Locked On Hawkeyes - Daily Podcast On Iowa Hawkeyes Football & Basketball - What's next for Iowa basketball plus why Iowa football's class of 2023 could be the best ever

Episode Date: February 24, 2022

The Iowa basketball team has a road game tomorrow evening vs Nebraska, and we've got you covered here with what we want to see in this matchup. Last game, Iowa took it to Nebraska. Can we see the same from Fran McCaffery's Iowa Hawkeye squad? We certainly should.Plus, after landing two commits in the last two weeks, this class of 2023 is shaping up to be one of the best ever for the Iowa football team and we explain why here.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 Thursday 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 as always, we have a great episode for you today. We're talking a little bit about Iowa versus Nebraska, what we want to see from the Hawks against Nebraska, as it should be an easy win, but we'll talk about that more.

We're also talking about recruiting. We haven't had a chance to dive into it. Iowa lands two recruits in the last week-ish. Who could be next for the Iowa Hawkeyes? And finally, Michigan versus Wisconsin. We all saw the video. We're going to talk a little bit about that and how the Big Ten continues to screw things up around the Big Ten.

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 or wherever you get podcasts at by searching Locked On Hawkeyes. So let's get into it. Iowa gets Nebraska. Okay. Last time Iowa played Nebraska was an easy win.

98 to 75 at home for Iowa. That is an easy comparison to say we hope Iowa wins by that much again. Now, it's also worthwhile saying Nebraska is going to hopefully come out motivated and hungry. And I say hopefully meaning they are hopefully for themselves going to come out hungry and motivated. They have struggled throughout the season. They've only won one game since the start of the year. One game since the start of the year. And since losing to Iowa, they fell to Maryland at home 90-74

and also to Northwestern 77-65. It wasn't all sunshine and rainbows, though, in that game versus the Hawks for Iowa. Nebraska came out hot early. They hit a couple shots. They were really attacking Iowa down low. And until Iowa started forcing quite a few turnovers in the middle part of the first half, Nebraska was looking like they were going to try to make this a game. Now we've talked a lot about Iowa and how impressive they have been over the last couple of games. This is a really important game for them to win.

We need to see them take care of these teams. And they have gone 5-1 in their last six games. I want to believe it. But in the past couple of years, when we want to believe, sometimes they just pull up a stinker. They just do it. And it's very, very, very frustrating to watch. I think about that 2020 team that lost in Nebraska January 7th on the road.

Followed it up with wins over a good Michigan team, a good Rutgers team, a good Wisconsin team, a good Maryland team. up with wins over a good Michigan team, a good Rutgers team, a good Wisconsin team, a good Maryland team. I think about the 2019 team. I'm going to look this up real quick. I'm pretty sure. Yep.

They fell to Nebraska on the road as well in overtime, actually. They lost four straight to close out March going into the NCAA tournament. This is the tournament team that ultimately brought Tennessee down to the wire. Nebraska on the road, two of the last three seasons, has been tough for the Iowa Hawkeyes. So I'm not coming in here saying Iowa's guaranteed to win. They certainly should win. But I'm going to be smart about this and understand that we have seen this team struggle in the past. Now, is this a different team?

It is. A bunch of different players. But we've seen some of those issues before where they start slow. They let bad teams kind of get into it a little bit. They have figured out a way to come back and take over those games. But it is a concern. Now, Kempom projects this to be an 87-74 win for Iowa. And when you talk about Nebraska, you have to focus on the guys who did the most damage to Iowa last game. And that starts with Derek Walker. 6'9", 239-pound junior.

Had a 150 offensive rating, 14 points on 6 of 8 shooting and 6 boards. Lat Mayen had a 115 offensive rating, 7 points, 3 boards, 2 assists. That's not ideal. Eduardo Andre, 140 offensive rating, 10 points on four or five shooting, 6'11", 236 pound freshman. So you can see the big men are really doing damage against the Hawks. I also thought guard Alonzo Verge did a great job of getting into the paint versus Iowa and dishing the ball out. I thought he was a very electric playmaker for Nebraska in this game, all things considered. So when you look at the weaknesses, Iowa needs to defend the paint better.

