The 2021-22 Iowa women’s basketball team can still make the NCAA Tournament’s Final Four.

Sure, the Hawkeyes underperformed at the beginning of this season. Admittedly, Iowa’s 74-73 loss to IUPUI on Dec. 21 was pretty troubling — especially for a Hawkeye team that was ranked as high as No. 8 in the Associated Press Top 25 Poll earlier this year.

The Hawkeyes have since steadied, winning eight of the nine games they’ve played since Dec. 21. Iowa is currently riding a win streak of seven games.

The Hawkeyes seem to have finally found their rhythm — something they struggled to do at the beginning of the year.

Six of Iowa’s games have been canceled or postponed this year because of COVID-19. As a result, the Hawkeyes have endured two stretches of 10 or more days without a single game.

Iowa didn’t play a game from Nov. 17 to Dec. 2 because some of its players tested positive for COVID-19. The Hawkeyes didn’t play a single game from Dec. 21 to Jan. 2 because their opponents were having COVID-19-related issues.

The more the Hawkeyes have played this year, however, the better they’ve gotten. Iowa seems to have all the ingredients Final Four teams need.

The last thing the Hawkeyes need to do to prove they are contenders is beat a ranked team. Iowa has yet to beat an AP Top 25-ranked foe this year.

With a few wins over highly rated teams like Michigan and Indiana, the Hawkeyes could skyrocket in the AP Top 25 and prove to the country that they can contend for a national championship this year.