Locked On Hawkeyes - Daily Podcast On Iowa Hawkeyes Football & Basketball - What's next for Iowa basketball after big home loss to Michigan? | Iowa Hawkeyes podcast

Episode Date: February 18, 2022

The men's Iowa basketball team dropped a huge game last night versus Michigan despite mounting an impressive comeback attempt late. We break down what went wrong in this game and what Iowa needs to do to quickly turn this thing around with an away game against Ohio State tomorrow afternoon. Can Fran McCaffery's Iowa Hawkeye squad rebound quickly to get their first signature win tomorrow?We wrap up the show by discussing the latest rumored candidate in the Iowa football team's search for a new quarterback coach after Ken O'Keefe unexpectedly stepped down two decades with the team.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 Friday 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, and we are here under unfortunate circumstances. The Iowa Hawkeye men's basketball team lost last night to Michigan. We're going to be talking about that. We're also going to be talking about the game tomorrow.

They turn around very quickly and have a very important road game versus Ohio State. We're also going to be talking about the Iowa Hawkeye quarterback coach search and why one of the current quarterback coaches could be up for the job. We're going to be talking about that all on today's show. 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, your first listen every single day. You can find the Locked on Hawkeyes podcast for free wherever you get podcasts at. So let's get into it. What a frustrating game overall last night, right?

Iowa finally gets over that hump of starting slow. Thank you to Keegan Murray, who put in a lot of points early on. Patrick McCaffrey is getting involved. I mean, here was kind of literally the progression of that initial first five minutes. Keegan Murray gets the first five points, including a foul. P-Mac with a fadeaway. J-Bo with a three-pointer after Rabracha fell down. P-Mac with another bucket at the key. Rabracha hits a jump shot. All in a row, right? Iowa's doing great offensively. Unfortunately, they couldn't control Michigan's offense.

Michigan, one of the slower-paced offenses in the entire country, was playing transition basketball, getting out and running, and also utilizing their big men to really take advantage of the Iowa Hawkeyes down low. They just absolutely ate last night against the Iowa Hawkeyes down low. Former five-star, I always mess up his name, but Musa Diabate had a career game against Iowa. I mean, that's kind of what just happened last night, right? Musa Diabate, 28 points, 12 of 14 shooting from the field, eight rebounds, 1 block, 1 steal. Hunter Dickinson didn't have as good of a game as Diabate.

He's 14 points with 5 of 8 shooting, 9 rebounds, 7 assists. So when I say not as good of a game, I mean he didn't have a career game. Hunter Dickinson still did damage. So the two big men really hurt the Iowa Hawkeyes in this game. Iowa just had no answer for them at all from a defensive perspective. Offensively, Iowa played pretty well for most of the game. I mean, they still put up 79 points in this game. Keegan Murray had a solid game, 23 points.

Patrick McCaffrey had an amazing final couple minutes with 13 points. Phillip Rocha put in 12 despite dealing with injuries. Jordan Bohannon put in 11. So it was a well-rounded effort by the Iowa Hawkeyes. Offensively, they just could not keep up with the Michigan team that wanted it more. Michigan wanted it more. They did a great job of making their shots.

And they came out in the second half absolutely gunning. Because Iowa took a lead into that second half, and Michigan came out, outscored Iowa by nine points in that second half. They were 12 of 16 to start the half, and they shot 65% from the field overall in this game. You're not going to win a lot of games when the other team shoots 65% from the field overall in this game. You're not going to win a lot of games when the other team shoots 65% from the field. Iowa also having a rough game from a turnover perspective.

Only 11 turnovers technically, but some of those turnovers were just bad. Getting the ball stripped as they were dribbling, bad passes. Not typical Iowa turnovers that we see. So very frustrating all around. Some of the takeaways from this game. First and foremost, Keegan Murray, congratulations, setting the sophomore scoring record. He was dealing with cramps.

