Iowa State coach Bill Fennelly on his goals for the 2024-25 season
Iowa State women’s basketball coach Bill Fennelly is excited about what’s happening at the school right now.
AMES − The 2024-25 women’s basketball preseason All-Big 12 team was announced recently by the league’s coaches. It featured 10 players and what Iowa State coach Bill Fennelly believes to be one giant omission: Cyclones point guard Emily Ryan.
“The coaches in the league must not think she’s any good because they picked six or seven point guards on the All-Big 12 team and she didn’t make it,” Fennelly said during Iowa State’s annual media day. “It didn’t bother her, but it bothered me a little bit. But that’s OK. She’ll handle it better than the head coach.”
Ryan is one of the best point guards in Iowa State history and has been one of the Big 12’s best since she began her college career. The 5-foot-11 guard broke into the Cyclones starting lineup as a freshman and has been rewriting the school record book ever since.
In four seasons with the Cyclones, Ryan has averaged 10.9 points, 6.6 assists and 4.4 rebounds per game. She’s coming off one of her best seasons in which she averaged 11.6 points and 6.9 assists per game while helping a young Iowa State team grow into one of the most successful teams in the league.
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Fennelly has praised Ryan’s leadership for sticking with the Cyclones even after Iowa State’s roster underwent a massive makeover following her junior season. While many of her teammates departed, Ryan stayed and tried to help Iowa State survive a turbulent time.
Ryan once again showed how much she loved Iowa State when she opted to take advantage of the extra season of eligibility awarded by the NCAA due to the COVID-19 pandemic and come back for a fifth year.
“She cares deeply about this university,” Fennelly said. “She cares deeply about her teammates. She cares deeply about her fans and I think the leadership she has shown to our program is unlike anything I’ve ever seen.”
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Ryan is one of the reasons why expectations are sky high for the Cyclones. Iowa State was picked to finish second in the Big 12.
“You come to practice and whatever she says, everyone, everyone listens, not just the players, the coaches, the trainers and the managers,” Fennelly said. “She’s just got that ability because everyone knows it’s sincere. There’s nothing phony about her. She loves what this is about.
“She’ll be a college coach someday.”
Tommy Birch, the Register’s sports enterprise and features reporter, has been working at the newspaper since 2008. He’s the 2018, 2020 and 2023 Iowa Sportswriter of the Year. Reach him at tbirch@dmreg.com or 515-284-8468.
