It was another day at the office for the Iowa Hawkeyes.
Before a sold-out crowd at Carver Hawkeye Arena, they dispatched the visiting Washington State Cougars by a lopsided margin, 72-43. They are now 6-0, which is their best season start since the 1995-96 season when they started 7-0.
After starting the game trailing 19-18, the Hawkeyes went on a roll and never looked back. They outscored the Cougars by a combined 37-9 in the second and third quarters. Even with the win, the Hawkeyes arguably didn’t play their best basketball overall. They only shot 42 percent from the field and 12 percent from the 3-point line. They made up for it by taking 21 trips to the free throw line, although they only shot 57 percent from the stripe
Nevertheless, they had the fortune of the Cougars shooting a meager 27 percent from the field. The Hawkeye defense played a huge role. They finished with 35 defensive rebounds, seven blocks and forced the Cougars to turn the ball over 20 times. It was much like their 71-58 win over Kansas last Wednesday—defense ruled the day.
Offensively, Iowa was propelled by the triple threat of Lucy Olsen, Addison O’Grady and Hannah Stuelke. Olsen scored a game high 17 points, grabbed eight rebounds and dished out five assists. O’Grady finished with 14 points, seven rebounds and two assists. Stuelke came away with 11 points and six rebounds.
The sharpshooting Olsen only made one 3-pointer out of four attempts, as the bulk of her points came from her patent midrange jumper, her admitted sweet spot on the court. “I like the midrange a lot, and it’s hard to guard a lot of teams that don’t face it and today was pretty open,” she said after the game.
Other notable performances came from the freshman pair of Taylor Stremlow and Ava Heiden. Stremlow finished with five points, six rebounds and two assists. She had a noteworthy no-look pass to Heiden for a basket in the paint, who four points and one rebound. Sydney Affolter came away with eight points and eight rebounds. Taylor McCabe didn’t score, but she did grab six rebounds. Teagan Mallengi didn’t score on any of her five field goal attempts or three 3-point attempts, but notched six points from the free throw line.
In the final minutes of the game, all the remaining bench players came in to finish the job. Among them was freshman Aaliyah Guyton, the daughter of former Indiana Hoosier A.J. Guyton. Guyton scored her first two points of her college career at the free throw line, which sparked a strong celebration from her teammates. In January, she suffered a season ending ACL injury at Peoria High School in Peoria, IL after having signed with Iowa. As a result, it was uncertain when she would play this year, until head coach Jan Jensen gave her the green light.
Jensen takes pride in facilitating this great start to the season with this group in her first year as head coach. Now, a luxurious flight awaits to take the team to Cancun, Mexico for the Cancun Challenge. After the game, Jensen offered an extended reflection of the uplifting, early days of her first season in charge:
Number one the flight will be much more enjoyable tomorrow (Monday). I did mention that to them. I said, regardless of what role I have, it is much more fun to fly to a tropical place when you get a win.
But seriously, I feel forever grateful to these kids who stuck with us when there was that transition. They’re just working their tails off and I think you see that. I think you just kind of want to go back to that Northern Illinois game where you get over the hump or the colder shooting or whatever. But I think sometimes, the beauty of the team is they want it so much, they get tighter. So I’m trying to figure out ways to keep them loose and having fun because the tough sledding is because they want it for me, I think, they want it for each other, they want it for all these fans.
I think the coolest part is that they have found a different way to win and that is with their defense. They are believing in it and I’m pretty sure I’m gonna have to kick people out of the gym here and that’s what’s fun about it because they can still say, “Oh coach, sorry I didn’t hit those much” and I’m like, “Hey, you know what, we got another win, now we’re gonna keep improving, we got everybody in the game.” So I’m very proud of them for that and they’re just a really great group.
The collection of experienced and emerging talent have surprised most thus far.
Iowa (6-0) takes on the University of Rhode Island (4-3) on Thursday, Nov. 28 at 6:30 p.m. ET and BYU (5-1) on Friday, Nov. 29 at 9 p.m. ET at the Cancun Challenge.
