Locked On Hawkeyes - Daily Podcast On Iowa Hawkeyes Football & Basketball - Iowa basketball trending up at perfect time after win vs Michigan State | Iowa Hawkeyes podcast

Episode Date: February 23, 2022

The Iowa basketball team capped off a grueling six days of three Big Ten games with a huge win over Tom Izzo's Michigan State Spartans. With this win, the Iowa Hawkeyes move to 9-7 in the conference with four games remaining, and it's safe to say that Fran McCaffery's squad is trending up. In fact, they're looking like a team that could make waves in March.We also discuss the women's basketball team's huge win over Indiana and their path to a Big Ten regular-season title. Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!Built BarBuilt Bar is a protein bar that tastes like a candy bar. Go to builtbar.com and use promo code “LOCKED15,” and you’ll get 15% off your next order.BetOnlineBetOnline.net has you covered this season with more props, odds and lines than ever before. BetOnline – Where The Game Starts!Rock AutoAmazing selection. Reliably low prices. All the parts your car will ever need. Visit RockAuto.com and tell them Locked On sent you. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You are Locked on Hawkeyes, your daily podcast on the Iowa Hawkeyes. Part of the Locked on Podcast Network, your team every day. Welcome back Hawkeye Nation to a Wednesday morning episode of the Locked On Hawkeyes podcast. Your daily podcast covering your Iowa Hawkeyes on the Locked On Podcast Network. As always, I am your host, Andrew Wade. Excited to be back for another show today. And we are absolutely rolling. Iowa basketball is on fire, both men's and women's.

Women's taking down number 10-ranked Indiana on Monday. and women's. Women's taking down number 10 ranked Indiana on Monday. Iowa giving a huge blow to Tom Izzo at Michigan State last night at Carver Hawkeye Arena. It was a fantastic game. Both games were great to watch. We're going to cover both of them on today's show

and what it means going forward for the Iowa Hawkeyes for the rest of the season. Are these teams, teams that go deep in the NCAA tournament? I think so. We'll tell you why here in a few moments. But first, I want to thank you all for making the Locked On Hawkeyes podcast your first listen every single day. You can find the Locked On Hawkeyes podcast for free wherever you get podcasts at and

also on YouTube by searching Locked On Hawkeyes. So let's get into it. Last night, the men's team took down Michigan State, and it was a phenomenal game to watch. You just love seeing Tom Mims is a lose. You love seeing Michigan State, and it was a phenomenal game to watch. You just love seeing Tom Mims is a lose. You love seeing Michigan State lose, and you love seeing this Iowa basketball team respond to adversity well. They have done a truly phenomenal job the last couple of weeks of responding to adversity. Now, a lot of people were really upset about what happened when Iowa played Michigan. It was a frustrating game.

It was frustrating to lose that. But for Iowa, they didn't turn around. Two days later, go on the road, take down Ohio State by double digits, and then three days later, go home and take care of business against a Michigan State team that was also desperate for a win. They have been struggling their last couple of weeks. They desperately needed a win in this game, and Iowa put it to them. And how they're putting it to them is just as impressive, all right?

It's not just a barrage of three-pointers. It's a concerted effort by everyone on the team to play both ends of the basketball, right? You play offense and you play defense. Jordan Bohannon playing some of the best defense I've ever seen him play. The team as a whole playing some of the best defense I've seen them play. Offensively, you're seeing a lot of guys get involved. You're seeing a lot of guys understand what their role is now. And you're seeing Keegan Murray somehow continue to elevate his game to even greater heights. So let's talk about it. In this game, Iowa started off hot.

We've had an issue with Iowa coming out a little slow. Not really hitting their shots. Teens built a lead on them. They had to battle back early on in the game. Not in this game. They got into a 10-point lead within four minutes of the game. And they were getting it from all over the place. Keegan had six. We got three from Tony Perkins, three from Jordan Mohannon, and two from P-Mac. Four of the five starters scored the first 14 points of the Iowa Hawkeyes.