That was kind of injuries were an issue this night as well. Keegan Murray dealing with cramps throughout the game. Phillip Abracha had to leave for a little bit. Patrick McCaffrey sounds like he was sick all day and still put together a very nice performance. Refereeing was inconsistent. And I don't mean just against Iowa, just overall. What is a travel?

I honestly have no idea at this point. It felt like everyone was just walking around. All right. How did some of the big men not get more fouls when they were clearly going up, kind of hitting the Iowa guys? It just felt like there was a lot of inconsistency in the officiating on both sides but when you look at the very final play that didn't change the the outcome of the game right Iowa needed to do a bunch of other things Michigan did a better job than Iowa but what a weird call as well Michigan's trying

to foul Jordan Bohannon and the refs just do not call it. And that's another thing I want to talk about. Jordan Bohannon did not screw that play up. For those of you out here that are upset about Jordan Bohannon taking a crappy three, Jordan Bohannon was trying to get a three up as they were fouling him so he could go to the free throw line and get three free throws. If Michigan fouls him with two free throws, he makes both those. Iowa's still down one with three seconds left. There's almost no time for Iowa to win that game. Now, the refs did not call that foul on Michigan.

Jordan Bohannon was trying to get a shooting foul by going up as they were hitting him. It didn't work out, but probably the best play Jordan Bohannon could have made given the circumstances that were happening. So layoff of Jordan Bohannon. He did not do anything wrong in this situation. Offensive rebounding was better in the second half. Iowa actually won the offensive rebounding battle 13-10. That has been an issue in the past.

But they were up 7-0 middle part of the second half in offensive rebounding. So doing a great job, at least getting those second chance opportunities for the Hawks. I thought Joshua Gundelay played really well in his limited minutes. Not obviously not a lot of minutes, only four minutes, but drew a foul had a nice rebound where I felt like the rebound he got, he went up over Michigan's guys, right? He had good positioning. He was ready for, he knew what his role is.

So I know it's only four minutes, but we're seeing these tiny spurts from Josh. I would love to see him just get a little bit more time, especially in a game like this where we're getting hammered, just absolutely hammered down low. Put a Josh in, see what happens. We need to get better around the rim. I know we were trying to draw fouls on Michigan's big men, but we need to get better around the rim. We need to make and convert those dunks. A lot of missed dunks. A lot of missed layups. Some poor shot selection again

from some of our guards. Just a frustrating game all around to watch. And it's a big game. Iowa couldn't really afford to lose that game. They lost all their wiggle room. When we were talking earlier this week, we talked about Iowa having an opportunity to get a four seed, count it out the window, it ain't happening.

Theoretically it could, but it's not. This team has not figured out how to win a close game or an important game. They haven't figured it out yet. Trajectory is very important, right? Going into March Madness, you need to be on an upward trajectory. They still have an opportunity to build momentum. But it just makes it a lot less likely or a lot less easy, a lot harder, I guess, to get there and to get to that point. Now you go on the road against Ohio State.

They desperately need a win like this. You have Northwestern, you have Nebraska, Michigan State. You basically have to win those three games because you're not expected to win at Ohio State, you're not expected to win at Michigan, and you're definitely not expected to win at Illinois. That puts Iowa at 10-10 going into the Big Ten tournament. That's not a great tournament resume.

Also with no quality quad one wins on your resume. That makes this Ohio State game even more important. So where does Iowa go from here? Well, they're 17-8, 7-7 in the conference. Again, they need to go 3-3, arguably 4-2. They need to probably steal a win at Ohio State. Maybe they come out and they're excited. Maybe they come out, they're enthusiastic, energetic after a rough game where they just barely lost. The team seemed encouraged, at least. They seemed

positive after the game, understanding that they weren't appreciative of some of the officiating, but also they needed to do more to actually win the game and that they did do well towards the end, right? They closed a 10-point gap at the last three minutes. Patrick McCaffrey put the team on his back and said, we're going to try to get here. Keegan Murray had a nice look for a three. He had an opportunity to tie it up. That was a good look. He just missed it.

