By Michael McCurdy
With the Iowa football team’s recent struggles, many fans are ready to focus their attention from the woes in Kinnick to the hope of what could be a successful season in Carver-Hawkeye for the men’s basketball team.
Iowa started its season off on Nov. 4 against Regis in an exhibition matchup, walking off with a 95-73 victory.
The Hawkeyes came out fired up and ready to go with the new video board above mid-court, along with new renovations Carver had in the off-season.
The team’s starting five consisted of sophomore Christian Williams at No. 1, senior Peter Jok at the shooting guard, redshirt sophomore Nicholas Baer at small forward, junior Dom Uhl at the other forward, and freshman sensation Tyler Cook at the forward/center position.
Iowa’s offense was clicking early on thanks to the poise of Williams. He said Iowa head coach Fran McCaffery has stressed the importance of playing with a level head as a point guard, and that is how he naturally plays.
“Yeah that’s just how I kind of try to hold myself,” Williams said. “Coach tells me to be smooth and play under control, never to play so fast you get all out of sorts.”
With all that said, the Hawkeyes were tied with the Rangers 17-17 at the under-12 minute TV time-out.
McCaffery was not pleased with the defense throughout the game. He said the execution and the effort needed to be better if the Hawkeyes want to compete against the always-talented Big Ten.
“We didn’t really play the kind of defense we need to play. They spread us out and kept us on our toes,” McCaffery said. “They were able to make their open shots, and I thought our cohesiveness defensively was not what it needs to be. There was a lot of good, but also a lot we need to work on moving forward.”
After the under-12 TV time-out, the Hawkeyes brought in a new cavalry of players who helped spark a 20-0 run. Freshman Jordan Bohannon ran the point and moved the ball around smoothly. What really kept the run going for the Hawkeyes was the hot hand of Jok — the senior sunk 4 3-pointers, boosting Iowa’s lead to 51-31 at the half.
The remainder of the game was a tale of two halves. The Hawkeyes came out in the second half complacent and struggled to push their lead over the Rangers.
Regis was able to cut the lead to 9, forcing McCaffery to call a time-out and give his team an earful. Immediately after, Baer came in the game and was able to do something no other Hawkeye could do during that pitiful offensive stretch — make the open pass.
“Making the easy pass is something our coaches stress all the time; we don’t need any Magic Johnson passes,” Baer said. “You know, if I see Tyler Cook open in the lane, I’m going to give him the ball. There will be some teaching points we’ll go over in film, but we hope to improve on this for our next game.”