Iowa State Basketball Coach T.J. Otzelberger Ranked Poorly Among Sweet 16 Peers

With the Sweet 16 here for the Iowa State Cyclones, they will be hoping that another good game against the Tennessee Volunteers will result in a trip to the Elite 8.

So far in the NCAA tournament, the Cyclones have been playing some excellent basketball. This shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise considering how well they did in the Big 12 tournament, but it was good to see that momentum carry over.

For a good chunk of the season, this has been one of the best programs in college basketball. With a 16-0 start to the campaign, they were ranked as high as number two in the AP Poll this season, and it looked like the sky was the limit.

Due to the Big 12 being a challenging conference, the team did struggle a bit at times in conference play, especially on the road. However, none of those struggles have been an issue for them of late, and they have been thriving.

It has been very impressive to see that the team hasn’t missed a beat despite star forward Joshua Jefferson being out basically the entire tournament. A lot of credit has to go to the team for stepping up, but also to head coach T.J. Otzelberger for his coaching ability. Recently, all of the coaches in the Sweet 16 were ranked, and while Otzelberger wasn’t near the top, that shows the level of talent that remains.

Stacked Coaching List for Sweet 16

Is this the best group of coaches we’ve EVER had in the Sweet 16? Sheesh! @matmlodzinski had a tougu time ranking them. pic.twitter.com/gNierHiL7J
— College Basketball Review (@CbbReview) March 23, 2026

With a lot of the best teams in the country remaining in the Sweet 16, it should come as no surprise to see some of the biggest names in the game on this list. While Otzelberger has been fantastic in his career with Iowa State, some of the names ahead of him are the elite of the elite and Hall of Fame caliber coaches.

However, while there might be coaches with more career accolades than Otzelberger, that doesn’t mean that he and the Cyclones can’t play a little bit of spoiler. On Friday, he will be taking on Rick Barnes and the Volunteers. The head coach of Tennessee has been with the team for a long time and has had a lot of success. He is one of the coaches just above Otzelberger on the rankings, but it is Iowa State who is expected to win this matchup.

While the ranking for Otzelberger might be low, he will have a chance to add to his growing legacy with Iowa State in the Sweet 16.