by Tulsa Brave » January 17th, 2015, 8:41 am
As an Iowa State alum myself, who grew up in Peoria on Bradley basketball, let me help with a few things...
First of all, Hilton Magic is not a recent term. That term was first coined back in the 80's when I was a student there, and with good reason. During my 4 years there, we were nearly unbeatable at home, consistently beating teams that were far superior to us, including Kansas, Oklahoma, and Missouri. Yet on the road, we hardly ever beat anyone, including the worst of the worst in the old Big 8. You'd be hard pressed to find another D-1 team in the nation that had a home/road disparity as large as the Cyclones did back then. Nowadays, that disparity is long gone, but the term "Hilton Magic" is still used for some reason.
I can not speak for current ISU students, but those of us from long ago are nothing like what is being described here. What I will say is that Hoiberg has achieved great results in a short term based on the state of the program when he took over. He has done so in what is seen as an unconventional way, but it has worked. They have over-achieved each season recently, and this year should be a legitimate Big 12 contender, although they still do have a few shortcomings, which will likely keep them from being a true national title contender. Compare what Hoiberg as done at ISU to what Ford has done at BU, or Lusk at MSU.
We also do not compare everything we do to Iowa. We've proven on the court our superiority to them the past several years, winning 5 of the last 6, and 9 of the last 13 years against them. UNI has competed favorably against both Iowa and Iowa State as well recently, so we hold nothing against them or Wichita State. Personally, I do not want to see UNI or WSU against ISU in the tourney until at least the Final 4, because I don't want the teams I root for to play each other until as late as possible for obvious reasons.