Locked On Hawkeyes - Daily Podcast On Iowa Hawkeyes Football & Basketball - RELIEF: Iowa Hawkeyes Secure NCAA Bid, BREAKDOWN Why Clemson Could Be Their Best Draw

Starting point is 00:00:00 The brackets are out. The Iowa men get a great round one matchup with Clemson. But the women, their road to the sweet 16 could be tougher than usual. You are Locked on Hawkeyes, your daily podcast on the Iowa Hawkeyes. Part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. Welcome in. I'm Trent Condon, and this is the Lockdown Hawkeyes podcast. Thanks for making Lockdown Hawkeyes your first listen every day. We are your daily.

Starting point is 00:00:35 Iowa Hawkeye podcast. I've been covering the Hawkeyes for over 20 years now here on the radio in the state of Iowa, including currently on the Iowa Sports Radio Network. You can hear me each weekday from noon to two. Talking the world of sports and a lot of Hawkeyes with you in stations in Sioux City, Iowa City, Cedar Rapids, and the Quad Cities, along with our flagship, 106.3 KX&O in Des Moines. Today's episode of Lockdown Hawkeyes is brought to you by Fanduel. Fanduel is giving you a way to turn your energy into even bigger potential wins with a college basketball parley profit boost. Head to Fandual.com to get started. Well, with the brackets here, we got so much to get into today.

Starting point is 00:01:16 We're going to talk about the Iowa women, the path that they have, a draw that sets up well to make a deep draw. But get that second weekend, the Sweet 16 could prove to be a little bit more difficult, a little bit more scouting that's going to go into it as well as the Hawkeyes earned the, top number two seed on the women's side. But we begin today on the men's side as the Iowa men get their marching orders. And I don't know if this is just some of the scar tissue that I have as a Hawkeye fan throughout the years. But as we're going through the brackets and the different, obviously, bracketologists that we talked about, the different metrics that are there. For a while before the final bracket came out, I just had that sinking feeling that,

Starting point is 00:01:57 oh no, they're not going to do this to Iowa, right? We talked about maybe some of the negative things that could be there with the Hawkeye resume, the two quad three losses that they sustain the losses to Maryland on the road in Penn State, if that was going to be a negative. I had that feeling because I go back as a kid and back in the, what had been, the mid-90s, I guess it was. And when Iowa was left out with 20 victories, which at the time was a benchmark that was going to get you in, you play in a power conference, you win 20 games, they're going to get in,

Starting point is 00:02:25 and they were left out. I think it was 95 in memory serves. But regardless of that, just that slight feeling before they came back. after the TV break and had that final bracket there. But alas, we know that is not the case. Iowa was safely in, as we talked about for weeks and weeks, that the resume was going to be good enough that we weren't going to have to sweat on selection Sunday,

Starting point is 00:02:44 but because of the way the brackets were revealed, I was still sweating a little bit, and maybe that's just my negativity. That's starting to show just a little bit on that one. Hawkeyes earn a number nine seed. They were the final number nine seed. Made the prediction yesterday that I thought that they were going to be a number a 10 seed, where one spot off on that. Yet, here's a thing. You look at the bracket and the

Starting point is 00:03:06 Hawkeye bracket, obviously, in the way that it is constructed. Now, they open up against Clemson. We're going to talk about that matchup against the Tigers, I think a matchup that works out for them pretty well overall. But here's the other part. If Iwo would have fallen from a 10 and everything stays the same. Yeah, they stay in the same region. They're still going to be lined up in the south. Well, that means that if they were in the 710 game and you move them there instead of Texas A&M, Well, Texas N, A&M pumped that up, whatever it is, just to simplify things as much as possible. A second round matchup against Houston, I know I'm crazy for a lot of reasons. But I think Iowa has a better shot against Florida in the round of 32 than they would against Houston.

Starting point is 00:03:46 Not because the matchups better. That Florida team is also huge. It's the style of play. And Florida, as you saw in their last loss to Vanderbilt in the SEC tournament, they can shoot themselves out of games. And with their back court, with Lee, and with Boog, they're a team that is really good. They're really big. It's a bad matchup. Heck, they got a condon on their team.

