This one's going to sting for a bit. #7 Iowa went toe-to-toe with rival #19 Illinois, and traded haymakers for 40 minutes before Illinois came away with a late run and victory, 80-75. Iowa led as late as 72-71 with under three minutes to play, but Illinois scored the game's next seven points to take control as time ticked away.
Luka Garza and Joe Wieskamp each led a balanced Iowa attack with 19 points, and Keegan Murray scored eight in his first career start with CJ Fredrick out. Unfortunately, Fran McCaffery kept Garza off the floor for 12 minutes over the course of the game due to mounting foul trouble, and while Jack Nunge played the game of his life on the defensive end as a replacement 5, the Iowa offense struggled just enough without its MVP.
Who's there to clean up the miss?
— Iowa On BTN (@IowaOnBTN) January 30, 2021
The reigning B1G POY, of course, that's who.@LukaG_55 and No. 7 @IowaHoops are in a good one at No. 19 Illinois. pic.twitter.com/KbC1pyHttQ
If you or your loved ones watched the game, you may have been exposed to bad officiating. Sadly, this does not make you eligible for compensation. In a game as tight as this one, bad calls can swing the balance of competition, and that was the unfortunate case in this one. The word "unfortunate" is chosen intentionally; there's no reason to believe the referees consciously decided to bury Iowa (see Hanlon's Razor). But the missed calls were bad, bad, bad, and bad in Illinois' favor.
Fans will point to a missed travel that directly led to an Illinois three-pointer with 7 seconds left in the first half, a botched goaltending call that wiped a Joe Wieskamp putback off the board, and a three-second call that stopped an Iowa fast break. That's seven points swinging Illinois' way in a game that was never led by more than that by either team, and that in and of itself was bad enough. Two of the calls on Garza were awfully dicey as well, including this fourth whistle.
@hawkeyenation 4th foul? pic.twitter.com/r3FlmuKfoG
— Brad Cathcart (@bradcathcart77) January 30, 2021
And then there's the fact that Illinois managed to play the last 10:02 of the game — all after entering the bonus — without committing a single foul. It could be that they, as a group, played the cleanest defensive basketball this world has ever seen. It could be. It seems more likely that the officials' whims and discretion just didn't favor the Hawkeyes this evening. I hope they tighten that up for the rest of the season; these kids are busting their ass out there and they deserve an evenly called game. That's all.
Despite all that and a bevy of misses at the rim, Iowa had its opportunities to steal this one, or at least send it to overtime. Jordan Bohannon hit a three-pointer to cut Illinois' lead to three points with 11 seconds to play, and the Hawkeyes immediately forced a five-second call to get one shot at tying the game up. Unfortunately, JBo couldn't hit from deep again, and although Iowa fouled Kofi Cockburn for the one-and-one with 5 seconds left, he was able to corral his own rebound off the missed front end (ughhhhhh) and he was able to hit the next two shots with ease. Ballgame.
That all said, this was a great, competitive battle by two teams that had earned their lofty preseason rankings. For all the hype about the animosity between the two sides, the game itself was sportsmanlike for all 40 minutes, and it turned on such small hinges that if they played each other 10 times, Iowa probably wins five of them. Also, they'd both be very confused why they have to play each other so often.
If you've been an Iowa basketball fan for more than just, say, the last couple years, it's understandable to see a two-game losing streak and think "here we go again." Believe me, I know. But Iowa had far from its best game, got the short end of the ref stick, and STILL took Illinois to the limit in Champaign. Don't bail on caring about this team, but also don't let a loss like this ruin your weekend. This is the toughest conference in the nation, and losses were always going to happen. The schedule softens a bit over the next five games, and if Iowa can take even four of those, the Hawkeyes will be in great shape to still put together one of the best seasons in the nation. Fret not, faithful.
69-69 with 4:20 left - Developing Story indeed (h/t @Adam_J_Tweets) pic.twitter.com/mjBONQw0iP
— CJ Fogler 6'7" IQ 269 #BlackLivesMatter (@cjzero) January 30, 2021
Also, this happened.
Onward and upward. Go Iowa Awesome.
