Iowa State women win Big 12 title in perhaps Municipal’s last Division I championship

Bill Fennelly brought Iowa State to Municipal Auditorium the first year the building played host to the Big 12 women’s basketball tournament in 1997.

So it was fitting that his Cyclones captured the final event scheduled to be held at the historic structure on 13th Street in Kansas City.

Iowa State defeated top-seeded Texas 61-51 on Sunday behind Ashley Joens’ 28 points. The Cyclones took control in the third quarter and continued to extend their lead behind Joens and an excellent defensive effort.

The final horn sounded and confetti showered the Cyclones. They cut the nets at one end of the floor, then the other. In between, Fennelly looked around Municipal, which was populated with Iowa State fans, and got emotional.

“I love it here,” Fennelly said. “Look at the fans. ... Our kids love playing here. There’s so much history in this building. It’s sad for me. I have so many great memories here.”

This from a coach whose program hadn’t won the event since 2001. The Big 12 women’s tournament will be played at T-Mobile Center next season, a week before the men’s tourney.

Because the Big 12 will number 14 teams in 2023-24 with the addition of Houston, Cincinnati, BYU and Central Florida, the women’s tournament will start on a Wednesday. They’ll play through Saturday, take Sunday off (because of BYU doesn’t pay on Sunday for religious reasons), and then hold a title game on a Monday.

The men’s tournament will begin its five-day run the next day.

“We love coming to Kansas City,” Fennelly said, “but I don’t know if we can ask our fans to spend two weeks here.”

Municipal, which opened in 1936, will continue to hold championships for the NAIA — that 16-team tournament begins Monday — and the Division II MIAA Tournament.

But the building that has held many NCAA championship games and regional finals may have seen its last Division I tournament.

Municipal is where Bill Russell won his first NCAA title for San Francisco, where Wilt Chamberlain lost a triple-overtime classic to North Carolina for the championship and where UCLA legend John Wooden won the first of his 10 NCAA titles.

That happened in 1964, the last of Municipal’s NCAA title games. The men’s championship relocated to bigger arenas, domes and stadiums. But Municipal welcomed new visitors like the NCAA women’s tournament, UMKC, the MIAA ... and the Big 12 women.

Municipal played host the first six Big 12 tournaments, the last two and about half of the 26 events played.

But if Sunday was a farewell for Division I championship basketball at Muni, it went out with a fan favorite on top, powered by a remarkable individual performance.

The Longhorns had no answer for Joens, the fifth-year senior who surpassed 3,000 career points during the tournament. She added a team high 10 rebounds and three assists, none bigger than the pass that set up Nyamer Diew for a three-pointer that closed the third quarter and gave Iowa State its largest lead at 47-39.

Joens added tournament most outstanding player honors to her league MVP award.

“We got the best player in the Big 12, and one of the best in the country,” Fennelly said.

From there it became a matter of closing it out for a the third-seeded Iowa State team that had split with Texas during the regular season. And in that, the Cyclones gained energy from a fan base that made Municipal Auditorium feel like a championship venue perhaps one last time.