It wasn’t pretty, but the Iowa Basketball team earned a victory over the 10th seeded Temple Owls on Friday afternoon in Brooklyn, NY.
It doesn’t get much better than basketball in March. Unless you have a dog in the fight, then it can be very nerve racking. That was the case on Friday afternoon for Hawkeye nation. Iowa held a lead for a majority of the game, and even stretched it out to as many as 12.
However, Temple wasn’t going to go down without a fight. The Owls would scrape and claw their way back into it on two or three separate occasions and we had ourselves a ball game. Iowa had a lead with about 10 ticks left on the clock, but Anthony Clemmons fouled Quenton DeCosey on a three point attempt, which sent him to the line with the ability to tie the game.
After DeCosey made all three freebies, Iowa turned it over and we were headed to overtime. The Hawkeyes got the victory on a put back by Adam Woodbury after a miss by Mike Gesell, 72-70.
More from Dear Old Gold
- Bet $1, Win $365 GUARANTEED Backing Hawkeyes with Bet365 Iowa Promo!
- How Fans Can Get an Official Jersey from Fanatics This Week!
- Bet365 Iowa Promo: Bet $1 on Hawkeyes vs. Cyclones, Win $200 Bonus GUARANTEED!
- Caesars + BetMGM Iowa Promos: Win $250 GUARANTEED + Back Hawkeyes With $1,500 No-Sweat Bet!
- DraftKings + FanDuel Iowa Promos: $400 Bonus for Iowa vs Utah State Week 1
Turnovers
The Hawkeyes didn’t turn the ball over in the first half, which was surprising given how much we’d heard about how good Temple was on defense. Despite this, Iowa only led by one at the half. Temple was red-hot from the field, which had a lot to do with it, but the zero turnovers in the first half was a huge reason why Iowa led going into the locker room.
Iowa would go on to turnover it over just three times total in the game, which helped them avenge their 35 percent shooting clip. Iowa is set to take on a pretty athletic and well-coached Villanova team on Sunday, so they’ll need to limit their turnovers against them.
It was encouraging to see Iowa take care of the basketball like they did, especially since they seemed to be turning it over a lot towards the end of the season, including 17 against Illinois in their loss in the Big Ten Tournament.
Late Game Offense
This continues to be brutal. It becomes Gesell dribbling around for 20-25 seconds and then chucking up something wild. There isn’t any movement on the offensive side late in games and Gesell doesn’t have the ability to take a defender off the dribble like that.
Iowa is a team. They down have a break-you-down guy that gets to the rim whenever he wants. In these late game spots, Iowa needs to run offense. Get some motion going. Instead of standing around and making it easy on the defense, move. The hardest player to guard is the one that is in constant motion.
If Iowa stands around against Villanova, they won’t be winning the game.
Free Throws
Iowa had a couple chances to make it a two possession game late in the game, but Peter Jok split free throws one two different occasions, and that left the door open for the Owls. Jok is Iowa’s best free throw shooter at 86 percent, so the right guy had the ball in his hands. He missed the second half of a one-and-one with eight seconds left, and that led to the Clemmons foul and the ensuing DeCosey free throws.
Adam Woodbury made two big free throws in overtime, but Iowa did struggle late in the second half. I like what they did getting the ball into Jok’s hands, but he has to make those free throws.
It isn’t alarming, but it’ll need to be fixed on Sunday when they take on second seeded Villanova.
Next: Hawks Win Thriller Over Temple
There was a lot to be said about the push off that led to the Woodbury game winner, but we’ve seen officials swallow their whistles all the time late in games and today was no different.
The game time for the Iowa and Villanova game on Sunday has not been set.