Starting point is 00:04:07 You know they got to be good, right? Honestly, though. With Boogie Flan, he shoots 23% from three. With Xavier-Lee, he shoots 28% from three. Just a game where they don't shoot it well. They're probably going to dominate the boards, but Iowa can muck it up, play an ugly style. I would take Iowa shots better. against the Gators, then I would against the Cougars,

Starting point is 00:04:29 regardless who it is. It was going to be incredibly difficult. And it is going to be Florida if they get there. But in order to get there, they got to win a game when they have to win a game against Clemson. So let's start right there and talk about this Clemson matchup. What they're going to see in a Clemson game where Iowa is currently the favorite in this game. Ken Pomeroy has them favored by two points, one point over at Bart Torvig. But here is a big difference.

Starting point is 00:04:54 And the betting lines currently at last check at Fanduil, always subject to change. The Hawkeyes were a two and a half point favorite in that one. But this Clemson team, that's profile is very similar to what Iowa is. Well, they're going to be playing without their big guy. And now as Carter Welling toward his ACL in their last game of the ACC tournament, because of that, obviously he's not going to be there. And now with him out, it definitely changes the equation for this team. made team that you look through the resume, very similar to Iowa.

Starting point is 00:05:25 They have a couple of nice wins on there. They beat North Carolina in the ACCC tournament. We know though North Carolina, that is a different squad than what they've been throughout the course of this season with the entry to Caleb Wilson as he is out for the rest of the season. You go through not a whole lot of depth in their resume, non-conference. They got an overtime win against a Georgia team that's in the NCAA tournament. They beat Cincinnati. That was on the wrong side of the bubble. But outside of that, a whole win against Miami is.

Starting point is 00:05:51 decent, not a whole bunch of much else on that resume that says that this is going to be an excellent team. Brad Brown-Bron-Elles teams, and we go way back to some 16 years ago, one of the guys that was mentioned possibly taking over for Todd Licklider, the job that obviously went to Frey McCaffrey. Speaking of Frady Mac, congratulations to him, getting his Penn team into the NCAA tournament, becoming the fifth team that he has coached now to the NCAA tournament. and it was great to see a lot of Hawkeye fans that were rooting for Penn to get it done. T.J. Power, who I know some Hawkeye fans felt like Iowa was going to get three, four years back and maybe how different things could be if that would have played out.

Starting point is 00:06:30 Alas, he ended up at Duke, then of Virginia, and now playing for him at Penn. But great game, really fun to watch and entertaining and see him frayed on the sideline and the joy on his face for a guy that resurrected the program. And obviously never got us to the heights that we wanted. And we never got to get to that second weekend with him. but did so many good things during his career. But back to Clemson and what we're talking about here. Love this matchup.

Starting point is 00:06:53 I don't think there is a better eight, nine matchup when you go through the bracket and look what Iowa could have had. That is going to be better than this. They played a slow pace like Iowa wants to play at tempo-wise. This is one of the slowest teams in the country. They are not very good offensively, 71st in the country. And for a power conference team,

Starting point is 00:07:12 that is certainly not even close to an elite level, coupled with the defense, it's good. They're 20th in the country on the defense event, but we're not talking about anything crazy here. They don't get on the offensive glass real big. And we talked about obviously one of their big guys being out. So this is a lot of positivity for Iowa. This is a kind of matchup that you look through and you say,

Starting point is 00:07:32 this is going to be a good one for Iowa. They're not overly big. They don't shoot it well. They're going to play a pace style of play that Iowa is very comfortable in. I think this is about as good as it could possibly be for the Hawkeyes. and it feels like we haven't sent that very often throughout the years. We continue to dig into the men's bracket. Plus, we're going to talk about the Hawkeye women.

