Locked On Hawkeyes - Daily Podcast On Iowa Hawkeyes Football & Basketball - Iowa stomps Michigan State with unexpected production | Iowa finds out current tournament projection | NFL Draft rumblings

Episode Date: February 15, 2021

The Iowa basketball team dominated Michigan state in quite an unusual way. We break all of that down before diving into tournament ranking analysis. We wrap up the show with some NFL Draft coverage.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 “LOCKEDON,” and you’ll get 20% off your next order.BetOnline AGThere is only 1 place that has you covered and 1 place we trust. Betonline.ag! Sign up today for a free account at betonline.ag and use that promocode: LOCKEDON for your 50% welcome bonus. 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 Monday morning episode of the Locked On Hawkeyes Podcast, your daily podcast covering your Iowa Hawkeyes on the Locked On Sports Network. As always, I am your host, Andrew Wade, and today's episode is brought to you by Built Bar. Go to BuiltBar.com and use the promo code LOCKEDON, and you'll get 20% off your next order. And on today's show, we are breaking down the Iowa win over Michigan State. A very rare occurrence, Michigan State getting blown out so poorly at the Breslin Center.

That is all covered on today's show. We're also going to talk a little bit about the rankings. Iowa was recently included in the top 16. The NCAA released what would be the current NCAA bracket if the tournament was scheduled today. Iowa was ranked within that. We're going to talk a lot about that, Joe Linardi's bracket, and what Iowa has the potential to do either moving up or down,

depending on the next couple weeks. We also have some football talk as well, giving you some NFL draft talk with the top 300 board from Matt Miller coming out. There were four Iowa Hawkeyes there. We're also going to go through a few other mock drafts and let you know where some of these Iowa Hawkeyes are currently at, and then talk a little bit about women's basketball. That's all coming up on the show today. And if you like it, give us that five-star review.

Subscribe wherever you downloaded this podcast at and follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. But let's get to the men's basketball game, an 88-58 beating of Michigan State. A lot that we can love about this game. Let's just get through some of the stats real quick and then we'll break down some of the themes we saw. Iowa held Michigan State to 35% shooting from the field,

only 6-21 from three. They forced Michigan State into seven turnovers and out-rebounded them 44-34. Still lost the offensive rebound battle, but still overall beat Michigan State in the rebound battle. Had 5 blocks to 2 blocks. It was fun. I really enjoyed the game. I enjoyed watching Iowa get a pretty easy win. And it came from different spaces than

we typically see them. Luka Garza having one of the worst games of the last two years for him, only playing 23 minutes, finished with eight points, eight rebounds, three of 11 shooting with three assists, and then two of seven from the line. So I thought that was really interesting when I looked into the Luka Garza stats. There's a lot of interesting themes that kind of popped up from that. That game, again, the fact that Iowa won that game and won it by 30 with the National Player of the Year, or who it should be the National Player of the Year, sitting

and not really getting a lot done, that's huge. So here's where Luka Garza this game ranks in comparison to other games. A couple themes I kind of noticed from that. This was his worst free throw shooting game outside of Illinois this year, where he was only shot one free throw. Last year,

there's only one worse than that. And it was Cincinnati where he shot one of four, but not a good look when you're shooting two or seven. This is something he worked on in this off season. You expect it to be better. And as of lately, the free throw shooting has really been off, which really hurts the Iowa Hawkeyes in some of these games.

Overall, his shooting percentage on the day, 3 of 11, 27%. That was one of the worst shooting percentages he's had in quite some time. His lowest point total in the last two seasons. Only one other time was he even held under double digits. And four times he shot worse than 27% in the 2018-2019 season. Just a bad day all around. We're going to have that. Everyone has a couple bad games.

Luka Garza, though, has had kind of a bad stretch the last couple games. Three of his five worst shooting days this season have come in the last week, so I expect him to turn it around. That is not the Luka Garza we have become very familiar with, but what I think is more impressive is how that has coincided with the rise of a few other players. Guys like Joe Wieskamp, Jack Nunji, and even Connor McCaffrey have really taken the show this past week. I mean, Joe Wieskamp is playing like a guy who can play in the NBA.