It went rimmed in and rimmed out. It happened. So Iowa put it together towards the end, trying to keep themselves in this game, trying to will themselves to a win, and they just couldn't do it in this game. Hopefully they can turn it around as they take on Ohio State tomorrow. And we're going to be talking about that game here in a few short moments. But first, I want to tell you about BetOnline.net because BetOnline.net is where I go for all of my betting needs.

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BetOnline.net, where the game starts. 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 we talked about the Iowa-Michigan game. It was very frustrating to watch towards the end, a game that you felt like Iowa needed to win. Now Iowa turns attention in a very short time frame to Ohio State. They have Ohio State tomorrow. Let's hope

Phillip Abracho is feeling healthy. Keegan Murray has figured out the cramping situation. Obviously, it's kind of a one-off random situation. Patrick McCaffrey hopefully feeling better. This is not an easy place to go, though. Now, Jordan Bohannon felt confident. They felt confident because they were able to go to Ohio State last year on the road, get a key win to help the Iowa Hawkeyes get a number two seed in the NCAA tournament. But this is not the same team on either side. And there's fans in the crowd as well. Ohio State has the 21st ranked home court advantage.

This is not going to be an easy game for the Iowa Hawkeye squad. And they do a lot of things that hurt Iowa. They're 17th and three point percentage, and they'd like to utilize the three pointer, right? 91st in points accumulated from three point attempts. They do have an incredibly slow pace of play. So it's going to be a very interesting matchup and dynamic with the Iowa Hawkeyes, 268th in adjusted tempo. So much as we saw Michigan, Michigan had a much slower pace of play coming into this game, but they utilized Iowa's transition offense and defense and took advantage of it. They ran down the court. They outran Iowa, I felt, for a lot of the game.

Maybe Ohio State does something similar. What it's really going to come down to, though, is E.J. Liddell. E.J. Liddell is Ohio State's MVP. He is the guy who keeps this team absolutely rolling. He's a strong, strong player, and I expect him to be match-upped against Keegan Murray. How fun is that? Going to be two National Player of the Year candidates matched up on each other. E.J. Liddell, number two, according to Kempom and National Player of the Year rankings.

Keegan Murray, number six. So it can be a lot of fun seeing those two go at each other all game. And I think Keegan Murray has the advantage here. EJ Liddell, a little bit slower of a guy. He is an inside out forward, but doesn't have as much athleticism, in my opinion, as Keegan Murray, not being able to drive it to the rim as well. I think Keegan Murray is going to have the advantage here, and he's going to be able to take advantage of EJ Liddell on the defensive side of the basketball. But again, one of the things that EJ Liddell does really well is shoot the three. He can shoot the three, and what he does against Big Ten bigs

is he shoots the three well, so they have to come out, and then he drives past them. That isn't going to happen against Keegan Murray. You also want to watch out for Kyle Young, a similar type of player who can drive to the basket, plays with his back to the basket as well, and plays kind of that John Harar type role from Penn State at Ohio State. As I mentioned, Ohio State does a good job of shooting the three well. A couple guys to watch out for, Jamari Wheeler, a senior shooting 39% from three. Malachi Brankham shooting 45% from three. It's going to be tough to get this win. Ken Palm currently projects Iowa to lose 81 to 77. Ohio State having plenty of rest after dominating Minnesota 70 to 45 this past week on Tuesday.

What is Iowa going to do in this game? Who knows? We've seen Iowa bounce back from losses like this pretty well. We've also seen Iowa come out kind of sluggish and then turn it on the second half, but it's too little too late. Little JoJo reference there. I think we're going to see an Iowa team that comes out hungry and motivated. I think this is the game where Iowa steals a win.

I really do. I think after losing to Michigan, I think Iowa can go to Ohio State, who is a solid basketball team, right? Don't get me wrong. Ohio State is a very, very good basketball team. But I think there's an opportunity here to get a W. When you look at what Ohio State does, Iowa has gotten better, not great, at perimeter defense. We're

not going to get torched down low like we have in the past. We're not going to get torched down low like we did against Michigan. What Ohio State does, Iowa has the athletes to take advantage of, in my personal opinion, at least from a three through five perspective. I think Iowa uses this length to impact passing lanes, play tight defense. I would like to see what I saw from Tony Perkins and Joe Toussaint in this past game. They did a phenomenal job defensively. Tony Perkins got a little bit more involved offensively as well.

