By Blake Dowson and Adam Hensley

FINAL SCORE: Iowa 116, Savannah State 84

Blake:

Before the season started, I worried about who would score for Iowa if Peter Jok had an off night shooting the ball. Jok did in fact struggle against Savannah State, but Iowa found a couple of hot hands throughout the game.

Brandon Ellingson scored 23 points for Iowa and was extremely efficient, and he was possibly outdone by the work of Cordell Pemsl, who finished with 18 points and 9 rebounds.

This looks like a team that could legitimately play with a first and second unit. The group of Ellingson, Pemsl, Ahmad Wagner, Jordan Bohannon, and Isaiah Moss seem to work pretty well together.

Iowa head coach Fran McCaffery will in all likelihood widdle the rotation down to eight or nine guys getting significant minutes, but at this moment it has to be hard for him to choose which one or two guys gets cut out of playing time.

Adam:

Iowa let the 3-pointers fly at record levels today. The Hawkeyes attempted a school-record 43 shots from deep, making 18 of them (also a school record).

It was evident that Iowa fell in love with shots from deep. The Hawkeyes only shot 20 free throws (4 less than Savannah State). This game had a pick-up feel to it; each team ran the floor, turned the ball over, and jacked up 3’s.

Iowa did not handle Savannah State’s full-court trap defense very well. The Hawkeyes seemed to rush the ball up court, adding to this up-tempo feel.

Combined, there were 34 turnovers committed.

Tyler Cook finally got more touches in the second half of play. The freshman scored 14 points, tied for second most of any player in the game.