IOWA CITY — In one of the loudest, most hotly contested iterations of the Cy-Hawk Rivalry, the Iowa women used a late 15-2 run to overpower the visiting Cyclones, 75-69. Lucy Olsen led the Hawkeyes with 25 points and five assists in the win, while Syd Affolter contributed 16 points in her biggest impact back from offseason knee surgery.

"We were down for most of the game, but we were never out," said Affolter. "We never thought we were going to lose that game. No matter what the score is, we're competing until the buzzer hits."

Iowa State forward Audi Crooks led all scorers with 31 points in a dominant performance, but she was held scoreless in the fourth quarter until the game was out of reach.

"Our defensive strengths looked better in the second half," said head coach Jan Jensen in the postgame news conference. "And then the crowd always escalates them a bit."

1. Defense keys the comeback. Following a dismal 30-turnover performance against Tennessee, all eyes were on how the Hawkeye offense would handle pressure from the Cyclones (to say nothing of the Big Ten). What a difference the trip back home makes: Iowa committed just nine turnovers in Wednesday's win, to 21 from the visiting Cyclones.

"What we learned [from] Tennessee is how everybody lost," said Jensen. "When you learn how everyone loses, you can know what you have moving forward. And when I watched everybody adapt and turn the page pretty quickly, with a little bit of a chip [on their shoulder], I thought, 'All right, I think we've got something.'"

Hannah Stuelke's 13 points and nine rebounds look solid enough on paper, but her biggest contribution to the game was lockdown defense on Crooks down the stretch, as Iowa blew the dust off its small-ball lineup and put Stuelke back at the 5. The gambit worked, as Iowa was able to deny Crooks the ball in scoring position more readily as the game lurched in the Hawkeyes' favor — the tipping point coming on a perfectly-timed pocket pass from Affolter to Stuelke for the lead.

"They make it really hard for you to run your offense," said Iowa State head coach Bill Fennelly, who has not won at Carver-Hawkeye Arena since 2008. "And then you have enough size, and Hannah Stuelke is very versatile. She can guard on the perimeter, she can guard in the post. ... They're a really, really good solid, fundamental defensive team."

Iowa's ability to shut down Crooks didn't come a moment too soon, as Iowa State's All-American candidate had 27 of her points through the first three quarters — all while Jensen generally avoided doubling the hyper-productive center.

"She's got a beautiful touch," said Jensen of Crooks. "It's hard to double her, because no matter where you bring the double ... she has an unbelievable ability to step and fade, and the double, when you bring it, doesn't affect [her shot]."

Stuelke also found herself singled on Crooks for the center's passing ability.

"You can't [double] too often, because they'll kill you," said Jensen. "I know they practice it. You come for the double and she's going to [pass] it right out to a shooter. So I didn't put the double in the gameplan. Not out of disrespect, but I was like, 'Let her have that. Let's just don't let her kick it out for all those threes they can shoot.'"

The plan seems to have worked — not only did Iowa obviously win the game, but its defense held every other Cyclone to 38 points on 14-32 shooting.

Iowa's defense keyed the comeback, but it also keyed a downright volcanic Carver-Hawkeye Arena crowd, packed to the gills and ready to riot over every call that didn't go the home team's way.

"Thank you to the fans," said Jensen. "They helped us pull this one out."

While Fennelly didn't want to directly credit the crowd noise for his team's fourth-quarter implosion, he freely acknowledged its positive effect on the hometown team.

"This is one of the best [crowds], obviously," said Fennelly. "I don't think it really impacted our composure. Obviously it ratchets up the defensive intensity of the home team. ... At the end of the game, you commit a foul with four seconds on the shot clock, or you forget to guard — is that a correlation to the crowd? I don't know."

The defense saved the evening on multiple occasions, starting essentially from the jump. Iowa State staked a 12-2 lead to start the game, but by the time Stuelke stripped Crooks at the top of the key and raced to a layup, the Hawkeyes were back within four at 19-15, and the air was back in the proverbial balloon.

