Iowa State Cyclones Not Considered a Top 25 Team Heading Into Next Season

Should the Iowa State Cyclones be considered a Top 25 heading into the 2026 season?

Iowa State football coach Jimmy Rogers speaks during a timeout in the first half in the Iowa State and Iowa men’s basketball Cy-Hawk series at Hilton coliseum on Dec. 11, 2025, in Ames, Iowa. | Nirmalendu Majumdar/Ames Tribune / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

With the Indiana Hoosiers winning the national championship against the Miami Hurricanes, the 2025 college football season has officially come to a close. For the Iowa State Cyclones, they will undoubtedly be getting excited for a new era coming up. 

Following an 8-4 season, the Cyclones saw their head coach take the job with the Penn State Nittany Lions, creating a massive void for the program. Matt Campbell was a fixture with the team for 10 years and really turned things around. Fortunately, following his departure, they were able to hire Jimmy Rogers from the Washington State Cougars rather quickly. 

The new head coach is going to have his work cut out for him with a completely new roster. Iowa State has been rebuilt through the portal this year, but with limited NIL funding, that was undoubtedly a challenging task. 

For a good portion of the campaign in 2025, the Cyclones were ranked in the Top 25. This was a team that started off the season with a 5-0 record but did ultimately lose four straight games during conference play, which knocked them out of the Top 25. Now, while there is still a long way to go, the team will be hoping to be in the Top 25 once again in 2026. However, they are going to have to earn it on the field. 

Mark Schlabach of ESPN recently released his way-too-early projected Top 25 for the 2026 campaign. Unsurprisingly, the Cyclones didn’t make the cut. 

Iowa State Will Have to Prove Themselves

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Not shockingly, the Cyclones didn’t make the cut in the projections, and this will be a team that is going to have to prove themselves. Even though Iowa State has been able to rebuild the roster, they haven’t been able to bring in the same caliber of talent that they have lost. 

As expected, many players who entered the transfer portal for the Cyclones have followed Campbell to Penn State. A few of the players from Iowa State were considered to be some of the best in the portal, and it isn’t too surprising to see the Nittany Lions ranked 23rd in the early projections. 

If the Cyclones didn’t lose Campbell and all of this talent, that feels like the area that they would have likely fallen in. However, with a ton of uncertainty and new faces, Iowa State will have to make the Top 25 based on performance this year.