By Michael McCurdy
After a hard-fought contest on Jan. 14 with No. 3 Maryland, the Iowa women’s basketball team has the opportunity to take some of that momentum into New Jersey tonight when it battles Rutgers.
Nearly one-third of the way through Big Ten play, the Hawkeyes sit at 11-7 overall with a rocky 2-3 conference record. The game tonight against Rutgers is a perfect opportunity for Iowa to get back on track in conference play after suffering two losses on the road to below-average Illinois and Penn State.
What’s going to be difficult about this matchup for the Hawkeyes is that they only get a couple of days to prepare for the Scarlet Knights after their physically draining game against Maryland. Rutgers’ overall record of 6-13 can be deceiving — the Scarlet Knights definitely have the ability to compete in the Big Ten and have shown it so far, going 3-3 in conference play.
Of Rutgers’ six conference games, the three losses have all occurred away from New Jersey, which means the team is undefeated at home in Big Ten play. This makes the challenge of coming away victorious even more difficult for the Hawkeyes, who have yet to win a Big Ten game away from Carver-Hawkeye.
After dissecting two of Iowa’s troubling losses on the road, Penn State and Illinois, it is apparent the Hawkeyes aren’t playing well enough offensively to win. Two stats that really jump off the page when it comes to Iowa road losses are 3-point shooting and turnovers.
During Iowa’s Big Ten opener at Illinois, the Hawkeyes shot a whopping 25 percent from deep. Against Penn State in Happy Valley, Iowa shot even worse from the 3-point line, 11 percent. In order to win on the road in the Big Ten, the Hawkeyes are either going to have to work for more efficient shots or find players who can consistently make 3-pointers.
With a young team, one constant across the landscape of college basketball is that turnovers and road games go hand-in-hand. Against Illinois on Dec. 28 in Champaign, the Hawkeyes accumulated a grand total of 23 turnovers and only lost by 5 points. If the women can limit their number of turnovers, they’ll have a chance against the Big Ten’s best in points allowed per game.
Against Maryland, the Hawkeyes went 8-of-20 from behind the arc, which might be a confidence booster for the women who struggle when it comes to 3-pointers on the road. Iowa head coach Lisa Bluder understands the 3-pointer is a very important part of her team’s game
“The 3-point shot is such a big part of our game now, and we want to utilize it,” Bluder said in a release. “I’m glad to see us doing a little better with that.”
If the Hawkeyes are able to come away with their first road Big Ten win, that might be enough momentum to carry this young team into a successful second half of the Big Ten season.