Dec. 6, 2011
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CEDAR FALLS, Iowa — A span of 20 seconds turned the tide of the game for the University of Iowa men’s basketball team, and it was all downhill from there as Northern Iowa downed the Hawkeyes, 80-60, Tuesday night at the McLeod Center.
Trailing 47-45 midway through the second half, McCabe appeared to score a bucket to knot the game at 47, but instead, it was waved off with an offensive charge call. The action sent the Iowa bench into a flurry, resulting in two bench technical fouls. UNI capitalized; as guard Anthony James sank all four of his free throw attempts to push the Panthers’ lead to 51-45.
Twenty seconds later, McCabe was whistled for a personal foul when Seth Tuttle was driving to the basket and a technical foul at the end of the sequence after batting the ball out of the net into the crowd. Johnny Moran and Tuttle made four more free throws, helping the Panthers open up a 55-45 advantage.
Roy Devyn Marble cut it to eight points (55-47) with a quick lay-up, but UNI scored the next 10 points to extend its run to 20-2 over a five-minute stretch to break the game open. UI head coach Fran McCaffery was issued his second technical and was ejected during the stretch, and Marc Sonnen’s free throws pushed UNI’s lead to 67-47 with 4:45 remaining.
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“I thought we fought, we fought hard,” said McCaffery. “We didn’t execute in the second half as well as we did in the first half. We started the second half well; we got it to within two. Zach has the tying bucket in the hole and then a whistle, so that was upsetting.”
“The momentum switched,” said Marble. “They started going on a run, and we were having trouble. Then Zach got a technical, and it started going all their way.”
Iowa shot 50.9 percent (28-of-55) from the field for the game, but it made 1-of-12 (8.3 percent) 3-point and 3-of-9 free throw (33.3 percent) attempts. The Panthers finished the game shooting 45.5 percent (20-of-44) from the field, 52.4 (11-of-21) from long range and 87.9 percent (29-of-33) from the free throw stripe. Iowa won the rebounding battle, 33-27.
Marble, who was making his first start of the season for an injured Bryce Cartwright, paced the Hawkeyes with 14 points on 7-of-12 shooting to go along with four rebounds and four assists. Junior Eric May added 10 points on 5-of-11 shooting.
After trailing by five points at the break, the Hawkeyes closed the gap to within 34-33 at the 17:46 mark on a May jumper. A Tuttle lay-up and a Jake Koch 3-pointer pushed the Panther’s lead to six points (39-33), but Iowa continued battling.
A Marble lay-up and May’s one-handed dunk made the score 41-39 with 14:25 remaining. Following an Anthony James 3-pointer and a jumper by Austin Pehl, Marble had back-to-back steals and field goals to make the score 46-43, and freshman Josh Oglesby hit a step back jumper to cut it to one (46-45) with 10:45 left.
Pehl then made 1-of-2 free throws to put Northern Iowa up 47-45 with 10:19 remaining before McCabe was whistled for the offensive foul and his bucket was waved off.
Iowa opened the game strong, jumping out to a 10-0 lead over the first four minutes. May got things going with a jumper in the lane, Basabe followed with back-to-back jumpers and Gatens made two straight to make it 10-0.
Northern Iowa spouted off the next eight points to get back into the game before battling back to tie the game at 19 with 5:49 in the half. The Panthers took their first lead on a Chip Rank 3-pointer at the four-minute mark and a Rank four-point play with 25.5 seconds left in the half made the score 32-25.
The Hawkeyes went into the locker room trailing 32-27 when Marble dished a pass to Andrew Brommer for a dunk with seven seconds remaining to trim the deficit to five. Iowa shot a blistering 59.1 percent (13-of-22) over the first 20 minutes, but the Panthers countered by making 6-of-10 3-point attempts.
“We played a good game today,” said Marble. “Toward the end it got away from us. I don’t think the score will really reflect how close this game really was. It’s in the past, now we have to get ready for Iowa State.”
The Hawkeyes (5-4) will face off against the Cyclones in an Iowa Corn Cy-Hawk Series match-up on Friday night in Ames. Tip-off is scheduled for 7 p.m. at Hilton Coliseum.