Still, a listless stretch of offense for the Hawkeyes in the whistle-heavy third quarter helped Iowa State balloon its lead back to 10 at 56-46, and the Iowa offense was still clawing back by the 5:21 mark of the fourth quarter, with the Cyclones up 61-58 off an Emily Ryan layup.

"[The Cyclones] worked their butts off too," said Jensen. "They could have gotten one on the road just as easily as we did."

Then came the clinching defensive onslaught.

Iowa forced five Cyclone turnovers in the last five minutes of the game, with four steals by four different Hawkeyes and a travel forced on Crooks. Affolter also came up with a clutch offensive rebound in a scrum with Crooks, leading to a trip to the charity stripe that helped push Iowa's lead to five; it would not be lower for the rest of the game.

2. The Fearless Four. After riding with the starters through the disastrous fourth quarter against the Volunteers on Saturday, Jensen and the staff knew they had to get their freshman class more involved, especially with Aaliyah Guyton rounding into form as the backup 1.

"I do think we made some errors [Sunday]," said Jensen. "We didn't get in some different combinations there. Tonight, I wanted to make sure I met with the staff that we've got some good young kids, and we've got to make sure we're giving them opportunities."

Consider the lesson learned; Jensen rolled with Stremlow on the floor for eight minutes of the decisive fourth quarter, while Guyton made it on the floor for three minutes — and iced the game with three points, via dagger, in the (ahem) ballroom.

Stremlow and Guyton were the only players off the bench in the fourth quarter for Iowa.

"Those two just came in today with a little fire, and it lit the rest of us up too," said Olsen.

Iowa also likely doesn't win this game without eight minutes from 6'5" freshman center Ava Heiden, who drew three fouls in the process but registered a pair of blocks and assists, flashing her promise of being able to play against top-level competition and finishing with a +5 court rating. Teagan Mallegni earned 7:20 of court time of her own, finishing scoreless but drawing three fouls and blocking another pair of shots in the process.

The Hawkeyes blocked eight shots altogether Wednesday, including two of Crooks' attempts.

Iowa's starting lineup boasts four seniors and a junior, but if Wednesday night is any indication, the freshmen are ready to dominate the bench rotation, with Iowa's class of 2024 taking 48 of the 59 bench minutes.

Every bench minute went to the freshmen from the 3:30 mark of the third quarter on, when Mallegni replaced junior reserve guard Taylor McCabe — who registered just a point and a turnover Wednesday, and missed two of her three free throws, an uncommon sight for the sharpshooter.

With McCabe still looking for her shot (and general productivity) this season, the door looks open for the freshmen to take as many minutes as Jensen can give them as the season progresses.

3. Welcome to the real Carver-Hawkeye Arena, Lucy. Olsen was instrumental in Iowa's win, with a season-high 25 points, along with a team-high five assists, two steals and — critically – no turnovers.

This was also Olsen's first time experiencing Carver-Hawkeye Arena in its full, ear-splitting majesty; Iowa's had no shortage of quality foes in its nonconference run, but most of those games had been on neutral courts; this was only Iowa's third home game of the season, 10 games in, and the other two were against (to borrow a football term) MACrifices Northern Illinois and Toledo.

"The very first exhibition game, her eyes were [wide] like, 'oh my gosh, this is amazing'," said Jensen. "I said, 'Wait until the game that the fans aren't going to give up their tickets for. You're not going to believe what it's like.' And when we got to this moment tonight — that fourth quarter, when we finally turned the corner, boy. That Carver crowd was there."

Olsen's introduction to a big-game atmosphere at Carver lived up to her coach's hype, with at least 108 decibels of Hawkeye roars down the stretch — literal rock-concert walls of sound as Iowa put the game away.

"It was so loud in there," said Olsen. "[Affolter]'s like, 'we're not switching the screens,' and I'm like, 'I can't hear the screen being called!'"

Now that Olsen's had her taste of what Iowa's home environment can truly bring, doubtless she's ready for more — though the team may want to figure out how to communicate screens to each other before the next time the Carver crowd turns the intensity up to "supernova."

Iowa begins its Big Ten season next with a trip to No. 17 Michigan State, still unbeaten at 9-0. That game tips off at 11 am CT Sunday on the Big Ten Network.