‘It just happened to be that it was Iowa:’ Sycamore grad Kylie Feuerbach transfers from Iowa State to Hawkeyes

When Kylie Feuerbach decided to leave Iowa State and enter the transfer portal earlier this month after her freshman season, the Sycamore graduate said she wasn’t planning on ending up at the Cyclones’ rival.

Feuerbach announced on April 16 she’d be transferring to Iowa after playing her first collegiate season with the Cyclones.

“It just happened to be that it was Iowa,” Feuerbach said. “It wasn’t intentionally supposed to be the rival school, it just lined up that way. I’m just really excited to be a Hawkeye.”

Iowa State went 17-11 last year and made it two rounds deep in the NCAA tournament. Feuerbach started both games, going 15 scoreless minutes against Michigan State and score six with seven rebounds in 34 minutes of a 84-82 overtime loss to Texas A&M.

Feuerbach played 28 games, starting 24 for a Cyclones team that featured three freshmen starting most of the year. She averaged 5.5 points and 3.1 rebounds per game.

Feuerbach said while she didn’t wnt to go to deep into it, she was searching out a school that would be a better fit, and felt Iowa was the program.

“I would say I have a lot of respect for them, the campus, it’s a great school,” Feuerbach said. “It just probably wasn’t the best or fit me. They have a great school but I just don’t think it was the best fit for me.”

First and foremost, Feuerbach said, she liked the coaching staff, pointing out head coach Lisa Bluder and associated head coach Jan Jensen.

She said she also liked the players, having played before with sophomore Megan Meyer, freshman Shateah Wetering, and co-national freshman of the year Caitlin Clark.

“They have a great program,” Feuerbach said. “Obviously they have a great school. Their team is great. They have Caitlin obviously. But they have a lot of great other players and I’ve played with a lot of them. I’ve played with Shateah [Wetering], Megan [Meyer], Caitlyn, of course. I kind of know the girls, the players they are, the people they are. Just about anything you can think of it really drew me to Iowa in every single sense you can think of.”

Iowa finished last season 20-10, reaching the Sweet 16 of the tournament before falling 92-72 to UConn.

One of those 20 wins was against Iowa State, 82-80 in a game in which the Hawkeyes outscored the Cyclones 26-7 in the fourth quarter. Feuerbach had nine points and three rebounds against her future team.

Feuerbach said she’s not sure what her role will be with the Hawkeyes.

“In any sense that I need to I’m always going to improve my game,” Feuerbach said. “I was put in a really good position for sure, and that kind of helped me preparing for knowing the next school I go to. The higher levels are going to be extremely competitive and the competition is going to be top-notch, which I’m excited about.”

Feuerbach committed as a sophomore to Iowa State and has a deep family history at the school. Since she committed so early, she said she enjoyed the 10 days of open recruitment she got to experience this time around.

“It was pretty fast,” Feuerbach said. “I committed pretty early so I never had a full-on recruiting process. Even though this was only 10 days or whatever it was, it went by fast but it was a lot. It went really smoothly and I had a lot of people helping me out with this the entire process.”