Starting point is 00:07:53 They earned the number two seed in the NCAA tournament. A lot of bracket talk. It is a great time. And after two years of missing the NCAA tournament, it is much better to be on this side of things. We dive a little bit deeper in to Ben McCullum squad. What needs to happen for the Hawkeyes to make a little bit of a run here, what the matchups look like and what potentially we could be looking at

Starting point is 00:08:14 with the second round matchup against. Florida. We'll talk about tip times as well as we continue. Lots going on. It is bracket time. We got you covered. Locked on Hawkeyes. College basketball is nonstop. Big games, tight spreads, momentum swings every single night. From early tip-offs to late night West Coast shootouts, there's always action on the board. And now Fanduels giving you away to turn that energy into even bigger potential wins with a college basketball parlay profit boost. You can build any college hoops parlay you want rivalry games right matchups whatever fits your read plus you can mix spreads totals player props all together and see how the slate plays out for you take a look at the hawkeyes

Starting point is 00:08:57 mentioned they're an early two and a half point favorite at fiendool over clemson in that one but not just that they got more that you can bet on who's going to be a team that gets into the sweet 16 a team it's going to make a run to the final four of course you can play the national championship as well and you can see where the Hawkeyes' odds are currently. In fact, you think the Hawkeyes are going to make a big run in this one with Fanduel? How about this? Iowa, to make the round of 32, minus 145 odds. To make it to the Sweet 16 meeting, likely beating Florida plus 650.

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Starting point is 00:11:23 So this will be a 550 start time. And yes, checked again, Iowa currently a two and a half point favorite over Clemson in the first round matchup over under sitting at 130 and a half. It feels like this is going to be a grinder type of game. 550 is the tip time. And I know people are already making your plans. Now, I love that we get this Friday game. I love the first day of the NCAA tournament.

Starting point is 00:11:48 Let everybody else kind of figure things out, right? And it just feels better playing on the Friday. I don't know what it is. Again, probably just one of my goofy things that I have inside my mind. But you're there longer. You get that opportunity. And if they get to Sunday, what it's going to look like. I think we have to remember come every March that this has definitely changed throughout the years.

Starting point is 00:12:09 And what we've seen in the past in the NCAA tournament, back when it was on CBS and all the games were only there. This move over with the Turner Networks. You got the games on TNT, TBS, True TV. It has changed how they also operate by the time we get to the weekend. So if they continue like they did a year ago, last season, this is what Sunday looked like. First, they have back-to-back standalone games, games that do not have anything else that are played on CBS. Likely going to be a big national game.

Starting point is 00:12:40 Last year, it was Florida, Yukon, that played that. There you had, of course, early and the national championships against the number one seat gators who went on themselves to win the national championship. That was followed up with Duke against Baylor. Those were those standalone games. If you look at the schedule that potentially could be happening, again, not knowing the upsets that are going to happen on Friday, but on Sunday, don't think it's highly likely that Iowa, Florida will get that kind of notoriety. It's going to get that kind of spot, standalone games on CBS. I think you're looking at probably the most likely the first game would be.

Starting point is 00:13:12 St. John's Kansas, Iowa State, Kentucky also would have that kind of opportunity. Upsets are going to happen. It's going to change things up. Sunday, though, look towards later in the day. Mid-afternoon, early evening, even late night, that could be more of a potential that we'll be seeing for a potential Iowa, Florida game if you're looking ahead to Sunday and trying to make your plans, figure out your schedule. I think that is the biggest likelihood that we're going to see in the way that this plays out.

Starting point is 00:13:39 It is a great time. Not only that, we got two other instigues. state teams that are also going to be playing on Friday. So on Friday, we'll get to see Iowa State. They'll be playing early in the day. And the Cyclones, as they're matching up in the first round, they'll be playing at 150 is the matchup with the Cyclones. And then also, as the Iowa game is going on, we will also get on Friday the U and I matchup as the Panthers will be moving on to Kakan St. Johns. That will be CBS. Also, something else to probably keep your eye on there. Since CBS has that, That means the big eight team is going to be there.

Starting point is 00:14:13 The likelihood is we're going to be Kansas, St. John's, unless the Panthers can pull the upset or Cal Baptist knocking off Kansas. It's the NCAA tournament. You never know what's going to happen. A lot of fun. We also know that the Iowa women are the number two seed in the NCAA tournament on the women's side. Now, they shift back a day and they will not get started until Friday with their bracket. We'll talk about the Iowa matchup, what's in front of them.

