A ferocious second-half effort allowed the Iowa Hawkeyes to overcome an early 22-4 deficit by defeating the Indiana Hoosiers 91-89 at Carver Hawkeye Arena. With this win, Iowa is now 9-6 on the year, 1-3 in the Big Ten Plays, and is still in the NCAA Tournament for now.
It was a full-team effort for the Hawkeyes to play without Patrick McCaffrey, who has rested the team to deal with anxiety. 30 points, 10 rebounds, 2 steals and a key block in the win. Philippe Rebraca continued his strong season, posting 19 points and 10 rebounds. Conor McCaffery scored 16 points, mostly thanks to going 6-6 from the free-throw line. Tony Perkins seemed at least partially out of his slump. Contributed 10 from the bench, including
The Hoosiers opened the game by drawing an and-1 on the first play of the game and quickly attacking Iowa at the rim. The Hawkeyes responded with a basket from Rebraca, but the Hoosiers rolled from there. With their backs to the wall, Iowa began to cut the lead thanks to Sandfort’s first three points in conference play, reducing Indiana’s lead to 28-13, but Fran killed Iowa’s momentum. I was asked for a technical that I did.
To their credit, Iowa did not roll over and went on an 11-0 run at halfway point to cut Indiana’s lead to 35-26. Mostly thanks to timely 3-pointers and great turnovers and great turnovers from Murray and McCaffery. and -1 from Perkins.
However, the Hoosiers were able to respond to all Hawkeye threats and quickly took the lead back to 13. Then Perkins woke up and cut Iowa’s lead to five in the final two minutes of the half — as part of a 6–0 scoring run, even with McCaffery on the bench.
response? Indiana brought the lead back to eight thanks to a blatantly ignored basket interference call by an official. Then there was Indiana State’s offensive rebound that put Hoosier back to his lead in double digits as the game went into halftime 50-40.
The second half started with the teams swapping baskets to kick things off, and Iowa was able to cut the lead to eight thanks to a huge 3-pointer from Murray who showed much more aggression in the second half. It was cold from the field. Murray’s nine points in the second half all beat Indiana’s seven as he led Iowa with his 7–0 run.
Iowa jumped out to a 4-point lead, but the Hoosiers stayed with them, their lead never surpassing 3, and after forcing multiple turnovers, they regained a 2-point lead with 8:08. rice field. The teams battled back and forth from there, with Jackson-Davis involved on both ends of the floor to give Indiana a four-point lead back.
Despite Indiana’s return to a six-point lead, Iowa was again behind by two with two minutes of play thanks to Murray. Still, the officials again bailed out IU without giving him a technical after an altercation between IU’s assistant coach and Fran, but the Hoosiers managed only one free throw and trailed 87-86 at 36.9.
Ten seconds later, after missing Indiana’s shot, Iowa called the final timeout, but was unable to execute on an out-of-bounds play. The other side also failed to convert, thanks to Murray’s tipball that was dropped.
Iowa didn’t miss a line, securing the win and keeping the Hawkeyes’ tournament hopes alive.
