Iowa 110, Maryland 87: Flamethrowers On

By RossWB on February 10, 2022 at 9:50 pm @rosswb
GO JBO GO
© Tommy Gilligan-USA TODAY Sports
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Entering Thursday night, Iowa really needed a road win after coming up short in their last two trips out east (Rutgers, Penn State), especially against a reeling Maryland team (losers of three in a row and five of their last seven entering tonight). They also needed a good offensive outing after several pedestrian (or worse) outings on that end of the floor. Uh... job done. And then some! Iowa absolutely lit up Maryland on Thursday, breaking several records en route to a 110-87 blowout win that wasn't even really that close for long stretches of the game. 

Iowa's offense showed positive signs early, with Jordan Bohannon and Keegan Murray making shots, but the Terrapins matched Iowa bucket for bucket for a while and the Hawkeyes simply couldn't get much separation. With under 9 minutes to go in the first half, Iowa led just 29-28. They ended the half on a 27-13 run that gave them a 57-41 lead at the break, courtesy of some lights-out shooting. Any thoughts of the game becoming more competitive in the second half or Maryland mounting a comeback quickly went away, though, as Iowa used an 18-4 run in the first seven minutes of the second half to open up a 30-point lead. At that point it was all about setting records and putting up ridiculous numbers. And Iowa did a whole lot of that. 

110 points? That's a record for an opponent at the Xfinity Center. 

110 points is also the most by Iowa in a Big Ten game in 27 years: 

How exactly did Iowa score 110 points? Well, shooting 60% from the floor (39/65) and 56% from 3-point range (19/34) will help you do that. Most of those 110 points came from the molten 1-2 punch of Jordan Bohannon and Keegan Murray, who had matching 30-point efforts in this game. That produced a few more records: 

30 points is a lot for any player in college basketball (well, maybe not Caitlin Clark...), but it was far less surprising to see Keegan light up the scoreboard like that; he is the Big Ten's leading scorer, after all, and this was the third time this season he's scored 30+ points. The fact that he put up 30 on just 14 shots is some pretty astonishing efficiency -- he was 12/14 from the field overall (2/3 from 3-point range) and 4/7 at the free throw line (so, yes, he missed more free throws than field goals) -- but Keegs has been getting buckets all season long. We're not exactly numb to it, but we're definitely a bit used to it. 

But JBo going off for a 30-piece? That came out of left field. We knew that he was capable of going off like this (although 30 points does tie his career high)... it's just that we hadn't seen JBo-the-flamethrower in a while, you know? Bohannon entered this game having made just 25% (12/49) of his 3-point tries in his last seven games and not having made more than two triples in a game since making three against Wisconsin back on January 6. So of course he went 6/9 from deep in the first half. Nice. He tacked on four more threes on seven tries in the second half giving him a preposterous 10 made threes in just over 30 minutes of work. 

Those 10 made three-pointers? A new school record, of course. 

Which seems fitting. Bohannon owns every other 3-point record at Iowa -- why not this one too? Kingsbury's mark had a nice 28-year run in the record books, but there's a new (old) three-point king these days. Bohannon finished one made three-pointer shy of the Big Ten single-game record, which I suppose gives him something to shoot for over the final 8+ games of his Iowa career. 

Bohannon's a divisive player among Iowa fans and, to be sure, it can be tough to watch at times when his three-point shot isn't falling. But performances like this are certainly why Fran sticks by him so doggedly. Our hope? This is not just a one-game supernova performance, but the start of final blaze of glory for Bohannon in an Iowa uniforms. We've seen other departing Iowa seniors find a new level in their last few games in black and gold, like Aaron White and Matt Gatens. Bohannon doing the same could put a bow on his Iowa career -- and help secure another NCAA Tournament berth for Iowa, too.

Of course, JBo wasn't the only Hawkeye torching the nets from deep in this game; as a team, Iowa made 19 three-pointers in this game. That tied Iowa's single-game team record for made threes in a single game -- and broke the record for made threes against Big Ten opposition. (Previously set against -- who else? -- Maryland.) Keegan Murray went 2/3 from deep and Patrick McCaffery went 1/4 from long range, but Iowa also got some impressive sharpshooting from their bench, too -- Iowa's second unit went 6/11 from behind the arc here, led by 3/3 shooting from Payton Sandfort and 2/3 from Austin "The Assassin" Ash. It was simply raining threes in this game and it was beautiful to behold. 

Outside of Murray and Bohannon, Filip Rebraca had 6 points and 7 rebounds and Tony Perkins had 5 points, 4 rebounds, and 3 assists -- a much better effort for Perk in his second career start. Joe Toussaint had 5 points and 5 assists off the bench, while Ahron Ulis added 3 points and 3 assists as well. Perkins, Toussaint, and Ulis all played between 14-18 minutes as well, led by Toussaint's 18 minutes of action. 

This was, simply put, a brain-meltingly good offensive display by Iowa. They averaged a preposterous 1.53 points per possession for the entire game -- and that was actually down from their average through most of the game, thanks to some slightly cooler shooting over the last 8-10 minutes of action. This was fun. Really, really, really fun. 

Go Hawks. 

NEXT: Iowa heads home to face Nebraska (7-17, 1-12) on Sunday, February 13 at 1 PM CT (FS1). 

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