Starting point is 00:14:37 and why this matchup here in the round of 32, a place that has not been easy for the Hawkeyes here over the last couple of seasons, and even extra hurdle has been put in there. We'll talk about that as we continue. Look at the Iowa women. We continue on the locked on Hawkeyes podcast. What if sports were traded like markets? Now you can put your sports IQ to work in real time with Robin Hood prediction markets.

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Starting point is 00:18:10 Again, code March, locked on Hawkeyes. Dot Supercast.com. We jump over to the Iowa women as they get the number two seed in their women's NCAA. So it'll be Saturday afternoon, 3 o'clock tip off for the Hawkeye women as they will take on Fairleigh Dickinson in the first round. Just taking a quick peek at this Fairley Dickinson team. Now, they're going to come in in a winning streak. And in fact, a very long winning streak for Fairleigh Dickinson. As they have ripped off now, what is it,

Starting point is 00:18:41 22 consecutive victories, including three straight in their conference. They went undefeated in the Northeast Conference this year. Had a couple of close calls, a one-point game. There was another close call in there, but overall, really a dominating performance out of them. They went in their conference tournament by 25 by 20, and then 22 in the championship game. I think shows you just how good this team is compared to their competition. But Iowa is favored currently by 29 and a half. Last year, Fairley Dickinson was also a 15 seed in the NCAA tournament.

Starting point is 00:19:11 They lost by 22 against TCU, a team that is not very big. There are three best players. There are three players that average double figures per game. Are three guards, five six, five nine, and five six between the three of them. They're okay, three-point shooters, but nothing at the elite end. They don't get to the free throw line very often. There doesn't appear to be much here that is a big concern. However, this is the tricky part that you get along with it because there will be a game played on Carver on Thursday.

Starting point is 00:19:40 It will be in the opening round and that's going to certainly look much different as you're going to get the opening round matchup between Virginia and Arizona State. And this is a rarity because normally we see these games in the round of 68, the Dayton on the men's side, though they're played at the places that they're going to play on the women's side, an 11 seed, sometimes at 12. That's what you normally see. just interesting that it falls in the 12 and it shows you that gap between the mid majors and low majors and everybody else on the women's side it's big on the men's side as we learned last year and at the women's side maybe it's even going to another level while you have these teams so that means that i was going to have to scout an extra team they'll get a look

Starting point is 00:20:19 at them up close and personal obviously at carver that'll be played by the way at eight o'clock with virginia and arizona state the winner of that one will get georgia georgia is the seventh seed and might make you a little bit narrow risk because Katie Abrahamson Henderson took her Georgia squad as an Iowa alum and gave them a tussle a couple of years ago with Caitlin Clark and company and made that a game. That was a two-point game in the final couple minutes of that one. Caitlin had a big shot to help put it away. A Georgia team 22 and 9 on the season got a couple of good wins on their resume. Overall got some decent wins in there against the upper echelon teams though. they certainly did struggle when they faced off,

Starting point is 00:21:00 battled against Oklahoma, lost that one by four, got blown out by Texas, lost in the first round of the SEC tournament to Kentucky. Overall, it's going to be another solid team. It's kind of what you see year and year out from this squad, going to be good on both ends of the floor. They're going to have some physicality to them. And as we've learned with Iowa women's basketball, and going back to early in Caitlin's career during her sophomore campaign

Starting point is 00:21:22 when they got knocked out by Creighton in the round of 32, the hardered wins that they had against Georgia. against West Virginia, getting to that Sweet 16, there's just something about that round of 32 game, even a game against a team that you're on paper better than, even with the home court advantage that I was going to have in that game, it's going to be overly, certainly difficult. And it's proven to be the case here recently for this Iowa women's team,

Starting point is 00:21:47 even with the home game that they had. Now, that wasn't the case a year ago, had to go down to Oklahoma, and that one didn't go well at all against Jenny Baranchic's team. Obviously, we remember that one. and how ugly that one got and how quickly it got away. But 3 o'clock on Saturday, excuse me, for the first game. Then they will play again on Monday.