Rebounding wasn't necessarily the issue, but it was allowing Nebraska to go into the paint at will. Now, I've been a big supporter of Phillip Bracha. He was struggling in this game. And in those situations, I would like to see Joshua Gundelay come into that game a little bit. I've been pretty impressed with Josh and his limited minutes. Now there's been struggles still right where he can't get down the court as

quick as their team. And in transition, he's a weakness or a liability, but I really liked what I saw against Michigan state. His passing ability was there. He defends the rim. He's a big guy. It's not easy to get around Josh. I don't think Iowa would make that switch, especially early on in the game. They expect Iowa to kind of force some turnovers on the

perimeter a little bit more, but that would be my opinion in that situation. I also want to see Iowa not let off the gas. I talked a lot of negative stuff in the first couple minutes, but Iowa is a very good team and they are much better than this Nebraska team. And I want to see them put it on them. Get up by 20 points in the first half, get up by 30 within 10 minutes left and put your backups in and just roll through this. We ultimately need to get up early, get out hot, and allow our starters to take some time and rest. Keegan, Patrick, J-Bo, Chris, we need these guys to be healthy. You look at what happened in last year's NCAA tournament. Seemingly everyone was dealing with an injury, a nagging, tough injury, and we got destroyed by Oregon.

A nagging, tough injury. And we got destroyed by Oregon. Now, I know we're not a top 10 ranked team in the nation right now, but this team is still a very strong team. And they have some really interesting matchup potential to be able to go far in the tournament, barring injuries. So can Iowa get out quick? Can Iowa get out of the game healthy? Those are the two big things I'm looking for.

I also want to see two halves of defensive rebounding. We've seen that the last couple games. Let's continue it going forward. They need to continue to improve on the defensive end and being consistent on that defensive end, and they have been for the last couple games. Ken Palm is noticing. They jumped up to 80th in defensive adjusted efficiency rating. And finally, again, I want to see some of the younger guys get some time. These guys could have key minutes down the stretch or even into next season. Keegan Murray, more than likely, not going to be here next year. Jordan Bohannon, not going to be here next year.

With the transfer world the way it is, who knows what else could happen. So you really want to see Josh continue to improve. You want to see Peyton Sanford. He's going to be a huge player next year. With his three-point shooting ability, we're going to need a guy like that to be able to come up and shoot the ball three, four times a game from behind the arc, like a Jordan Bohannon does.

Give you that spark. So you want to see some of those younger guys get some more minutes, get some more experience, so they can be pivotal key players in next year's team. Coming up, we're going to talk about recruiting and who is up next for the Hawks, right? We've landed two recruits, one being a very significant in-state recruit.

Now, who could be up next for the Iowa Hawkeyes? We're talking about that here in a few short moments. But first, March Madness is only a few weeks away. That means you need to start thinking now about where you're going to be running your brackets this year. Are you going for the usual? Are you looking for the best? We've done our homework here, and we're actually running our brackets at runyourpool.com.

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If you want to play against us for a shot at a cash prize, join us at runyourpool.com slash locked on. And while you're there, create your own pool for your friends and family and enter Pure Mattis at checkout for $10 off your custom pool. All the rules and details will be available there. That's runyourpool.com slash locked on for your chance to win a cash prize. We look forward to seeing and be available there. That's runyourpool.com slash lockdown for your chance to win a cash prize. We look forward to seeing and beating you there. And thank you all for making the Lockdown Hawkeyes podcast

your first listen every single day. You can find the Lockdown Hawkeyes podcast for free wherever you get podcasts at and also on YouTube by searching Lockdown Hawkeyes. Let's get into it. But first, just as an FYI, we're going to be actually creating our own pool for all of you Iowa Hawkeye fans out there as well. Winner gets a t-shirt that I'll send out to you.

So be on the lookout for that coming in the next probably week and a half. At least getting that pool set up so you can get signed in. So let's get into it though. Recruiting wise, as you might have heard, Alex Moda, a big-time in-state recruit, joined the Iowa Hawkeyes. And it was a bit of a surprise for everyone. To this point, we had thought that Iowa was not going to be getting a commit from Alex Moda anytime soon, or that Alex Moda was even going to commit anytime soon. And it really seemed like most of the momentum was going towards Iowa state.

