The Iowa women’s basketball team downs Michigan, 85-69.
By Mario Williams
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Nearly three weeks ago, the Michigan women’s basketball team scored 30 points in the fourth quarter to give Iowa its first loss in the Big Ten.
The pain the Hawkeyes suffered never went away. Iowa went on a three-game losing streak.
However, the 85-69 win against Michigan on Thursday night in Carver-Hawkeye was the sweetest of revenge for the Hawkeyes.  It was a win Iowa needed to get back in the groove, to ache all the pains it has endured these past few weeks.
“We needed this,” Iowa head coach Lisa Bluder said. “It was a lot more fun coming out here tonight than it’s been in the last couple of weeks.”
Iowa got things going early. It was a contest of who could hit from downtown, and freshman Tania Davis and Michigan’s Katelynn Flaherty battled it out on at the point-guard position.
Davis got the crowd going, scoring 8 points in the first quarter, which included two 3s. However, her defense wasn’t good when playing jersey-to-jersey against Flaherty.
When the first quarter concluded, Flaherty had 16 points while the rest of her teammates had 7. She was 6-of-6 from the field and 3-of-3 from behind the arc, with her only miss coming at the free-throw line.
The game was tied 23-23 going into the second quarter. Iowa didn’t do a whole lot in the first three minutes of the second quarter, as Flaherty and Michigan’s Kelsey Mitchell tried to extend Michigan’s lead. But, the highlight of the second quarter again was Davis.
The Grand Blanc, Michigan, native nailed back-to-back 3s that got the fans out of their seats.
“I’m getting to know the plays a lot better,” Davis said. “I’m getting to know this system a lot better, becoming much more of an offensive threat, and a defensive threat. I’m more comfortable and I’m so glad to be with a great group of coaches and teammates.”
By halftime Iowa led by a point, and that momentum transitioned into the third quarter. Sophomore Chase Coley came off the bench in this contest and added a spark in the post for the Hawkeyes. She took risks going against Michigan’s toughest players, and she made easy jump shots that were key for Iowa. Coley was 6-of-7 from the field in the third, scoring 8 points and adding 7 defensive rebounds.
“Michigan was the team that kind of started this little downhill spiral for us,” Coley said. “It was really fun to come back and show everyone that’s not the team we are, and we showed them who we are tonight.”
The Hawkeyes held Michigan to only 7 points in the fourth quarter, and the Wolverines were 5-of-15 from the field.
Iowa finished the contest with 42 percent shooting from the field and had 11 turnovers — 4 fewer than its season average. The team also snapped its three-game losing stream on its home court.
Bluder hopes this win can transition into the team’s matchup on the road against Northwestern on Jan. 31.
“It’s one game at a time,” she said. “Hopefully, this will get us going down the right path in these last nine games.”

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