Three thoughts after the approximate loss of Iowa basketball against Northwestern

By trying to bounce back from a ugly defeat of 81-61 against Illinois Wednesday, Iowa Basketball (15-14, 6-12 Big Ten) underwent another defeat on Friday evening in Northwestern (16-13, 7-11) by a score of 68-57 in front of an energetic crowd of the Welsh-Mryan Arena in Evanston, in the district.

Offensively, the Hawkeyes Shooting 21 for 58 of the ground, including 8 for 25 beyond the arc and 7 out of 10 of the charity band. Defensively, Iowa has once again had a difficult game, forcing only seven Wildcats turnover, including four interceptions and a block.

Although the match score never seemed to become uncontrollable for the Hawkeyes, the defensive presence of the Wildcats kept the Iowa at the length of the arm during most of the night.

Unfortunately for Iowa, the loss now makes the way to the Hawkeyes to get a much more difficult big ten -ten tournament. With two games to play, the Hawkeys are in 16th place in the conference, with both USC And the Minnesota holding the tie equality broken must lose its next match.

With the discouraging loss sending Iowa on a dark trip to Iowa City, here are three thoughts from the Friday match.

Payton Sandfort and Josh Ten were ineffective offensively

Friday, an offensive scenario almost the worst case occurred for the Hawkeyes while Payton Sandfort and Josh Ten were held under a double figure by the tenacious defense of Northwestern.

The two best Iowa scorers combined to shoot 6 for 25, including 2 for 11 of the 3 -point beach.

While the credit must be granted to Northwestern for having forced the two to difficult shots, the night of the night of the two has considerably hampered the capacity of the Hawkeyes to match the Wildcats score.

The center of the northwest of Matthew Nicholson was a problem

Unlike the defeat of Iowa against Illinois, where they allowed Tomislav Ivisic to score 22 points, the center of Northwestern Matthew Nicholson caused headache for the Hawkeyes offensively with its size and on -board protection.

While the 7 -foot senior recorded only three points (all of the free throw line), he smothered the attack on Iowa with three blocks, a flight and five defensive rebounds while making the life of the Hawkeyes difficult inside the painting all night.

Again, this Nicholson performance relocates the importance that the 6 -foot 10 inch Owen Freeman would have had in Friday’s match if the second year striker had been healthy.

Although hypothetical, given the injury at the end of the Freeman season, his presence against Nicholson in the painted area would certainly have opened brand tracks for other players and even prevented the second and third chance opportunities for the Northwestern attack.

Drew Thelwell was the only light point offensively

After missing Wednesday’s match against Illinois with an injury, Drew Thelwell was the main offensive weapon of the Hawkeyes against Northwestern on Friday. The senior transfer goalkeeper led the team by scoring 14 points on a shot of 5 for 7 from the ground, including a perfect 4-en-4 long range. Thelwell also recorded three assists, a rebound and a flight in the night.

While a large part of the defensive attention was drawn to Sandfort and ten, Thelwell carried the Hawkeyes offensive thanks to an impressive shooting performance against the Wildcats.

However, Iowa will certainly need more than Thelwell to perform well in their last two games of the regular season if the team wants a chance to cring into the Big Ten tournament.

Iowa will return home for a five -day interruption before their senior night match Thursday against n ° 8 Michigan state From Carver-Hawkeye Arena, where the Hawkeyes will honor the contributions of the elders Luc Laketa, Drew Thellwell, even Brauns and Payton Sandfort.

Thursday evening’s match against the Spartans will be broadcast on FS1 with Tipoff scheduled at 7 p.m. CT. In addition to television broadcasting, fans can connect to Hawkeye Radio Network To follow the action with the Play-By-Play voice Gary Dolphin and the color commentator Bobby Hansen.

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This article originally appeared on Hawkeyes Wire: Three thoughts according to the loss of Iowa basketball against Northwestern