John Rothstein had this to say about Joe Wieskamp after the game. He said, People are sleeping on Joe Wieskamp, has quietly emerged into one of the best wings in college basketball, can score, rebound, and has a defined position in elite wing. I couldn't agree more. We'll talk about this tomorrow, about whether or not this kind of hurts the chances of Joey's camp coming back because he's showing the kind of guy that we all knew he could be. He is becoming the go-to guy for the Iowa Hawkeye offense.

In 28 minutes of play, 21 points on 7 of 13 shooting, 7 rebounds, 3 assists, 5 of 7 from behind the arc, which has been a phenomenal showing the last couple weeks, shooting I think 60-ish percent behind the arc lately, and 1 block and 1 steal. Just a phenomenal performance by Joe Wieskamp all around. One of the reasons why Iowa has won the last two games and why they've been in the last couple games is because of Joe Wieskamp. Also, Connor McCaffrey, that performance was something else there.

16 points on 6 of 8 shooting, 4 of 6 from 3. He is now shooting 33% from 3 this year. And I know, I think it might just be the fact that his shooting, the shooting mechanics are just atrocious. They look so gross watching him shoot the ball. But he isn't that ineffective. You know, I remember his first year where he got some playing time his redshirt freshman season. He was not a very good shooter. Not saying he's the best shooter, not saying he's even a great shooter, but he shot 34% last year. He's now shooting 33% from the three this year.

Teams are going to have to start paying attention to him. If he can keep that up, teams are going to have to go for him as opposed to try to double-team Luka Garza, which is what the Spartans did, and that really came back to haunt them. Again, with C.J. Frederick out, having a guy like Connor McCaffrey knock down a few shots like that will be really huge for Luka Garza and for the rest of the basketball team. Now his season-high 16 was actually the second-highest point total

he's ever had in his career. He had 19 against UConn three years ago. In that year, though, only shot 29 threes. So he's improving as a deep threat kind of guy. Those four threes, two higher than any other time this season, which his second highest was actually two against Illinois. Twice he hit three threes last year. But again, that was a huge performance from Connor McCaffrey,

and if he can continue to do that, that's going to be phenomenal for this basketball team. But let's talk about Jack Nunji, a guy who really started off the season with one great game after coming back from his father passing away, and then struggled for quite a bit, to the point where there were people saying Jack Nunji should never play another minute, which I knew was not appropriate, not correct, but it was frustrating to see some of the struggles from Jack Nunji. Now though, he's becoming a very pivotal player. In 26 minutes of play, he got more time than Luka Garza did.

a very pivotal player in 26 minutes of play. He got more time than Luka Garza did. 18 points, 11 rebounds, 6 assists, tying or superseding career highs for all those. 7 of 11 from the field, one block, only one personal foul. Had a team best 26 plus minus tied with Connor McCaffrey. Jack Nunji has him really going off. One of the most impressive things, though, that I found is his defensive energy throughout this kind of struggle. Jack Nunji has been really going off. One of the most impressive things, though, that I've found is his defensive energy.

Throughout this kind of struggle, Jack Nunji has been the one consistent guy defensively where I feel like he has been a stalwart down low and doing a great job of spelling Luka Garza. And when a team can't just key on Luka Garza, they have another 6'11 big man they've got to work on, that makes his team even more unstoppable offensively than they have been in the past. And again, the defense has been really impressive from Jack Nunji. Also, I thought the defense in general against Michigan State was really good. Fran's working in more man-to-man defense. He likes to mix it

up a bit, but he prefers to run man. Unfortunately, Iowa just typically doesn't have the best athlete to be able to handle a man-to-man concept consistently, but when they're getting burned from the perimeter so often, you've got to do something different. I'd rather give up a few layups than give up open, wide-open three-point shots every single time.

Now, again, zone defense also kind of helps out from a foul perspective, keeps guys fresh with the offense, but Fran does trust his bench, so I feel like man is kind of the approach to go, and it seems to be working the last couple games where Iowa defensively has played a lot better. Now, this is a big time. Iowa has Penn State coming up and Wisconsin coming up this upcoming week. That is a big opportunity for the Hawks to continue this win streak.