He ultimately decides to go to Iowa. That's a huge grab for the Hawks and Iowa continues to clean up in the state of Iowa. Now, Matt Campbell is on a phenomenal job at Iowa state and he's done a good job of, of kind of putting the pressure on the Hawks of really having to, to win these recruiting battles because he's doing a good job at Iowa State. All things considered, a very good job at Iowa State. But Iowa still is doing work there, right? They already have three in-state kids, Alex Moda, Ben Cooter, and Maddox Bortrain Johnson. The final two, both fantastic wrestlers in the state of Iowa.

Ben Cooter, a three-time state champion, also a guy who was going to be playing or wrestling for the Iowa wrestling team. So to land Alex Moda, a three-star recruit, a 454th-ranked player in the nation, fourth-ranked player in the state, is huge. And the biggest thing that happened here is Alex Moda was being looked at as a defensive back for the Hawks. At Marion, he plays a lot of different positions. Quarterback, running back, linebacker, you name it,

he plays a lot of positions for Marion. He wanted to play on the offensive side of the ball, and Iowa hadn't really talked to him a lot about the offensive side of the football. When they started talking about playing wide receiver, that's where the interest really started to wind up here. And he was interested in playing that wide receiver position. What we would see Alex Motta play is a similar role to potentially an Arlen Bruce next year.

Now, Arlen Bruce, we only saw a little bit of what I think we're going to see from Arlen Bruce as he was getting acclimated to the offense as a true freshman. But Arlen Bruce is the guy you can line up anywhere on the field. Jet sweeps. You can do some things in the backfield. line up anywhere on the field jet sweeps you can do some things in the backfield he can even throw the football a little bit I think you get a similar type of dynamic with Alex Moda so that'll be really interesting to see how he fits into that that wide receiver group I know Iowa is looking to take two wide receivers that being said there's

a chance they could take three they're really high Kai Black, the Urbandale product as well. I believe Urbandale. I'll need to check that real quick. And then also Kyler Casper is clearly a guy they want to bring into the program. Now, I don't think Iowa is necessarily the front runner for Kyler Casper. Iowa is definitely in the mix for Kyler, but he's getting heavily recruited by a lot of schools. And there's several really big schools that those offers are pretty important to Kyler, but he's getting heavily recruited by a lot of schools. And there's several really big schools that those offers are pretty important to, to Kyler, in my opinion. So whether or not they get Kyler, they're still working really hard on getting a big time wide receiver, a six foot four or six foot five kind of guy who can play that X position for the Hawks. Now, Kyler, if they bring him in, that'll be huge anyways, right? They're going to want to bring him

in as he is a fantastic player. But in the meantime, they're going to be working on grabbing someone else, in addition to Alex Moda, to round out what they want to have in that two wide receiver class. If they can bring in Kyler, they'll make it three wide receivers. The other recruit for Iowa is Chase Brackney. A little over a week ago, committed to the Iowa Hawkeyes, Chase Brackney, a three-star defensive end prospect out of Colorado, out of my backyard, Cherry Creek, just a few miles away from me.

Chase Brackney, a 6'4", 250-pound defensive end, shows a lot of hustle play, a lot of hustle in his pass rush sets, a guy who is going to be a very hard worker when he gets the Hawks. And his recruiting was starting to pick up momentum. Had offers from USC, Cal, Nebraska. He wasn't ranked initially, but as we've seen with Iowa, it doesn't matter if you're not ranked. They're finding guys who fit that program. And nevertheless, he has already gotten ranked

after receiving that offer from Iowa. So Chase Brackney joining the program. And right now our defensive line is starting to look pretty darn good. Kelvin Bell is putting together a nice little set there. Even this year with Maddox, Borchery and Johnson at the defensive tackle, Chase Brackney as the end, a guy who also could switch inside potentially as well,

has some room on his body to grow. This defensive line already coming to fruition pretty quickly. So who's up next for the Hawks? It isn't Kyler Casper, I'll tell you that much. But there's three guys to be on the lookout for. The first and primary one is Leighton Jones. Iowa extended an offer to the Indiana product a few weeks, or last week, I believe.

