The Iowa Hawkeye Men’s Basketball team probably isn’t satisfied with how things ended down in the Bahamas, but nothing can be changed now. So, as I reflect on this team’s weekend, I ask myself what I learned about the Iowa Hawkeyes.
The answer? Not much.
In the game on Thursday against Xavier I learned that Iowa is capable of playing gutsy, hard nosed basketball against a pretty solid team. So I thought. After seeing Xavier go 0-3 on the weekend, I changed my mind about this being a good win. It’s basically the exact opposite of that. Devyn Marble was impressive with his 30 points, but other than that, the rest of the team looked a little shaky.
That brought us to Friday against UTEP. This game almost isn’t even worth analyzing. Iowa defeated the Miners by a score of 89-53. The team played balanced basketball, but it was against a team that quite frankly isn’t very good in my opinion. The Miners would lose the following night to Kansas by 4, which makes Iowa look a little better.
In the championship game on Saturday we learned that Iowa needs to learn how to defend the three point line better. Villanova buried 14 three pointers in the game which is over half of their total field goals made, 27. The second half was the worst part about it all. Villanova guard James Bell hit 3 consecutive long balls to put a huge dent in what was a 13 point Iowa lead. Towards the ladder part of the game, Ryan Arcidiacono hit a couple of deep ones that would propel Villanova to the win.
Iowa is lucky that they shot so well from behind the arc otherwise this game would not have even been close. Iowa would hit 11 three point field goals in the game, which is promising for Coach Fran McCaffery.
Devyn Marble was the most impressive Hawkeye. He averaged just over 20 points per game in the tournament.
Even though they were unable to bring home the title, I think it was good for Iowa to finally play some teams that can get up and down the court and shoot. It is only going to help them in the long run. Especially when they welcome Notre Dame (5-1) into Carver Hawkeye Arena on Tuesday night as a part of the Big Ten/ACC challenge.
Game time for that one is scheduled for 8:15 p.m.
