Rachel Blount: Fennelly's positive force bonds Cyclones, fans -- even when team loses

Bill Fennelly keeps a framed copy of the boxscore in his office at Iowa State, just to remind himself of the way things used to be. The bottom line of that single sheet of paper shows that 310 people attended Fennelly's debut as the Cyclones' women's basketball coach in 1995.

There were nearly that many standing in the Williams Arena lobby two hours before the Cyclones' 76-56 loss to Georgia in the second round of the NCAA tournament Monday. It's fashionable these days for sports teams to identify their fans as a "nation," but Cyclones women's hoops devotees qualify as a full-blown cultural phenomenon.

Even as their team fell behind by 32 points in the second half -- and long past the point at which Minnesotans flee from the bleachers to beat the traffic -- they leapt from their seats and bellowed for every Cyclones basket.

This came as no surprise to Fennelly. The native son has long understood how tapping into the home-state zeitgeist could inspire the kind of fierce devotion that isn't undone by a blowout loss. As Tim Brewster tries to reconnect with the Gophers' disaffected football crowd, he would do well to follow the Fennelly method of grabbing fans by their hearts, one handshake at a time.

"How many fans cheer when you're down by 30?" said Fennelly, who left the court Monday blowing kisses to several thousand people offering a standing ovation. "They'd be running for the exits. Iowa State people are not that way. They are the most special people I've seen in my career as a coach."

The mutual admiration runs deep here, and it has much to do with Fennelly's approach to building a program. He and his wife, Deb, both grew up in Iowa and remain steeped in its ethic. The coach took a five-figure pay cut to come to Ames, where the staff at Hilton Coliseum used to cordon off a tiny area with yellow tape to mark the handful of seats that would be occupied at women's basketball games.

Personable and outgoing, Fennelly is the kind of guy who thanks the media for attending news conferences and gives speeches to just about any civic group or kids' club that asks. In his previous job at Toledo, he once shook the hands of all 150 fans who showed up to a game. Iowans appreciated his genuine enthusiasm and humility; he appreciated their desire to connect with their athletes in ways other than sitting in the stands.

Fennelly gave them a winner. Before he arrived, the Cyclones were coming off a four-year record of 22-86 and had had five winning seasons in 22 years. During his tenure, they have won 20 or more games in seven seasons, made eight NCAA tournament appearances and are among the top-drawing women's basketball teams in the nation with an average of 8,906 fans at Hilton.

More important, he gave them a team that reflects the Iowa ideal of friendliness, modesty, effort and generosity. That, more than anything, is why thousands of people traveled up I-35 to wave their signs and pompons for a Cyclones team that was badly outmatched.

"It's pretty special to see 7,000 people drive three hours on a Monday night to watch 40 minutes of basketball," said Cyclones forward Megan Ronhovde of Barrett, Minn. "That's the experience I had every single night in Hilton. It's a really neat, neat thing."

Even Georgia coach Andy Landers was impressed. When an ESPN reporter asked him whether it was fair for the Bulldogs to play what was essentially a home game for the Cyclones, he didn't bite.

"This is what little girls dream of when they're 8 or 9 years old, shooting in the driveway," he said. "The score wasn't that good today. But the Iowa State fans made it a great game."

Fennelly has said he considers himself a recruiter of fans, not just athletes. His program's wide-ranging appeal proves that in a bandwagon-jumping culture, a personal, genuine approach still can generate real loyalty.

"I think our fans have an emotional attachment to our players," he said. "It has been an amazing transformation. They are connected to quality young people who care about their university, who appreciate the opportunity to live in a great community and go to a great school. The respect has grown and grown and grown."

Anyone who doubts that needed only to hear the roar when the Cyclones pulled within 34-11 on Monday, or see the fan waving his "We Love Our Cyclones" banner when the score was 51-27 at halftime.

"He built this program one fan at a time, shaking hands and knocking on doors," said Calli Thiesen Sanders, a senior associate athletic director at Iowa State. "He is like no other coach I've ever been around."

Rachel Blount • rblount@startribune.com