Iowa forward Luka Garza took an elbow to the face from Purdue’s Isaac Haas, and eventually play stopped as blood dripped down his face.

Garza’s bloody mug mirrored Iowa’s final product against Purdue in Carver-Hawkeye on Jan. 20; the Hawkeyes took a punch to the face and could not recover.

Iowa had no answer whatsoever for Purdue’s potent shooting from beyond the arc, and when Boilermakers weren’t draining 3-pointers, they were finding uncontested looks inside.

“It’s hard,” head coach Fran McCaffery said. “Because, like I said, if you just guard the 3-point line, then [Isaac] Haas is going to go off. If you just worry about Haas, then they’re going to burn you on the 3-point line.”

Iowa’s defense couldn’t contain either of those threats, and the offense’s ice-cold outing didn’t help things.

The Hawkeyes’ shots fell at a tune of 44 percent, but taking away the second half, they hit 25 percent of their attempts.

Garza’s performance was the lone bright spot in an otherwise bleak morning outing. The freshman scored 19 points — the only player in Black and Gold to reach double figures — thanks to an efficient 8-for-10 outing.

However, take away Garza’s shooting, and the rest of the Hawkeye starters combined to go 10-of-30 from the field.

Cook’s 9 points came sparingly, Bohannon only made one of his five 3-point attempts, and Moss missed six of his seven shots — it was an all-around off day for Iowa’s key players, and Purdue capitalized in a major way.

“If we can get some things off transition misses or turnovers, we’ll take it,” Boilermaker head coach Matt Painter said. “We try to find guys in rhythm, in transition, shooting those 3s, but if not, just move the ball, and break down, and execute. I think that’s what we did.”

Purdue’s execution, especially when its lead grew to 37 points, remained unmatched by Iowa. The Boilermakers drained 69 percent of their attempts from the field in half No. 1, then managed a solid 44.3 percent in the second.

Iowa has been on the wrong end of runs before; this is nothing new. Looking at Iowa’s loss to Rutgers, the Scarlet Knights countered a 9-0 Iowa run with a 12-0 spurt of their own, and they jumped out to lead by as much as 17 points in the first half.

The Hawkeyes trailed by as much as 20 when they toppled the Illini in Champaign, Illinois, only two games ago. There was no resiliency in the Hawkeyes’ Jan. 20 effort.

One game before, against Maryland, Iowa kept things close, but over the final 11 minutes of the contest, the Hawkeyes’ offense spun off the track. The Terrapins outscored the Hawkeyes 30-12 over that stretch.

Things don’t get easier from here on out. Iowa faces a gauntlet, clashing with Minnesota, Penn State, Michigan State, Ohio State, and Michigan in a span later in the season. Iowa can’t afford to allow runs if it doesn’t plan on swinging back.

“We can’t have that happen. We have to be able to set the tide,” Nicholas Baer said.