According to Steve Deace, Iowa turned red by getting rid of primaries. He says that should happen everywhere and replace them with conventions or caucuses.
But the caucuses and conventions are still held separately by the parties. The Alaska ranked choice scheme eliminates any separate party selection process and lumps all candidates together on one voting slate.
Not an expert on Iowa, but they voted Red for Trump in the general election which is still a choice of the major party candidates in a normal voting process by the citizens. And they've been electing Republican Senator Grassley for decades.
I think separate, closed primaries is a better way to select candidates than caucuses or conventions. Now those might be better than open primaries in some states.