Senior guard Jordan Bohannon has had a rollercoaster of a career at Iowa over the last five years. Bohannon started as a freshman, and didn’t look back for the next two seasons.

Then, in 2019-20, Bohannon played the first 10 games of the year and underwent season-ending hip surgery Dec. 19.

Now, the Marion, Iowa, native is back on the floor. Through Iowa’s first three games of the season against North Carolina Central, Southern University, and Western Illinois, Bohannon scored just 11 points. 

Then, on Tuesday night, Bohannon exploded for 24 points and six assists as No. 3 Iowa vanquished No. 16 North Carolina at Carver-Hawkeye Arena, 93-80. The show Bohannon put on against the Tar Heels was his best since Feb. 7, 2019 – when he scored 25 points against Indiana in Bloomington.

“The last year and a half or two years have kind of been hell,” Bohannon said. “I know there’s obviously a lot worse things than having surgery and missing basketball games, but there’s been a lot of soul searching for myself, a lot of spiritual aspects that had to kind of shift these last two years because I was in a really dark place. I had a lot of my teammates, my close friends, and my family members that really picked me up and got me through these times. I really worked my butt off to get in the shape I am now and get back from a second hip surgery.”

“I am going to celebrate that aspect of being able to come out and play and not have any pain because I really did work my butt off to get here,” Bohannon said.

Despite his injury woes and slow start to the season, Bohannon never lost any admiration from head coach Fran McCaffery.

“I knew Bohannon [could score 24 points],” McCaffery said. “If he gets open shots, he’s going to make them. That’s just the way he is.”

Bohannon wasn’t the only Hawkeye making shots Tuesday evening. Guards Joe Wieskamp and C.J. Fredrick also contributed a great deal to Iowa’s offense. Wieskamp dropped 19 points on 7-of-12 shooting and Fredrick poured in 21, shooting 8-of-11 from the field. Both Wieskamp and Fredrick shot 5-of-7 from beyond the arc.

“I’ve been begging [Wieskamp] for three or three and a half years to shoot the damn ball and he hasn’t listened to me until the last couple years,” Bohannon said. “I’m glad he’s finally shooting the ball and he’s deciding to shoot the ball when I pass it to him. I want him to continue shooting the ball.”

Bohannon, Fredrick, and Wieskamp’s shooting was much-needed as North Carolina bigs like Armando Bacot, Garrison Brooks, Day’Ron Sharpe, and Walker Kessler held Iowa’s No. 1 scoring option – Luka Garza – to just 16 points.

“That’s the reason I came back [to Iowa],” Garza said. “I wanted to be a part of this group. I knew the potential of this team and the guys we had around me who can all score the ball and help us win. Going forward, teams are really going to put game plans on me, and when you give open shots to our shooters, we have some of the best shooters in the country in Joe Wieskamp, C.J. Fredrick, and Jordan Bohannon, those guys are going to kill you, and they did tonight, and I’m just proud of them. I’m thankful for them to pick me up when I wasn’t having a great offensive night.”

While Garza did score just 16 points on 6-of-20 shooting, he still pulled down 14 rebounds for a double-double. At one point, the senior center scored 10 consecutive Hawkeye points.

On the night, Iowa shot 42.5 percent from downtown and 48 percent from the floor. According to Bohannon, however, there is still room for improvement.

“I was just trying to find some fire to try to have a big game,” Bohannon said. “I didn’t think I really shot the ball well, I just hit some pretty big shots. I still think I had an off-day shooting, to be honest.”

Bohannon shot nearly 44 percent from distance and 47 percent from the floor.

Iowa will hit the hardwood at Carver-Hawkeye Arena again Friday night for a matchup with Iowa State at 8:00 p.m.