The Iowa women’s basketball falls to Michigan State, 74-69.
By Mario Williams
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When the fourth quarter ended, and Iowa had lost to Michigan State, 74-69, junior Ally Disterhoft walked off the court to shake the opponents’ hands and said, “We had this game.”
Those words that slipped out of the guard’s mouth couldn’t have been said more perfectly. Iowa played a solid second quarter to take the lead at halftime and played well against a veteran Spartan team, but it just wasn’t enough.
Prior to the second quarter starting, Iowa was down by just 2 points. Michigan State then went on a 9-0 run in three minutes. In that three-minute time-span, Iowa missed a 3-pointer and committed four of its 19 turnovers.
Michigan’s State Branndais Agee took no time getting the Spartans in the groove. She was 4-of-6 from the field, scoring 10 points, and she was 2-of-2 from the 3-point arc.
Hawkeye sophomore Chase Coley finally got things going for the Hawks when she made a jump shot to cut the lead to 7. With the help of Coley’s 9 points in the second quarter, Iowa was able to find some rhythm. Sophomore Whitney Jennings cut the lead to 3, but Disterhoft got the crowd members on their feet.
After a missed 3 by Jennings and a rebound by Christina Buttenham, Tania Davis found Disterhoft wide open on the left side of the court, and she knocked down a big 3 to tie the game.
Forty-some seconds later, freshman Tania Davis got a feed from Buttenham and drove for a lay-up to give the Hawkeyes a 2-point lead, and by halftime, the Hawks led by 3.
“I thought the last 10 minutes of the second quarter were outstanding,” Iowa head coach Lisa Bluder said. “We go on a 10-0 run [7-0, actually] to go in the locker room, and we got great momentum going.”
When the third quarter arrived, the Hawkeyes had a tough go trying to defend Michigan State’s Aerial Powers. She had 19 points in the third quarter and was 8-of-14 from the field. She had many looks inside, grabbed rebounds of her missed shots, and turned them into easy baskets.
Powers averages 21 points per game and finished with 25 points, shooting 10-of-18 from the field. She also grabbed 7 rebounds.
“She’s definitely one of the most athletic players I’ve went against, hands down by far,” Davis said. “She’s just a great player. She can shoot the 3-ball, post you up, she takes what the defense gives her, and that’s what makes her so good.”
By a point at the end of the third quarter (51-50), but the Hawkeyes didn’t fully execute to grab the win it so desperately needed. Jennings, however, knocked down a 3 from the top of the key at 2:36 to make the score 66-64, Michigan State, but the momentum went downhill afterward.
While Iowa played solid jersey-to-jersey defense, its missed opportunities on offense hurt the team. Sophomore Buttenham missed key shots at the charity stripe, along with freshman Megan Gustafson.
Iowa was 2-of-5 from the free-throw line in the fourth quarter. In addition to those, Disterhoft also had another chance to tie the game, with an open wide attempt at a lay-up but couldn’t finish.
“We’re close on moving ahead,” Disterhoft said. “We’ve had leads, we’ve played with all these teams, we outplayed Michigan State in almost all statistically categories, except a few. It’s always just frustrating because we’re always so close. We just got to keep working hard and grinding.”