Prior to this game, I was thinking, do we sit Tony Perkins as a starter? Maybe play Peyton Sanford, maybe play Aaron Ulis? But I wasn't very impressed with either of their performances in this past game. Tony Perkins is the guy. I think you look at what Tony and Joe can do, you feel pretty confident about how they could possibly match up on Ohio State's guards. So despite some of the things that Ohio State brings to the table,

despite the fact that Ohio State is a good team, 16-6 at this point, I feel confident Iowa can get a W. Ohio State has had its ups and downs. They have not had a real signature win at this point. You could say Wisconsin at home. Michigan on the road is a definitely good win. Those are two good wins. But outside of that, not a lot to really write home about.

They fell to Xavier early in the season. They fell to earlier in the season. Indiana, Wisconsin, Purdue, Rutgers. There's an opportunity here for Iowa to steal a win. Will they do it? Remains to be seen. We're going to be covering all of that though right here on the Locked on Hawkeyes podcast

coming up on Monday. We'll be breaking down what happened in this game, whether or not Iowa was able to get a win, a much-needed win, for them to kind of bolster their resume going into NCAA tournament time. We'll be talking about all that on Monday's show. On Tuesday's show, we got a full crossover preview of the Iowa-Michigan State game, which is also very critical to Iowa's NCAA tournament hopes. We're going to be talking about that with the host of Locked On Spartans.

We're going to be talking to Matt Sheehan, talking about all that on Tuesday's episode. Be on the lookout for that. Coming up, we're going to talk about Tony Raciopi, the quarterbacks coach for Spencer Petras, the quarterbacks coach for Marco Lannis. Is he going to be the next quarterbacks coach for the Iowa Hawkeyes? That will be coming up in just a few short moments.

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You can check out that episode if you want. I think it was two weeks ago, actually. Otherwise, give you a little quick preview of what Iowa needs to do. Again, controlling that pace of play, defending the perimeter, attacking EJ Liddell, Keegan Murray. I think those are really the three big takeaways for Iowa as they head into tomorrow afternoon's game against Ohio State. In other news, yesterday we talked a lot about the quarterback coach

situation. Ken O'Keefe unexpectedly steps down. We don't know the full details of the situation, but really appreciate what he was able to do in his Iowa Hawkeye career. But the last couple of years, if we're being completely honest, the quarterback situation has sucked. It has been bad. Spencer Petras has not been what we needed him to be. I think the jury's still out on Alex Padilla. I was impressed by some of his throws, but you would like to see him continue to improve. But for some reason, Iowa fans aren't giving him the light of day

in that situation. But I think the situation needs to improve overall in that quarterback room. Now, it's important to note that the reason why players like Alex Padilla hiring – wow, I'm drawing a complete blank, and I feel so bad. What is going on here? Let me pull Alex Padilla.

Drawing a complete blank here on his quarterback's coach name right now. I feel so bad. I really like the guy too. Well, when it comes to me, I will make sure to bring that back up. But nevertheless, Alex Padilla has a quarterback coach. Spencer Petras has a quarterback coach. You see these things because quarterback coaches at the end, oh, Tim Jenkins is Alex Padilla's quarterback coach name. Excuse me, sorry. Apologies, I really messed that up. I don't know why I couldn't remember Tim's name. So apologies, Tim, if you ever listened to this.

But quarterbacks at the college level get a quarterback coach because they don't have the time to work with their quarterback coach as much. Now you see a lot of development for certain programs. It's a little bit unique, right? Iowa has such a complex offense. It does make it tough for the quarterback coach to spend a lot of time working on fundamentals. They just spend a lot of time installing the playbook,

working through reads and progressions. Now, I was hoping Iowa was going to go the route of maybe a quarterbacks coach slash passing game coordinator and then simplifying that offense and allowing Iowa to work on a bit more of those fundamentals. It does look like one of the guys though, in the running is Tony Raciopi. Now that's interesting to me because he's going to be a guy who would be more fundamental based. He has a pretty impressive resume.