Wisconsin not looking like a team that is really, I mean, they're truly looking like a middle of the pack team. Penn State's going to be an interesting matchup. We're going to be breaking all that down on the show over the next week. We also have a crossover episode coming up for Wisconsin, specifically talking to Asher Lowe. So lots of fun stuff there. But the fact that Iowa got this win, a 30-point win against Michigan State, and Tom Izzo's press conference afterwards,

all he had to say was, I'm embarrassed. That was huge. It was a big win. I know Michigan State is not having the best of season this year. Honestly, probably one of the worst seasons they've had in a long time. Michigan State is still a strong team. Tom Izzo is still a fantastic coach. Playing at the Breslin Center, regardless if fans are not,

is still a very difficult task. So for Iowa to get that win is a huge confidence boost for this program. And with C.J. Frederick being out, C.J. Frederick being out, Luka Garza struggling, Iowa was able to step up with other guys and get it done. And again, Joe Wieskamp playing like an NBA guy. Connor McCaffrey giving Iowa what they need.

And Jack Nunji just coming into his own. I mean, a lot of these guys are really starting to come into their own. So love that for the Iowa Hawkeyes. Coming up on segment number two, we're going to get into some NCAA tournament predictions. Where are they expected to be at? All that fun stuff again coming up on segment number two, we're going to get into some NCAA tournament predictions. Where are they expected to be at? All that fun stuff, again, coming up on segment number two. Before we get into that, though, I want to tell you about BetOnline.ag because BetOnline.ag is the fastest and the easiest way to bet on all your sports action.

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Peter Bukowski hosts Locked On Today, a daily podcast breaking down the biggest stories with analysis from our local experts. Start your day with all the sports news you need in under 20 minutes. Subscribe to Locked On Today wherever you get your podcasts at. Now let's turn our attention back to this men's basketball team, which is doing so phenomenally the last two games. Again, it's great to see them get back on the winning track. I know it's tough without Cedric Frederick.

Luka Garza struggling as of recent, but we're seeing big guys step up. What I thought was more impressive was the fact that despite their skid, four or five games lost prior to this two-game winning streak, they are still in the hunt for a one and a two seed possibly. Right now, they have a four seed. The NCAA revealed the bracket that would be set today if it were to come out. That was over this weekend on Saturday

prior to their win over Michigan State. I don't think that would have made too much of a difference. However, a few teams lost. Iowa should be able to jump over West Virginia, for example, in that game or in the rankings matchup. Iowa sitting at 13th, which is a four seed. So again, you go on a four game, you lose 4 out of 5 games, and you're still at a 4 seed.

And to be fair, the highest 4 seed there is. That's pretty awesome to see. A lot of opportunity here for Iowa to continue to move up. Currently, Joe Linardi actually has Iowa as the 11 overall ranked team as a 3 seed. So, again, lots of opportunity to go up. They have games against the third overall and fourth overall seed, according to the NCAA and according to Joe

Lenardi. So lots of opportunity here, and I can't stress that enough. Right now, AP poll, Iowa currently at 15. They should jump up as well. They should jump up over West Virginia and Missouri, maybe even Texas Tech. They'll be 12th or 13th, in my personal opinion, in the AP poll that comes out today.

And according to Kempom, Iowa is now third overall, making a bit of a jump there. Adjusted offense is number one. Defense has gone up a little bit as well to 111. Not great, not even good. Actually, probably just more like below average to bad. But still, 111 better than what they were before, and their defense has been coming on the last couple games. We'll see how that continues to play out against Penn State and Wisconsin.

Iowa currently sitting at 8th in the net ranking with 4-5 record in Q1 wins. Now, what all this means, it's basically an idea of the picture, right? You have a resume that you're putting together. You want to have a better resume going forward. Now, all these things kind of factor into it. Specifically, the net ranking especially factors into it. And why that's so important is the net ranking is basically a better way of identifying what teams are really the best teams in the nation.

It doesn't put any sort of emphasis on when you played those games, but it does put an emphasis on what teams you played and where you played them at, which is why you talk about these Q1, Q2, Q3, Q4 wins. That's why Q1 wins are so important for the Hawkeyes. But when you look at this, Joe Linardi has Iowa at 11. The NCAA bracket has Iowa at 13. Kempom has them at 3rd. The net ranking has them at 8.