You like to see that type of balance and the ability to get out to that hot start. They carried this lead into the half with a 46-32 lead. Coming out in the second half, Michigan State came out strong. They stopped Iowa on a couple possessions. Iowa offensively kind of running around, not really having a groove there. Michigan State taking it to the basket, getting a couple points, getting it to within 10. Frank McCaffrey called the timeout, and things took off from there.

The game never got closer than 11 points. And when Jordan Bohannon hit his back-to-back threes and they were back breaking threes, just typical Jordan Bohannon in your face threes. And it was fantastic to see those three, those two threes broke out the game. So it was 55-44. Jordan Mohanna hits back-to-back threes, 61-44. With another Keegan Murray jump shot made it 63-44. And Iowa never looked back from there. In this game, Keegan Murray, 10 of 15 shooting. So again, we talked about the fact that he continues to elevate his game.

10 of 15 shooting is incredibly efficient for anyone, let alone a wing who's also shooting threes and shooting a barrage of different jump shots like Keegan Murray is doing. 28 points on 10-15 shooting, five rebounds, two assists, one block, and two steals. Jordan Bohannon has been that consistent 10-15 point guy as of late. 11 points, two rebounds, two assists. Really, really playing strong basketball the month of February since being inserted as the starting point guard for the Iowa Hawkeyes. Patrick McCaffrey only went two of nine, but he added in six rebounds, which is going to be something we're going to talk about

when we get to the takeaway section. Philip Abracha, getting the job done the way he needs to. Strong defense, seven rebounds, two blocks in this game. I got a couple of comments on YouTube about why Phillip Abracha shouldn't be playing. I disagree. Look at what he was able to do in this game. As we talked about on previous shows, whoever, if Fran starts Phillip or Chris the five, I'm not going to be too upset, but I think what Chris can bring to that second level unit is amazing and really elevates that second unit. And Phillip Abracha has understood his role in this offense.

He understands that he's not going to be the second or third option. He's the fourth or fifth option on that first unit, but he's willing to do the dirty work and get his boards, which is a very humbling thing and something it takes a lot of work to do, especially coming from North Dakota where he was putting up 16, 17 points a game and was an all-league type of player. Chris Murray also had a solid game as well

in 16 minutes of action, 11 points, four of eight from the field. And I wanted to call this out. Peyton Sanford, after only getting one minute last week, got five boards in this game in about 10 or 11 minutes of play. So you'd like to see the bounce back from some of these younger guys being able to sit down, come back and play really key minutes. I'm not a younger

guy, but Joe Toussaint has also been playing some really valuable minutes since getting benched. It's kind of impressive to see how the team has really gelled since then. And that's going to be one of the big takeaways. When I talk about this team and whether or not they can make a run in the NCAA tournament, there's a lot of things right now that are saying yes. A lot of things that are telling me this team can make a Sweet 16 for the first time in the Fran McCaffrey era. A lot of things that get me very excited about this team as they're trending up in the month of February. So we're going to be talking about all that coming up in a few short moments. But first, I know it's tough with resolutions to stick to them, right?

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The recap we talked about on segment one. Let's get into the takeaways from this game. And there's a lot of them. First, I mentioned the fact that Iowa could be a contender for the Sweet 16. I'm about to tell you why. I've really been impressed with what Frank McCaffrey has done. I would argue this is his best coaching job he's ever done. This is a team that lost two NBA players, lost a pivotal role player to Xavier,

lost the best three-point shooter they had to Kentucky, and yet here they are playing some of the best basketball we've seen them play in some time. But it's not just what Fran's doing off the court. It's what he's doing on the court. The lineup change, having Jordan Bohannon move to that one, has really, really taken off of this team. We've seen the defensive energy been just truly impressive. We've seen offensively, they've all kind of hit their groove.

They figured out their role. And I'm going to get to that piece in a second. But the one thing I want to cover here is the timeouts. Now Fran is, we know what Fran is, right? We know some of the things Fran will do. You get two fouls in the first half, you're not playing the rest of the game. It's a very normal Fran thing to do. He also loves to save his timeouts.

