, questions and other meanderings watching ball on the couch and with fireplace a-blazin.’

** I’ve written, and will continue to write that Cy vs. Hawk needs to continue. Yet, I wonder, as the Big Ten and SEC appear to be positioning themselves to change the face of college sports as we know it.

What happens to our grand in-state rivalry, and which bites dust first – football or basketball Cy-Hawk – when The Chosen 34 forms an alliance in which no outsiders are allowed?

The thought here is that basketball is safe given the commonality of a 20-game conference schedule, flexibility of non-conference opponents, and the eventual increase up to 76 or however many teams that could make future NCAA Tournaments.

If you’re not one of the top 76, no amount of crying about selection committee shenaniganswill change thinking that someone got hosed. If you’re not among the 76, you deserve what you didn’t get, but I digress.

Football, though, is a different monster. Some leagues have eight-game conference schedules. Some have nine-gamers. Some leagues have room for four non-cons, others have opportunities for just three.

If the SEC and Big Ten split off into an elite entity, what happens if they decide to build an entire 12-game schedule of just themselves?

What happens to Cy-Hawk football?

See ya.

That’s probably far-fetched, considering all the strength of schedule vs. wins chatter, but it’s still something about which I thought, while watching Cy-Hawk basketball last week.

** The women’s game nationally has been at least somewhat physical, but I look for that to intensify, as the popularity of WNBA games grow.

That game has been bod-to-bod, hand-to-hand contact the past few years. That game became more physical when Caitlin Clark joined up – opponents trying to rattler her with uncalled pushing and shoving all over the court. Will it trickle down to the colleges?

It already is.

** Has anyone checked in with Kansas State men’s coach Jerome Tang for his thoughts on drones that are flying above New Jersey?

I still shake my head on that one -- when Tang, taking (without verification) the word of an assistant that the Cyclones videotaped Kansas State’s timeout huddles during a 78-67 Cyclones victory in Ames last Jan. 24. It’s unfathomable something like that could even logistically happen, let alone give a team an edge.

Tang confronted Otzelberger during the game, then did likewise afterwards. A day later, we learned via the Kansas City Star that Tang was concerned Iowa State had “placed managers and/or other team representatives in spots behind the visiting bench where they could view, and possibly record, the Wildcats as they huddled up during timeouts.”

Otzelberger, mum on the issue after the game, erupted after Iowa State's next-game victory against Kansas in Ames.

"It's incredibly disappointing that after such an awesome game, an awesome environment and atmosphere, that I even have to begin by addressing something that happened earlier this week," Otzelberger said. "The ludicrous rumors earlier this week that somehow we were trying to gain an advantage looking into our opponent's huddles, is an affront to our players, our fans and to me.

"It's not who I am. It's not what our program is about, and I'm angry that someone would even make that suggestion."

Sorry for the lengthy context, but I wanted to make sure that new Drake coach Ben McCollum knew about this before his team’s Dec. 17 game against the Wildcats in Kansas City.