I think with a good week this week, Iowa should undoubtedly be in that 2-seed range. And if you beat Michigan and Ohio State, or maybe even just beat one of them and one of the other teams slips, that is a one to two seed. Again, putting yourself in a better position and why this all matters is the better seed you can get, the longer you can go in the tournament without playing a even better or top ranked team. So for example, if Iowa gets, let's say, a 5 seed in the bracket, and I know most of you might know this, some of you may not. If Iowa gets a 2 seed, but they're the fifth overall team as far as that 2 seed goes, they'll have a game against the number 4 overall seed.

So the positioning of that also matters, and they wouldn't play them until the Elite 8. So that's where all of this comes in. You want to have as high of a seat as possible so you're getting the most advantageous bracket for you going forward. That is why this is important. Now, these things change so consistently. Again, Iowa goes on a four.

They lose four out of five. They struggle there. They drop down. Now they have an opportunity to win a few more games. If they can do that, they're going to bump back up. And when you have a Ken Palm team that's ranked third overall, net ranking's eighth. Again, those usually typically align with how this NCAA

bracket is. Those are being updated more consistently than that bracket, right? The bracket is on Saturday. Iowa then takes care of Michigan State. They move up in Ken Palm. They move up in net ranking, possibly. Now we're looking at Iowa as a two seed, and as the week progresses, they could be getting further up into that two seed range, especially as other teams possibly lose. That's why this is all important. That's why this all matters for the Iowa Hawkeyes.

It's a constant positioning game, and we want to have Iowa have the most advantageous schedule as possible. On the women's side of things, Kaitlyn Clark has been phenomenal. She's up for a couple different awards. Put up 39 points against Nebraska a couple days ago. 88-81 defeat from Iowa over Nebraska, which is phenomenal. She had some ridiculous threes. And right now, they have 8-9 Penn State coming in February 18th, just a couple days from now. But they are currently an 8 seed. And they're one of the last four in as far as at-large teams.

So they're still on the hunt. They just need to keep winning the games they're supposed of the last four in as far as at-large teams. So they're still on the hunt. They just need to keep winning the games they're supposed to be winning. But I think what's important to note is that this team is very young. They have a lot of talent, and this is a team to be reckoned with going forward in the future. They've lost some pretty close games against some very good teams. This is the team that if I'm a women's basketball coach, I'm worried about Iowa in one to two years

because this is a team that undoubtedly could win an NCAA title at some point when you have a player like Kaitlin Clark and the young strengths and talents that they have. Not as good of a bench, a little bit weaker of a bench than we've typically seen for this women's basketball team, but when you have a player like Kaitlin Clark, you can go far. And when you have someone like McKenna Warnick, that's huge. So lots of opportunity here for this women's basketball team.

Just getting to the tournament would be a huge success given how much they've had to reload over the past couple years for Lisa Bluter's team, so really love to see that. Coming up on segment number two, or sorry, segment number three, excuse me, we're going to hop into our conversation about college football, give it a little bit of a draft breakdown, and then also talk briefly about the Chris Doyle news. I think it's important to at least cover it.

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On College Football. Subscribe to Locked On College Football wherever you get your podcast at. Now, speaking of college football, let's talk a little bit about the Iowa football team. And there's obviously a lot of guys that we know very well from their time as Iowa football players. They are preparing for the NFL draft. You might be a little bit surprised to know that a lot of them are going to be UDFAs. That is just an expectation at this point. There's only one guy who's getting any day one and day two buzz,

and that is Davian Nixon. Now, again, I've talked about this before. I've seen reporters, Iowa reporters say that, you know, Chauncey Golsan should be a day two pick. Yes, we might think that, but he's not going to be a day two pick. I follow a lot of these different draft sites. I do a lot of the coverage myself. Chauncey Golsan is a phenomenal player. He's going to make some team really happy. He's going to make some team really happy as a sixth or seventh round draft pick, unless he has just a phenomenal pro day. He had a great time down at the Senior Bowl, but just not a guy who's going to rise that much. We know what we're getting from Chauncey Golston. And just like AJ

Epineza last year, I don't expect him to test out of this world. I don't expect him to run super fast. That's just not the kind of player Chauncey Golston is. Down at the Senior Bowl, they had him playing at a three-tech at that kind of inside spot. So that's kind of where they see him at potentially, and I think that's important to know coming into draft season. We'll get some other guys who cover the NFL draft closer than I do on the show as we get closer to the draft period, but wanted to always keep you up to date as the most recent rumblings that are going on. Matt Miller at TheDraftScout.com released his top 300.