And he is a guy who, by all reports, wants to go to Iowa. It sounds like he could be a guy who commits soon to the Hawks. That would be huge for the offensive line. That would be huge for Iowa continuing to increase that foothold in Indiana. Out of Brownsburg, Indiana, class 2023, 6'4", 250-pound prospect, a guy who plays both offensive and defensive line and has a background in wrestling, a guy who Iowa typically likes to bring in. So I expect him to be the next guy. There's already crystal balls in place for him going to Iowa. Other guys to watch

out for is that Lafayette tight end, Steven Salenos, still working on him. Still don't know what his plan is. It sounded like he might make a decision last week. We could be obviously going into another week from now until he makes a decision. That would be a huge grab for the Hawks, getting a depth tight end, a guy who could potentially be a starter next year when we have some guys go to the NFL. Finally, the final guy to talk about is Matt Markway, a four-star tight end, a legacy recruit, a guy who was previously committed to Florida. When the coaching change happened, he reopened his recruiting, and it looks like Iowa might

be in the driver's seat here. The recruiting seems very, very strong for Matt Markway to go to the Iowa Hawkeyes. He's taking several visits this spring, and there's a good chance he could make a decision by the end of May. That'd be huge for Iowa to land another four-star guy. They're also in on Caden Proctor, the five-star target out of Southeast Polk. Things are trending really well for the Hawks there. So there's a lot of four and five-star prospects that Iowa is actually very much high on the list for. So this is a class, when I talked about it before,

this is a class that could easily rival that class of 2020. Now, two similarities in those classes. Now, I know Deuce Hogan is no longer here at the program, but Deuce Hogan committed very, very early, or excuse me, the 2019 class, I should say. Deuce Hogan committed very early in that process. Am I missing, let me see this real quick. I believe, I thought it thought it was 2020 class and now that i'm pulling up i'm like this is not making sense yeah okay 2020 class cool um this is a classic arrival of 2020 class that 2020 class rated 35th in the nation um according

to 24 7 sports 6 in the big 10 but the big thing they had there or eighth in the nation, according to 24-7 Sports 6 in the Big Ten. But the big thing they had there, or 8th in the Big Ten, the big thing they had there was Deuce Hogan committing really early in the process. Deuce Hogan then went and was actively recruiting other people across the nation. That's the same class that landed Logan Jones, who was getting some work at the center position. Deontay Craig, who's going to be a big impact player on the defensive line. Luke Lachey, who's already our number two tight end. Tyler Ellsbury, who's been getting work at the tackle and the center position. Gavin Williams, who's going to be a big impact player on the defensive line. Luke Lachey, who's already our number two tight end. Tyler Ellsbury, who's been getting work at the tackle and the center position. Gavin Williams, who's going to be our starter.

Elijah Yelverton, our third string tight end at this point. LaShawn Williams, also going to be in line for some carries. Y.A. Black and Ethan Hercut, both guys who are getting some looks at the defensive line position. Mason Richmond, our starting left tackle. getting some looks at the defensive line position. Mason Richmond, our starting left tackle. Lucas Van Ness, one of the best freshmen in the country this year.

Jay Higgins just waiting for his time. I mean, this is a pretty impressive class that you're looking at. And the other guys just have been buried in the depth chart because there's been so much talent above them. You look at Reggie Bracey or Brendan Dees-Fernandez, both those, A.J. Lawson, all those guys kind of buried on a very senior-laden depth chart of that defensive back spot. Quavo Matthews ultimately transferred.

So very impressive recruiting class for the class of 2020. And I think this class coming up could be significantly better than that. And that's saying something. And it starts though, when you land a guy like Xavier going into the end of this last class, a lot of momentum is going for the Iowa Hawkeyes. You have some big time guys recruiting other big time guys. They want to play with their guys they played with in seven on seven and that kind of stuff. That gives Iowa a lot of momentum.

Then landing Marco Lannis, a four-star quarterback is huge, right? You clean up Iowa, you get that four-star quarterback, and now you're looking at getting a bunch of other guys to really build that class impressively for the Iowa Hawkeyes. So the momentum is definitely growing in Iowa Hawkeye nation. And hopefully we get a few more commits coming in the next couple of weeks, especially as spring visit days come up coming up. We're going to talk a little bit about the suspension because they were a bit ridiculous and how the big 10 handled that. But isn't that the norm? We're going to be talking about that though,

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So head over to their website today or use your mobile device and learn more about the trends and action. BetOnline.net, it's where the game starts. All right, y'all, let's get into it. So most of you probably saw the tape of wisconsin and michigan and uh it was a bit of a weird situation so uh wisconsin called a timeout late in the game michigan was pressing late in the game michigan was down 13 14 points uh juwan howard took significant offense to this apparently and when they were going through the handshake line

he started saying something to Greg Gard. Then he tried walking away. Greg Gard grabbed his arm. That continued to escalate the situation. John Howard got really pissed off, reached over, slapped one of the other coaches in the head. And then several Michigan players,

including five-star Musa Diabate, who destroyed Iowa in the last matchup, started hitting people. The only other thing I want to call out is that one of Wisconsin's assistant coaches, after this fight breaks out, does one of this motions. And if you're not on the YouTube, I apologize. It's basically like a screw-off, or you can kind of get the vibe there. The Big Ten only suspends Dwight Howard for the rest of the season.

