Matt Campbell on Baylor's speed, Iowa State football's growth through three games

AMES — With the win against Ohio on Saturday, Iowa State football has a 3-0 record for the first time since 2012 and the first time in the Matt Campbell era.

But, fresh off that win, the Cyclones will face some of their toughest in-conference competition of the season when No. 17 Baylor comes to Jack Trice Stadium on Saturday. Despite the tough opponent, head coach Matt Campbell can reflect on the growth of his player through just three games.

“This young team has really had the willingness and humility to grow,” Campbell said Tuesday. “I think all these things are going to be tested again this week. We’ll have another measuring stick of how far have we grown and where are we really.

“I really like the humility and how this group has attacked growth so far, and they’ll need to continue to do that to continue to move forward.”

Here's what Campbell said ahead of Iowa State’s first Big 12 matchup of the season.

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What makes Baylor such a threat?

Iowa State enters Saturday’s game with the better record – 3-0 compared to Baylor’s 2-1 – in this young season. The Bears' only loss came against a ranked BYU team in Week 2, and it took two overtimes for the Cougars to pull out the win.

Outside of that game, Baylor’s offense has scored 111 points in two games, while the defense has held those two other opponents to just 17 points.

So, Saturday’s game could end up being quite the challenge for Iowa State.

Baylor’s speed is the first thing that came to mind for Campbell.

“They have elite team speed across the board,” Campbell said. “When you look at this football team, it doesn’t matter what the position is, what jumps off the film is the speed.”

Here’s how Campbell summarized it: When you talk about the secondary and the defense, they can run quickly and they’re physical. On the offensive side of the football, from the receivers to the linemen, everything is predicated on great tempo.

“You talk about special teams, they’ve already got a punt return for a touchdown,” Campbell said. “It really is about their speed and I think they’ve done such a great job of adding physicality to that speed across the board.”

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Lots of fresh faces getting game experience

The Cyclones have played about 30 different guys on each side of the ball against Ohio, and several players saw action in the season opener too.

That’s a good thing for Iowa State because the best way for players to learn and grow is to have that college football gameday experience. While Campbell was slow to single out individuals, he did mention a few names of players that caught his attention.

“(Linebacker) Myles Mendeszoon continues to do a great job for us,” Campbell said. “I think he’s leading our team right now in special teams tackles. (Defensive end) Joey Petersen, (linebacker) Hunter Zenzen, (running back) Deon Silas. A couple of those young quarterbacks went into the game and played really good.

“It’s still an evolution of who you are in practice, how do you continue to take advantage of the reps that you are given in games and then what are you doing for us on special teams, and the more you can earn trust in our program, the more opportunity then we’re going to try to give you to help our football team be successful.”

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Handling the special teams challenges

Let’s start by acknowledging that Iowa State’s special teams units are young: Both the Cyclones starting kicker and punter are true freshmen.

So, there are bound to be mistakes.

Iowa State had two punts blocked in the Iowa game, and Ohio blocked a point-after attempt Saturday. Campbell recognized that there's still a little bit of a learning curve for the young kickers, but there are some issues that need to be addressed.

“You gotta remember, there’s two young pups in terms of the kickers and punters, and so operationally, we got to continue to be the best we can be in some of those situations.

“From a protection standpoint, I think they’re certainly not as clean as they could be there. Both of those situations are a combination of…young players in some of those positions, you’re kind of going through a little bit of growing pains.”

Darren Wilson out against Baylor

Campbell did confirm Tuesday that wide receiver Darren Wilson Jr. would not play on Saturday, but didn't elaborate on the extent of his injury. Wilson is currently the second "Z" receiver on the depth chart behind Dimitri Stanley.

Speaking of Stanley, he'll be back against Baylor. Campbell said Stanley was sick last week, which was the only reason he missed the Ohio game.

Campbell also provided an update on Jake Remsburg, Cartevious Norton and Beau Freyler, saying that they have “high expectations” that all three would be ready to play on Saturday, although that could change over the course of this week.

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Alyssa Hertel is the college sports recruiting reporter for the Des Moines Register. Contact Alyssa at ahertel@dmreg.com or on Twitter @AlyssaHertel.

This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Iowa State football's Matt Campbell on Baylor before Saturday's game