By Michael McCurdy
In the past two games, the Iowa women’s basketball team has been without starting point guard Tania Davis, and surprisingly, her loss hasn’t tanked the team.Instead, the Hawkeyes have found a recipe for success even without one of their key ingredients — one that relies heavily on the play of senior Ally Disterhoft and sophomore Megan Gustafson. These two are already used to carrying most of the team’s workload, but with Davis out, their roles are more important than ever.
“I have to continue to be aggressive on the offensive end,” Disterhoft said. “I have to focus on bringing that attack mentality and encourage the younger kids on the team. I will continue to do what I can to help them progress into their newer roles.”
After going 1-1 without Davis, it is evident that in order to win consistently, both Disterhoft and Gustafson need to produce an prodigious number of points.
Against Michigan State on Feb. 9 Disterhoft went 7-of-13 on field goals and 3-of-5 on 3-pointers to finish with 25 points. Gustafson also had an impressive game from the offensive end, going 7-of-10 on field goals and tallying 18 points.
Even with great scoring outputs from Gustafson and Disterhoft, the Hawkeyes needed overtime to escape the Spartans.
Another key ingredient to Iowa’s success without Davis is for the rest of the team to affect the game on a consistent basis.
On Sunday, the Hawkeyes took on Ohio State in Columbus and lost a close battle (88-81) even with Gustafson going 6-of-16 from the floor. The game was back-and-forth and close until the end because freshman Makenzie Meyer understood that without Davis, it was time to step up.
She scored 17 points on an impressive 6-of-7 shooting effort that earned her Big Ten Freshman of the Week Honors. Her performance was exactly what the Hawkeyes needed on the road, but she wasn’t the only player to come alive in the absence of Davis.
Junior Chase Coley has emerged from the bench as the most consistent role player in these last two games. Against Michigan State, Coley scored 10 points, 2 of them being arguably the most important coming at the end of regulation. She sunk back-to-back free throws to send the game to overtime.
Even though it was only 2 points, they came at a critical time, and as a result, it illustrates how the Hawkeyes are growing without Davis as the floor general.
“But more than anything, it does give us confidence that we can, you know, play well without Tania,” Iowa head coach Lisa Bluder said. “We hate it, we don’t want it, but we can do it.”
Currently, the Hawkeyes sit at 15-10 overall, 6-6 in conference play. They are tied for sixth in the Big Ten with three other teams, so their next four games are huge if they plan on getting a good seed in the Big Ten Tournament.
The good news for the Hawkeyes is that even without Davis, they appear to be close in having the recipe for success figured out and at an important time in the schedule, because these next four games are in no way imposing.
“If we keep getting better every day in practice, we’ll take one game at a time,” Bluder said in a press conference. “If we keep getting better at the rate we are now, we’re going to be a very good basketball team by the end of this month.”