However, he has been utilizing those timeouts much more effectively in the last couple of games. And coming out of the timeouts, the team has been more effective as well. Sometimes using a timeout can stop another team's run, motivate your team. It doesn't always work like that, but in the last two games against Michigan State and Ohio State, we've seen Fran McCaffrey use timeouts early in the halves, and Iowa bounces back in a big way. Look at the second half against Michigan State. Iowa allows four points. They're cutting the lead from 14 to 10 very quickly. You hit a three, it might be a seven point game and you're seeing Michigan State crawl back into it,

get them a little bit more momentum. Now they didn't hit a three pointer, but I'm just saying in theory, right? Fran calls a timeout. Iowa comes back out, play a little bit more invigorated defense. They play a better offense. They're doing a better job all around at communicating.

All of a sudden, Iowa's up 20. Fran McCaffrey is not only doing a fantastic job outside of the game, but also in-game during in-game situations. I think, say for Penn State, where we probably should have fouled on that three-pointer, it's been pretty impressive seeing Fran McCaffrey in game situations. Now, I talked about the team gelling. Making that lineup decision to move Jordan Bohannon to the one has really helped this team out quite a bit.

And again, we talked about the fact that it's easy to overlook the fact that Iowa lost so many people from last year's roster. Phillip Abracha is the only new member in that starting lineup. And I say that, I mean, the other guys have played together, especially on that second unit, right? Tony Perkins, Patrick McCaffrey, Keegan Murray, those were all second unit guys. They have that chemistry.

They played together. But not in the first unit, not with Jordan Bohannon as much, not with Phil Brabraccia, and not with his many minutes, and not with Keegan Murray being the guy now, not with Patrick McCaffrey being the number two guy now. So it's easy to overlook that, but we shouldn't be. This is a very difficult coaching job that Frank McCaffrey had on his hands. And he's done a phenomenal job of getting them to come together and they're coming together at the right time. You don't want to be trending up in November. You want to be trending up at the

end of February, early March, as you go into Big Ten tournament time, as you go into NCAA tournament time. And right now, Jordan Bohannon is getting hot. Keegan is playing some of the best basketball we have ever seen from the wing position. And Chris is starting to come into his own, being a bit more consistent night in and night out in that second unit role. Could this team make a run? Absolutely. We talked to Trey Demps, former Northwestern basketball player, Big Ten analyst on the Big Ten Network. He talked about as well, they have a lot of matchup problems. You get the right matchups, Iowa can make a run in this. It all comes down to matchups in the NCAA tournament, and it's important that Iowa continues

to win so they can hopefully get a better seed and give them more favorable matchups as well. Right now, projected anywhere from a 7 to a 9 seed. If they continue to win, they could move up to a 5 or a 6 seed. Maybe even a 4 if things go really, really well the next couple of weeks. Right now, we just need to take it one game at a time, though. Need to beat Nebraska on Friday, take care of Northwestern on Monday, get those two games. You're at 11-7 in conference play. Now you're going into Michigan and Illinois, and there's nothing to lose there, really.

Play your hearts out. You're still getting into the NCAA tournament. You still have a decent seed in the Big Ten tournament. So a lot of things we're going to need to take as a game by game basis, but you got to start getting excited about this team and what you're seeing from this team. Again, I've talked about the team, it's hitting their stride, right? Going into this three game matchup, there's three game series with having Michigan on Thursday, Ohio state Saturday, Michigan state on Tuesday. I thought if Iowa went two and one, that was going to be a really good three-game stretch.

If they went 1-2, I wasn't going to be too upset. They go 2-1, and the way they did it, though, is most impressive, rebounding from a Michigan game where they almost won, right, to go on the road to beat Ohio State, to then beat Michigan State. They have not done this always. Last year, they lost to Minnesota in overtime on Christmas, three days after playing Purdue. Last year, they lost to Minnesota in overtime on Christmas three days after playing Purdue last year they lost Ohio State and Indiana after playing Michigan State

and basically a very similar situation playing games every couple of days this year they're three and four in games played within three days with wins being over Penn State Minnesota and Nebraska three of the worst teams in the Big Ten. So it's not easy to do that. It's not easy to turn around like that, and especially not easy to be home, away, and then home. So that even is more telling to me than anything else. The rebounding has also improved immensely. And here's two reasons why.

