Iowa basketball: Megan Gustafson making case for best of all time

All-American Megan Gustafson has been on a tear during her senior season with the Iowa basketball team. Could she be the greatest woman Hawk of all time?

Defining the criteria to be the greatest women’s Iowa basketball player is an impossible task, but if you watch any game of Megan Gustafson’s you, without a doubt, understand that she has a place in that list somewhere, if not right at the top.

Gustafson can literally do it all, and she is the main catalyst for the women’s Iowa basketball team being ranked this season (not to take away from all of her talented supporting cast). Moreover, she is putting up some impressive numbers that are helping her creep her way not just into the Iowa Hawkeyes record book but the NCAA’s record books.

In her career, she has been named to the All-Big Ten Freshman Team and First Team All-Big Ten (2x), and she received the award for Big Ten Player of the Year last season. She holds single-season school records in points, rebounds, field goals made, field goal percentage, free throws made, free throws attempted, and double-doubles. She also holds the career record in double-doubles with 55 (which is the best for both men’s and women’s), and she just set the record for most career rebounds.

She isn’t done there though. She is just a few games away from breaking Ally Disterhoft’s career scoring record of 2,102 points.

It’s not just the sheer volume of stats that she is putting up, especially in the points category, but rather how she is doing it. She is incredibly efficient from the field shooting 64.8%, which if she can hold that shooting percentage up will rank eighth all-time in the history of the NCAA for field-goal percentage.

Moreover, she is already in the top-25 of the NCAA in career double-doubles.

Honestly, at this point, what more could the 6’3” forward from Port Wing, Wisconsin do to bolster her resume?

How about adding a Naismith College Player of the Year award or leading the women’s Iowa basketball team to their first Final Four appearance since 1993?

Conveniently both items appear to be in reach. At this point Gustafson has to be considered a front-runner for the Naismith. She is fourth in the nation in points per game, second in the nation in field-goal percentage and tenth in rebounds. Just to throw another stat at you, she is 47th in the nation in blocks.

With the women’s Iowa basketball team sitting at 16th in the nation, they have the talent and the star player needed to make a run in the NCAA tournament. Making a final four appearance and winning the Naismith would be a heck of a conclusion to an amazing career so far, but personally, I think we just need to chalk it up to Megan Gustafson as the best women’s Iowa basketball player of all time.

Enjoy this season because we are watching a legend in the making.