Just a few months ago, Iowa State head coach Matt Campbell was riding a historic high. The Cyclones had just wrapped up their best football season ever. We’re talking 11 wins, a Top-15 finish, and a dramatic Pop-Tarts Bowl win over a ranked Miami team. They even had fans whispering, ‘Is Iowa State low-key a Big 12 powerhouse now?’ It was all good just a season ago.

But fast forward to now? The good vibes have vanished faster than a walk-on off a newly capped roster. And yep, that’s exactly what Campbell’s raging about. The NCAA’s new 105-man roster limit is about to gut the depth and heart of programs like Iowa State—the ones built on grit, not five-star glitz. And the man isn’t hiding his frustration. Not one bit.

The Cyclones’ 2024 campaign was straight-up electric. They kicked off Big 12 play with a 4-0 start (first time since 1938), snatched their first 10-win regular season ever, and punched a ticket to the Big 12 title game. Even though Arizona State dragged them in that final (45-19), Iowa State bounced back to edge out Miami 42-41 in a wild Pop-Tarts Bowl. Fair to say: the culture was working.

But here comes the gut punch. On the May 18th episode of CBS Sports’ Cover 3 Podcast, Iowa State insider Alec Busse dropped a cold dose of reality. “From an on-paper perspective, when I look at this roster, I’m not nearly as high on it as I was a year ago. I think it’s a team that wins like seven to nine games, depending on how a few of those wonky Big 12 close games go.”

In 2024, Alec Busse had predicted that Iowa State would go and compete in the Big 12 title game. Guess what? The man was on the money. Busse even pointed out that the 2024 Big 12 schedule may have been a bit of a smokescreen—only 3 of ISU’s opponents had winning records in conference play. In 2025, it’s a much steeper climb. Kansas State in Week Zero. BYU and Arizona State at Ames. A road trip to TCU. And now? A paper-thin roster.

Busse kept it real about the 2025 season’s expectation: “So I do think it’s a team that probably wins between seven and nine games.” Which, by Campbell standards, is a typical year. But the problem? The roster isn’t typical anymore. It’s forcibly being trimmed down thanks to the NCAA settlement.

Matt Campbell’s public outcry for athletes’ rights

Matt Campbell’s voice cracked a bit when he talked about what this new rule means for his players. Not his starters. Not even his two-deep. He was talking about the walk-ons. The grinders. The late-bloomers. And the next Caleb Bacon. “It’s criminal, and it’s sad. It’s disappointing.” Iowa State had 132 players on its 2024 roster. The new cap forces them to trim 27 athletes—most of them walk-ons, development players, or guys who haven’t had their breakout yet. And that stings for a program like Iowa State, where the culture has always valued effort over stars.

Campbell didn’t hold back: “A lot of things that you don’t believe in and you don’t stand for… right now you just try to navigate your program the right way and help benefit kids.” Translation? He is not trying to run a pro team. He’s trying to run a family. And the NCAA just told him to kick out a bunch of little brothers.

Let’s keep it real. Most fans don’t care about walk-ons ‘til they become legends. But at Iowa State? That’s the whole DNA. Caleb Bacon was a walk-on who ended up finishing second in tackles in 2023. Without that roster freedom, athletes like Bacon? Never even get a shot. And that’s what Campbell is raging against. He called the whole process “a really tough week” and questioned if college football is even about student-athletes anymore: “This isn’t a professional sport that we are going to mandate or dictate a number of how many guys can be on a team.”

But let’s not act like Campbell is anti-equity. He gets the why. The cuts are happening to balance Title IX and open scholarship space for underfunded sports. Baseball’s about to benefit, for instance. But that logic falls flat at ISU—because they don’t even have a baseball program. “I think that’s really hard for me to understand that value.”

The ripple effect is already real. Since April 16, when the spring portal window opened, multiple Cyclones have hit eject. Most recently, sophomore linebacker Jack Sadowsky V, who had 29 tackles in 2024, entered the portal. Some players in that “gray area,” as Campbell calls it, have landed elsewhere. Others? They’re still in limbo, caught between the dream and a roster rule that never existed until now.

Campbell is trying to spin it positive: “You see the ability to help a lot of young men, along the way… there’s a reward to that.” But let’s not sugarcoat it. This isn’t rewarding. It’s a gut-wrenching numbers game. And the guys getting cut aren’t the ones with NIL deals or NFL buzz. They’re the athletes who just wanted a shot. Here’s the kicker: the 105-player limit isn’t even finalized yet. The House vs. NCAA settlement is still in legal limbo. Judge Claudia Wilken has yet to sign off on the enforcement guidelines.  So yeah, Campbell’s out here making roster cuts like it’s law, even though nobody’s handed down the ruling.

And that’s why he’s heated. It’s the not knowing. The limbo. The way college football keeps acting like it wants to protect athletes while gutting the exact part of the sport that made it special. End of the day, Campbell didn’t call it criminal because he lost a linebacker. He called it criminal because college football just lost its soul.