"Power of the Pop" Wills WBB To Victory

AMES, Iowa ? At first glance, Tootsie Roll Pops and women's basketball seem to have nothing in common. But for three Iowa State women's basketball fans, the Tootsie Pops can mean the difference between a win and a loss.

Mike Webb of Leon, Dennis McElroy of Lamoni and Dale Streigle of Boulder City, Nev. (formerly Ames), started going to ISU women's basketball games when Bill Fennelly began his Cyclone coaching career in 1995. Seats were easy to come by in those days when average attendance was in the hundreds and the three friends watched games from behind the bench.

During one game during the 1997-98 season, Streigle had a couple Tootsie Pops in his jacket pocket and offered one to McElroy as a snack. The ISU women had fallen behind but rallied for a come-from-behind victory. The pair made the immediate connection.

“We did not want to risk the coincidence being a coincidence,” Streigle said. “So, we started carrying Tootsie Roll Pops thereafter to use only if our women were behind. We made sure to never put them in too soon. I guess we became believers in the ?power of the pops.'”

The “power of the pops” is catching on. The trio says that fans have caught on and people look their direction when the Cyclone women are in a close game.

“During games at Hilton, if our women happen to fall behind, fans from all over section 111 continue to look our way, waiting for the pops to come out,” Webb said. “It's usually a feel thing, we decide when to pull them out because we'd hate to ruin the magic of the pops.”

Cyclones.com met the three men in Kansas City's Crowne Center Hotel just after midnight, March 11, following ISU's first-round Big 12 Conference victory over Colorado. After an hour of conversation about the “power of the pops,” cyclones.com left a little bit skeptical. The next 14 hours would prove otherwise.

Iowa State trailed No. 1 seeded Kansas State, 41-35 at the media timeout with 7:36 left in the Big 12 tournament quarterfinal at Municipal Auditorium. Cyclones.com walked over behind the ISU basket to shoot some fan photos. Sure enough, McElroy, Webb and Streigle were planted in their front row seats, sucking on their Tootsie Pops. After a few seconds of video footage and a simple “hello,” cyclones.com walked back to the baseline to continue shooting video of the game.

Later, Fennelly would call the showdown with Kansas State one of the greatest games in his lifetime as a coach. The Cyclone women erased two six-point deficits, one in the second half and one in overtime, to stun the Wildcats and advance to the league semifinals.

“How else do you explain Alison Lacey scoring six points in 11 seconds, or (Kansas State guard Shalee) Lehning's final shot going all the way around the rim twice and rolling off,” McElroy said. “It's the ?power of the pops' that helped them.”

The trio not only believes that the pops will the team to victory in during a game, they believe the pops possess other powers.

The ISU women opened the 2007 Big 12 season 1-3, including with three straight losses, the last a heartbreaking home loss to Oklahoma State. It was then that Webb, the store manager at the Hy-Vee in Leon, arranged through the Hy-Vee store in Ames to send a bouquet of pops to coach Fennelly.

“We heard back from coach that he had put them on the training table for the ladies to have,” Webb said. “The next game at home vs. Texas, they won in style, 67-56.”

The “power of the pops” continued to prevail as ISU went 9-3 over its remaining 12 conference games, including a miraculous win over Nebraska en route to the championship game of the Big 12 Tournament in Oklahoma City, Okla. The performance propelled Iowa State to the 2007 NCAA Tournament.

Does the “power of the pops” have any magic left? Cyclone fans will wait and see. If the pops are needed, the trio will unleash the power this weekend as ISU takes on Georgia Tech Saturday at the Wells-Fargo Arena in Des Moines.

Players Mentioned

Alison Lacey

Alison Lacey

Alison Lacey

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