COLUMBUS, Ohio — This crazy Iowa basketball season, in seemingly several strokes of fitting fate, built up to exactly this. Those frenetic, sometimes miraculous finishes gave the…
COLUMBUS, Ohio — This crazy Iowa basketball season, in seemingly several strokes of fitting fate, built up to exactly this.
Those frenetic, sometimes miraculous finishes gave the Hawkeyes confidence they could deliver in big moments.
The four straight losses to finish the regular season tested their ability to stick together in difficult situations.
So, when the most important game of their lives came along, and repeated adversity struck… the Hawkeyes were ready.
Ready to grasp the moment, not shy away from it.
Ready to prove they are not only a tough team, but a very good team… with more basketball ahead.
Tenth-seeded Iowa impressively punched its ticket to the second round of the NCAA Tournament by vanquishing seventh-seeded Cincinnati, 79-72, Friday before a Bearcats-partisan crowd at Nationwide Arena.
“We’ve had so many last-second shots, so many last-second opportunities to try to get wins,” Bohannon said. “That definitely helped us.”
Iowa fell behind, 34-22, with 2 minutes, 43 seconds left in the first half. And it seemed like a miracle that it was that close.
Yet for a team that trailed Northwestern by 12 points with 2:54 left in a game on Feb. 10 and still found a way to win, this was child’s play. Iowa scored 24 of the game’s 37 points in a dominant, closing performance.
More on Iowa Hawkeye’s Cincinnati win:
As I reflected on this game of big moments a few hours after it finished, I came to this conclusion: There weren’t two bigger points than the ones Bohannon scored with 1 second left in the first half. The team’s No. 1 clutch option hadn’t scored in this game — after being shut out by Michigan in the Big Ten Tournament one week earlier.
But as he twisted in the lane to bury an off-balance jumper, the Hawkeyes were suddenly only down five, 36-31, with 20 minutes to play.