Starting point is 00:22:06 Likely against Georgia, Georgia will be favored to get there, but could be against Arizona State, could be against Virginia, an extra layer on top of it. Look in big picture, though, at the bracket. And as we speculated about the Iowa women, is the UCLA loss going to be impactful for them? Is this something that's going to linger, just how ugly that thing was and how it got away?

Starting point is 00:22:27 Iowa was the number five seed on the seat less, the best number two seed, meaning they don't have to play Yukon, you don't have to play UCLA again, don't even have to play Texas who won the series this year against South Carolina. If they would get to an elite eight, it would be against the game coxent. South Carolina's good. Don Staley is going to have good teams year-in year-out. However, as good as they are, compared to the other three number one seeds, this is the one I think you wanted.

Starting point is 00:22:56 South Carolina is a good rebounding team, but not at the elite levels that we've seen in the past. This is still not a great three-point shooting team overall compared to some of the past ones that we've seen. They're good from the outside. They can knock down shots, but it's not at an elite level. It's not like Yukon who's shooting nearly 40% from behind the arc this year, and they don't take a ton of them on top of it,

Starting point is 00:23:18 and that's been obviously the calling card throughout Dawn Staley's teams, and when I will pull that upset, obviously the game plan defensively, what they did, sang into the paint and making them shoot from the outside if they have one of those games. But long way to go before they get there. And a lot that has to be done in order for that to happen. You look at the Sweet 16, a potential match up there. If Iowa can get to the second weekend, TCU is the number three seed. I do like that. The Big 12 this year was certainly very down compared to what we're used to in the past. TCU, the pick of the litter there, them in West Virginia,

Starting point is 00:23:50 where certainly the top two teams in that league this season could also be Washington, who is is a six seed up there in that region, looking like a Washington TCU matchup in the round of 32. Washington team that came into Carver and Iowa played well in that one. When they ended the losing streak and got things going against Washington, that was one of the games that the ship started to turn. That was the first game that we saw Stremlow inserted into the lineup. Iowa won that one by nine and really solidify themselves as they went through. Then after that one, finish the year on a winning streak, six consecutive to end the regular season, two more in the Big Ten tournament, including those wins against Michigan, against

Starting point is 00:24:29 Illinois, what they were able to do before. They ran in to UCLA. Overall, two brackets for both the Iowa men and the Iowa women. I think we have to be pretty happy about it. I think overall, this was a big time opportunity to bank a push forward, and it worked out incredibly well for the Hawkeyes. Well, we will break these games down even deeper as we continue here throughout the course of the week.

Starting point is 00:24:52 We got a lot going on, not just the men's and women's side. We also have NCAA wrestling. We will preview nationals with our guys, Zach Zaco, over at Lockdown Nittney Lions. We'll get a perspective and break things down. And again, I just have that glimmer of hope after what we saw on the backside of the brackets from the wrestlers at Big Tens. And maybe they can push forward and do a little something extra, not win a national championship. I know that's off the border with Penn State and what they are. But are we talking about top five finish?

Starting point is 00:25:19 Is that a realistic goal for the wrestling team? We'll talk about that coming up this week here on Lockdown, Hawkeye. Again, if you've been thinking about joining our Everydayer Club, now is the time. You're going to get ad-free shows each and every day of Locked on Hawkeyes, the show you already listen to, but get it ad-free, plus access to our group chat on Discord. And if you sign up before the NCAA tournament tips off, you can get into our Everydayer Club bracket-poole on Discord, a chance to win Locked On March. Right now, use the code March.

Starting point is 00:25:49 It's going to get your first month free of the Everydayer Club, Lockdownhawkeyes. supercast.com. Use that code March or you can find it also in the show notes here each and every day. Again, locked on hawkeyes dot supercast.com. Love looking at the brackets and we will continue to break them down on your daily

Starting point is 00:26:07 Iowa Hawkeye podcast, Locked on Hawkeyes. Hope everybody out there has a great week. We'll talk to again tomorrow. Until then, go Hawks.

Locked On Hawkeyes - Daily Podcast On Iowa Hawkeyes Football & Basketball - RELIEF: Iowa Hawkeyes Secure NCAA Bid, BREAKDOWN Why Clemson Could Be Their Best Draw

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