They only suspended two Michigan players for a game each, Terrence Williams and Moussa Diabate. They also suspended Wisconsin guard Jacoby Neath for one game, and great guard guy $10,000 fine. This makes my blood boil, people. Fran McCaffrey got suspended for multiple games for yelling at an official in the tunnel. Juwan Howard punched a person and only got double that.

Greg Gard put his hand on a coach and escalated that situation as well and only got a $10,000 fine. Moussa Diabate threw several punches and landed them and only got suspended one game. There is zero consistency in the big 10. From top to bottom. You want to know why officiating is bad?

Because the top is bad as well. Kevin Warren is garbage, a piece of trash, and the worst commissioner in all the big conferences, in my opinion. Piece of trash might have been a little aggressive there, but he sucks at his job. He handled COVID poorly. He's handled a lot of things in this situation very, very poorly. I don't think he handled expansion talks that well. They're not handling the suspensions well. They're not handling the problem that the Big Ten has, the officiating. And again, I'm not talking about just at Iowa.

It's across the board. The officiating is poor here. You can turn on any Big Ten game, and I guarantee within five minutes, you see some very, very bad calls. And what's worse is these officials hold grudges against some of these coaches. Fran McCaffrey being one of them, the stuff that Tom Izzo gets away with, Fran McCaffrey couldn't dream of. If Fran McCaffrey punched a guy, Fran McCaffrey might be fired

or required to resign from the Big Ten. Not in Michigan, though. Jawan Howard just gets a five-game suspension. Frank McCaffrey gets the shaft in a lot of these things. And yes, he does show his anger a little bit more with his face. But he is not nearly as bad as a lot of these coaches are, yet has a significantly worse reputation than a lot of these coaches do. And the Big Ten handles these things accordingly based off their reputation.

I am not a Brad Davidson fan. I think Brad Davidson is one of the dirtiest players in all of college basketball. But even Brad Davidson gets kind of screwed because of his reputation. It is not okay that the Big Ten has an inability to be unbiased in these games. It's destroying the game, and it's making it... You look at what's happened to Iowa. How do you call a tiki-tac-fall at Rutgers to give Rutgers two shots at the free-throw line with two seconds left

when you haven't called that crap the entire game? How? Against Michigan, I honestly doubt the refs missed several travels on Iowa to allow Iowa to get back in the game. Now, of course, I'm happy that Iowa was back in the game, but if I were a Michigan

fan, I'm pissed. It's actually impacting the outcomes of these games and it's unacceptable that it's happening. And it's unacceptable that it continues to be a problem, not just officiating, but how the Big Ten handle situations. And they continue to have no sort of precedent they set for themselves or consistency with what they do.

So as you've heard me say, if you've listened to this show before, Kevin Warren sucks. And the Big Ten has a problem on their hands. That does do it for our show today, though. Coming up on tomorrow's show, we have a very, very special guest, a former Locked On host himself. Big Ten Ben, I believe, is going to be joining us on the show tomorrow. He's going to talk all things about Big Ten basketball, Big Ten football,

and his experience in the Super Bowl. So be on the lookout for that. Stay tuned for that. And I know you make the Locked On Hawkeyes podcast your first listen, and I hope you know I appreciate the heck out of that. It means so much to me. But now, if you can make the Locked On NFL Draft podcast your second listen, that would also mean a lot to me as well.

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So wherever you're getting Locked On Hawkeyes podcasts, you can also get Locked On NFL Draft. Thank you all for tuning in to today's episode of the Locked On Hawkeyes podcast, you can also get Locked on NFL Draft. Again, thank you all for tuning in to today's episode of the Locked on Hawkeyes podcast. Have a fantastic Thursday, and as always, Hawkeye Nation, let's go Hawks!