There will soon be a new McCaffery on campus. Fran McCaffery’s son Connor will prepare to start his Hawkeye career in both baseball and basketball this upcoming academic year.
By Jordan Zuniga
Future Iowa Hawkeye Connor McCaffrey celebrated with his Iowa City West High teammates as they clinched their spot in the state baseball tournament on July 19.
The game finished after five innings with the Trojans sealing the game on a grand slam that put them ahead, 11-1, and forcing a slaughter-rule victory.
McCaffrey had 3 RBIs in the game, including a 2-run homer in the third.
Also joining in the celebration from the sidelines was McCaffery’s father, the Iowa men’s basketball head coach, Fran McCaffery.
“It’s great to be out here in the summertime playing baseball,” Fran McCaffery said. “These guys have had an unbelievable year, and they’re still alive.”
West will play its next game Wednesday at Principal Park in Des Moines, where they will face Cedar Rapids Washington.
After the state tournament, Connor McCaffery will trade in his green and yellow Trojan jersey for the Hawkeye black and gold.
Next season, he will join head coach Rick Heller’s baseball squad as a walk-on while red-shirting for the Hawkeye basketball team.
Being a college student-athlete in one sport is hard enough, but competing in two whose seasons overlap seems nearly impossible. But it’s a challenge that Fran McCaffery thinks his son will be ready to handle.
“I think he’ll be fine,” Fran McCaffery said. “He’s very disciplined and a really good student. I think he’ll manage it; he already had to do it in the summer where he’s had lifting with basketball, lifting with baseball. He’s just has to make sure he doesn’t do too much in one day.”
Connor McCaffery, like his father, is not at all worried about the monumental task he has ahead of him.
“I’ll have plenty of people to work with,” he said. “My academic counselors said they’ll help me out with the class stuff; I just got to get a schedule I can handle. And then it’s just playing well; I just got to come out and play well, and I should be all good.”
Playing well has not been a problem for the younger McCaffery — he was a main piece on both his baseball and basketball teams.
Last year, Connor McCaffery was a jack-of-all trades on the basketball court, putting up a stat line of 13.8 points, 4.8 rebounds, 3.7 assists, and 1.8 steals per game.
The baseball diamond was no different in terms of his success; he hit .397 with 6 homers and 48 RBIs.
Although his high-school career hasn’t yet concluded, he looks forward to his first season with the Hawkeyes.
“I’m just really excited to get started,” he said. “To start playing with the Iowa guys, I’m already doing workouts with the Iowa basketball guys.”
Seven years ago, Fran McCaffery took Iowa’s dying basketball program and willed it back to life; Hawkeye fans hope that Connor McCaffery’s career at Iowa can be as fruitful as his father’s has been.