He had Davian Nixon at 20, which is about where I've seen him at, although the draft network, a lot of those guys typically have had him a bit lower. Amir Smith-Marset, he has him at the 143rd ranked player on his board, the 19th ranked wide receiver. And he talked about this. He thought Amir Smith-Marset was a third round kind of guy, but the wide receiver class is incredibly deep. O'Laric Jackson, offensive tackle number 18, the number 243rd player on Matt Miller's top 300 board. And then Chauncey Golsan, he had him as edge 28 and the number 200 player on the board. If you remember correctly, we did a seven-round mock draft, or Matt Miller did a seven-round mock draft,

and we broke it down here on the show. And Chauncey Golsan didn't make that seven-round mock draft. Now part of that was that seven-round mock draft doesn't have compensatory picks. And part of it is, you'll look at that if Alaric Jackson is ranked 243rd and Chauncey Golson is 200 why is Alaric Jackson getting drafted and Chauncey Golson isn't in

some of these late mock drafts? And a lot of it comes to that position and the scarcity there and the fact that it's tough to find tackles and when you look at Alaric Jackson and how much he struggled with the senior bowl you think maybe we can move him into guard. Maybe we can slide him inside and he can play that position a little bit better. Or maybe there's something we can do to improve on his technique.

Because he's a big guy. He's a very big guy. So there's that potential there, which I think is something that people don't realize. A lot of times it comes down to what potential do teams think you have. Now going to the draft network, Kyle Krabs had Davian Nixon fall into the Lions at 51. Joe Marino had Davian Nixon falling to the Broncos at 41. So both guys thinking Davian Nixon goes in day two. They also had another interior defensive lineman going earlier.

So it just really depends on where you evaluate some of these interior defensive linemen. But for the most part, Davian Nixon sliding in at either one or two as far as the top interior defensive lineman. Walter Football also had a five-round mock draft out. Davion Nixon, he had going to the Bucs at 32, which is an interesting selection. Teaming up some of those Iowa Hawkeyes. His concepts were basically that Ndamukong Suh is going to be retiring soon, and you need a guy to replace him. Now, there's been some rumors about J.J. Watt to the Bucs.

If Davion Nixon goes there, J.J. Watt goes there, that would be almost too much for that team. That's a lot of riches when you have areas that you could possibly fill in at other spots. And then you also had a Larrick Jackson in the fourth round of the Jaguars at 120. I just don't see a Larrick Jackson going up. He had such a bad senior bowl. The fact that he had to drop out. There's concerns about where he can play at. His athleticism handling, you know, speed rushers. There's too many concerns to warrant drafting him in that fourth round spot. That's just my personal opinion on that. Now, Chris Doyle news, he was signed by the Jaguar signed by Urban Meyer

and then abruptly resigned a day later. Now I don't want to get into the details of all this, but there was definitely some outrage floating around the internet on that. And I did think it was very interestingly timed, just getting his settlement and then going immediately to coaching. I feel like maybe let things simmer down for a bit before you try to go and hire a Chris Doyle. And especially given Urban Meyer's reputation, the whole thing was just a little bit interesting to me. I'm not going to get in.

If you want to hear my opinions on what happened and all that stuff, I highly recommend you go check out our shows from early June. We talked all about it there. I don't want to rehash that. I just want to make sure that I am giving the news that is coming out in regards to former Iowa Hawkeye athletic members. So just my thoughts there. That does do it for our show today.

We'll be back tomorrow. We're going to talk about NBA draft prospects Joe Wieskamp and Luka Garza. Where could they possibly end up? Are they going to leave? I mean, Luka Garza is talk about NBA draft prospects Joe Wieskamp and Luka Garza. Where could they possibly end up? Are they going to leave? I mean, Luka Garza is definitely leaving, but will Joe Wieskamp leave? I think a lot of that has to be determined based on the next couple games and how far Iowa makes it in the NCAA tournament. So again,

that's all coming up on tomorrow's show of the Locked On Hawkeyes podcast. I do appreciate you all tuning in. I appreciate the love, the support, the listenership. Have a fantastic day out there, Hawkeye Nation. Hope you had a good weekend as well, and let's go Hawks!