First and foremost, we have guys attacking the glass. And secondly, we have guys boxing out. What a concept. What we're seeing is a concerted effort by the wings to get to the glass. A couple of times in the game, you would see a Keegan Murray down low or a Philippa Bracha down low. They were just simply boxing out their guy, continuing to back them up. They weren't even trying for a rebound.

They were just boxing out. They were letting the wings run in there. You saw Tony Perkins crash. You saw Jordan Bohannon crash. Peyton Sanford crash in to get a board. Kudos to the coaching staff. Kudos to the Iowa Hawkeye players for putting a more concerted effort in there. Winning the rebound battle 40-38. It really does hurt momentum for other teams and extends possessions and increases momentum for an Iowa Hawkeye squad. It is demoralizing to allow a team to get multiple offensive rebounds and hit a back-breaking three like Connor McCaffrey did against Ohio State. Also, I thought what Tom Izzo said about Keegan Murray was pretty cool.

He said they've got a star. I mean, he is a star. Don't kid yourself. We talked to the staff, you know, who is the best player in the league, and there's four guys up for the wooden award in our league murray has got to be really high on that list after spending the time watching him on film seeing him in person watching him warm up seems like a hell of a kid his dad was a hell of a guy you've got something special enjoy him he also said they walked into an ambush he's right we talked about this with matt sheehan there was a chance iowa was going to be really hungry in this game when they had such an emotional night. They retired several numbers, including Luka Garza

and the great Roy Marble. And I want to end on that note before we get into the women's basketball team. Devin Marble seems like the fences have been mended here with the Iowa Hawkeye staff, and kudos to Fran McCaffrey for helping to refoster that relationship and making sure Devin Marble felt a part of the Iowa family and doing justice by his, his father, who was a fantastic, great Iowa player. Just a really great couple of days in Iowa Hawkeye nation. Hopefully we can keep this up coming up. We're going to talk about this women's basketball team and how they can make the big 10 title happen.

How can they win a Big Ten regular season title? It's actually very, very plausible. So we're going to be talking about that here in a few short moments. But first, I have some very important information to share with you. As you know, I like to gamble a lot. And I do all my gambling at BetOnline.net. I know football season is over, but basketball season is in full steam for both pro and college hoops. From all the latest odds, totals, player performance props, to where the next fired coach is going to land,

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BetOnline.net, where the game starts. So let's get into it. We talked a lot about the men's basketball team. It's now time to talk about the women's basketball team because they have been playing their hearts out. And there's a noticeable difference in this team. And it starts with the presence of McKenna Warnock. Yes, you probably thought I was going to say Kaitlyn Clark, but McKenna Warnock being back is huge for this basketball team.

They have been battling teams and dominating teams on the boards. They're getting an extra 15 points a game from her. This team is beginning to hit their stride as well. They dealt with injuries throughout the season. They dealt with inconsistencies, especially due to COVID layoffs, but they are starting to hit their stride. And with just a couple of games remaining, this team has the ability to win the Big Ten title. That's how close they are. But first, let's talk about the Indiana game. They beat Indiana at back-to-back games. You love to see it. Indiana, a top-10 ranked team, a very strong team,

and Iowa absolutely needed to beat them both these games to be able to get a tiebreaker and also to put themselves in a good position to win a Big Ten title. We've talked a lot about this, agnosium, honestly, but the officiating across the board, not just against Iowa, but across the big 10 has absolutely been atrocious. Uh, I don't know what they were calling in this game.

I will for San Diego. It was flabbergasted to me, to be completely honest. Uh, good defense was called as everything, right? It was just, it was ridiculous.

Um, also Iowa needs to clean up the turnovers, right? A lot of sloppy turnovers, 21 in this game. Iowa absolutely needs to clean this up. But Iowa, a strong three-point shooting team as of last year, was able to shoot 21.1% from the field or from the perimeter

and still win this game. So you have to be pretty impressed with what they're seeing or what we're seeing from this Iowa Hawkeye squad. Now, some of those turnovers, it's part of the game, right? They do a lot of risky entry passes to Monica. They do a lot of risky entry passes to Monica. They do a lot of risky entry passes to their wings that are crashing into the lane as well. Some of those don't hit. Some of them do.