It's not just hiring Marco Lannis, his quarterback coach or hiring Spencer Petras, his quarterback coach or Nate Stanley's is hiring a guy who has a pretty impressive resume. It's not just hiring Marco Lannis as quarterback coach or hiring Spencer Petras as quarterback coach or Nate Stanleys. It is hiring a guy who has a relationship with the Iowa Hawkeyes, who has an impressive pedigree, two-time All-American, runner-up for National Player of the Year, has several NCAA records or several NCAA records, a quarterback coach at the Manning Passing Academy. I mean, this is a guy who has experience,

and he would be interested in coaching for the Iowa Hawkeyes. What's interesting about this, I think, again, you're losing maybe that aspect of Iowa potentially simplifying the offense, but you're gaining a lot in that quarterback development aspect. You're also gaining a lot in East Coast recruiting. With his connections on the New Jersey side, Iowa has an in for other prospects coming up. It's not like he's only working with Marco Lannis.

It's not like he's only working with Spencer Petras. This guy also worked with Kenny Pickett, right? He's worked with several high-profile caliber guys. Iowa now has a better opportunity to reel those guys in, also expanding that base of recruiting to that New Jersey East Coast area. What's interesting about this is I wonder how it impacts Alex Padilla. If you hire Spencer Petras' quarterback coach, does that give Spencer the leg up?

Now, maybe not on the surface, right? No one's going to go out here and say that, but there is certainly going to be some bias there. When Spencer was getting booed on and whatnot, you saw Tony Raciopi talk about his character. When Alex Padilla was getting benched, you saw Tim Jenkins talk about Alex Padilla. These quarterback coaches, they love their kids,

their tutoring, and their training. They want them to do well. So that's going to be a really interesting development. I did not expect Iowa to even be interested in this. I expected Iowa to really go that route of improving the passing game, getting a passing game coordinator. I didn't expect them to go for a guy who was relatively unproven as a coach at the collegiate level in this regard.

He's done a little bit of coaching, but mostly it's been development and not necessarily on the high school collegiate level coaching space. Now I know I just talked about this yesterday and I said, Iowa would be willing to go grab a guy like Drew Tate because they grabbed a guy like Liddell Betts. Liddell Betts has the experience in Iowa's program. He understands the Iowa way.

He understands the offense. The running game hasn't changed in 20 years. Drew Tate understands his offense, right? There's a few things that have changed, but for the most part, he understands what the direction of Iowa football is. So that's where it becomes a little different. Now, Tony Raciopi certainly understands some of those concepts because he's worked with Iowa players, but he's not in the locker room, right? He's not in those meeting room or those film room discussions. He's not there. So there's a little bit of a learning curve there to understand that aspect of it. But if Iowa goes this way, I think it's definitely a trend in the right direction. Iowa getting a

little bit out of its comfort zone. So we'll see. I'm open to it. I hope Iowa makes a move pretty soon. I've also heard them talk about Kelton Copeland. I would rather prefer Kelton Copeland if he does go to the quarterback coach role to also be a part of the passing game, as well be a passing game coordinator. But if not, I'd like to stick him with the wide receivers and keep him there, especially with our young guys developing. I think he's done a phenomenal job there. But as we get more information on that quarterback coach position, we'll make sure to break it all down right here on the Lockdown Hawkeyes podcast.

So stay tuned for all that. Again, thank you all for tuning in. If you want to know how to bet on some of this weekend's events, check out the Lockdown Bets podcast hosted by your boy Q and handicapping expert Lee Sterling of Paramount Sports. They do a great job of breaking down three to four games every single day. So take a chance and look at that. Again, thank you all for tuning in. Have a fantastic weekend, y'all. And as always, let's go Hawks.