Iowa State coach Dan McCarney doesn’t want the speculation surrounding his future to be a distraction for his players. The Cyclones are 0-6 in the Big-12 after a 41-10 loss to Kansas and during his weekly news conference in Ames McCarney asked reporters to keep the players out of the discussion.
McCarney asked reporters to zero in on the last two games and the seniors finishing their careers instead of asking players about the coaches and whether the coaches should continue at Iowa State. McCarney says it’s probably not hard to tell what the player vote would be and asked as a favor to him that reporters focus in on the effort to finish the season as strong as possible.
McCarney was emotional as he said it’s not too much for the coaches to answer questions about the future, but said it’s way too much for the players and “unfair” to do that to the players.
A season that began with high expectations has become a string of disappointments and Iowa State needs to beat Colorado or Missouri to avoid a winless conference season. McCarney says they all wanted to have a much better record, but says they knew the schedule would be daunting. McCarney says the players have given a lot to the university and he wants the last couple of games to focus on their attempt to get a couple of wins, rather than focusing on whether he’ll be there for the future.
The Cyclones visit Colorado this weekend.