No. 19 Iowa hopes to bounce back at Minnesota

The final score might not show it, but No. 19 Iowa actually controlled most of its game Thursday night against sixth-ranked Michigan State.

The Hawkeyes led 35-31 at halftime and stretched that lead to 50-42 about four minutes into the second half, flashing their usual balance on offense and stringing together stops against a top-notch offensive team. Then a 24-2 run completely changed the narrative and led to an 82-67 loss that snapped Iowa's six-game winning streak.

"There are a lot of good things that happened for our team tonight, and you can't lose sight of that because you got beat," Hawkeyes coach Fran McCaffery said. "There was a stretch in the game where it got away from us. That's unfortunate."

Iowa (16-4, 5-4 Big Ten) will try to bounce back Sunday against Minnesota (14-5, 4-4) at Williams Arena in Minneapolis, the teams' only scheduled meeting this season.

One thing to look for from the Hawkeyes is their ability to get to the foul line, which the Spartans seriously curtailed on Thursday night. Iowa averages more than 27 free throw attempts per game, but got there just eight times against Michigan State, making all eight.

The Hawkeyes also finished the game shooting just 38.6 percent from the field, far under their season percentage of 47.3, and made only 5 of 24 3-pointers.

"We had a lot of open shots that I thought would go down," Iowa guard Jordan Bohannon said. "We missed a lot of bunnies and what was an eight-point lead at the time might have been 16 if we had hit some shots."

The Hawkeyes weren't the only team that missed an opportunity in its last game. Minnesota nearly stunned No. 2 Michigan with a late 10-0 run that tied the game with 30.9 seconds left Tuesday night, but Charles Matthews beat the buzzer and the Golden Gophers with a baseline jumper for a 59-57 decision.

The result kept a win-lose pattern going over the last six games for Minnesota, preventing it from climbing the ladder and getting out of the middle of the conference standings.

"We were just hoping that it was a shot-clock violation so we could get a chance at overtime," said forward Jordan Murphy. "We think we were playing those guys pretty well. They made a big run in the second half, but we made a run back, so it was a pretty interesting game to play in. We just didn't finish out our defensive possession."

Murphy has been the Golden Gophers' cornerstone, averaging 14.6 points and 12.1 rebounds per game, and collected 15 and 11 in the loss to Michigan. Amir Coffey is their leading scorer at 15.4 points per game, while Dupree McBrayer hits for 10.6 and freshman center Daniel Oturu nets 10.2.

Iowa also features four players in double figures, led by Tyler Cook with 16.6 points and 8.1 rebounds per game. Luka Garza averages 14.2 points, Joe Wieskamp contributes 11.6 and Bohannon is good for 10.8.

--Field Level Media