Iowa sophomore-to-be Andrew Brommer, playing for Culver’s of Coralville, nailed a 3-pointer from the wing to open the scoring in the game between Culver’s and Gatens Real Estate/McCurry’s.
Culver’s jumped out to a 9-0 lead in the first two minutes, thanks to turnovers on Gatens/McCurry’s first two possessions, and never looked back. The team led by as much as 26 and finished with a 103-88 win.
Although Brommer scored six of Culver’s first 16 points, freshman-to-be Eric May tallied 20 points of his own in a losing effort. The 6-5 guard started slowly, his only points during the game’s first 17 minutes came on a pair of free throws. In the last three minutes of the first half, he picked up his game and totaled five points before the break. That scoring burst carried into the second half, where he scored 13 of his 20 points, second highest on the team.
He hopes that his back-to-back 20-point performances in the Prime Time League this week will lead to future scoring success when he dons the Black-and-Gold.
“I hope it’ll carry over to the Iowa season,” May said. “I feel I can do more; there are some open shots that I missed that I really think I can knock down.”
While the incoming freshman was able to get into the paint early and often and nearly finished off an alley-oop attempt, he knows that there are parts of his game that need to improve.
“I’m working on my perimeter skills,” May said. “Being able to have good court vision and get the open guy the ball when he needs it. I’ve got to work on crashing the boards on both offense and defense too.”
Never having played at the college level, he is learning more each game about playing against other college players.
“These games are a lot more physical,” he said. “I’m not the tallest guy on the court anymore, and everybody is athletic, everybody can score, and everybody can D-up. It’s a lot faster.”
Brommer was no slouch either, finishing with 11 points, more than double his career best of five points for Iowa last season.
His first six points showed a skilled inside-out game. He hit the opening 3 and a few possessions later got the ball on the block and made a strong move to the basket that resulted in a 3-point play.
Playing against teammates May and John Lickliter brought out a friendly competition.
“It’s fun playing against them,” Brommer said. “It’s great competition. It’s always nice to have bragging rights.”
May also sees the fun side to playing teammates.
“You can kind of talk to them and stuff,” May said. “You get to see how they’re doing and how they’re improving. It’s a lot of fun.”
Missing out on some of the action with Brommer and May was Lickliter. The redshirt freshman hobbled off the court with three minutes left in the first half with an ankle injury. He had missed all four of his field goal attempts to that point, and he finished with two assists.
Even though the two Hawkeyes played well, Gatens/McCurry’s Jordan Eglseder led all scorers with 29 points. The 7-1 center from Northern Iowa dominated the paint, making 12-of-15 shots, while cleaning the glass with 12 boards. He scored eight points and had a game-high eight rebounds in a 65-46 loss to the Hawkeyes last December.