When they hit, they look phenomenal. When they don't, it's a very unfortunate, unforced turnover. So they need to clean that up. Rebounding, though, has gotten so much better. Again, I mentioned McConner and Warnock. They out-rebounded Indiana 37 to 27. That's going to be huge in these games, especially when you're giving up the ball 21 times in that game. You need to be able to extend possessions and close out possessions by getting the rebound offensively and defensively. And as I said, Iowa is currently positioning themselves for a Big Ten

title. If they went out, they'll at least have a share of that title. Plus, an Ohio State loss would also be ideal as well. That would give Iowa the full ownership of the Big Ten title. Also in Big Ten or in Iowa women's news, Monica is returning as well, which is absolutely huge. She's an all Big Ten center in this game against Indiana, 31 points on 13-17 shooting, 10 rebounds. Kaitlin Clark put in 29 points from 9-20 shooting, 8 rebounds, 8 assists, 7 turnovers. McKenna, as I mentioned several times, a pivotal player. Glad she is healthy. 5-8 for 16 points and 7 rebounds.

And freshman Addison O'Grady, 8 points and 8 minutes. This team is clicking at the right time, and they're going to all be back next year, baby. This team, they're just playing with house, the house cards right now or house money at this point. Sorry, bad,

bad analogy. They're playing with house money. They have the ability to go far and deep into the NCAA tournament. It starts with continuing to do well right now, right? You win these next couple games, you win the Big Ten tournament, Big Ten title. You go into the Big Ten tournament

with a number one seed or even a number two or three seed, get to the game, the Big Ten tournament game, you are probably positioning yourself for a three or four seed, which gives you a home game. Huge for NCAA, for that purpose,

for the Iowa women's basketball team, huge for their ability to make a run to a Sweet 16 or an Elite Eight or even a Final Four. And the fact they are all returning next year means that we got to enjoy this ride, baby, because it's going to be a lot of fun watching Kaitlin Clark, Monica McKenna, all these players continue to come together. Iowa bringing in another impressive recruiting class as well.

The buck does not stop here. This train is just getting going. The last thing I want to call out, though, about this women's basketball team, I just want to quickly call out the fact that ESPN is absolutely garbage. They post something saying Elijah Boston is clearly the national player of the year at this point. And it's just so typical of some of these mainstream media sites to not actually understand how impactful certain players are to teams. Elijah Boston doing great.

No doubt about it. Number one ranked team. Fantastic. Caitlin Clark has been putting together a season that rivals almost any season in the history of women's basketball, not just this year, but the history of women's basketball. And men's basketball, honestly, too. And the fact that she is not getting the love gives you everything you need to know about the lack of credibility for ESPN.

That's how I'm ending the show, though. We're going to be back tomorrow, breaking down some recruiting news and anything else that comes up in the next couple of days. Also, giving you a preview of Iowa versus Nebraska. So stay tuned for that on tomorrow's episode of the show. First, if you want to listen to more Locked On content, I know I appreciate you all tuning in to the Locked On Hawkeyes podcast, making us your first listen every single day, but I highly recommend you make the Locked On NFL Draft

your second listen every single day. Ryan Tracy and former NFL cornerback Eric Crocker bring the NFL Draft to life every day with insight and analysis on college football prospects like Tyler Linderbaum, Dane Belton, and Tyler Goodson, and also insight into NFL front offices. It's free and it's available wherever you

get your podcasts at, so check it out. Locked on NFL Draft. They do a great job there of breaking down all the draft stories going on up and through April. That'll do it for our show today, though. Hope you have a fantastic Wednesday. As always, Hawkeye Nation show today, though. Hope you have a fantastic Wednesday. As always, Hawkeye Nation, I appreciate you tuning in. Have a fantastic Wednesday, a great week,

and as always, let's go Hawks.