Three thoughts following Iowa basketball Senior Night loss vs Michigan State

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As Iowa basketball (15-15, 6-13 Big Ten) celebrated the contributions of its four seniors on Thursday night from Carver-Hawkeye Arena on “Senior Night,” the Hawkeyes could not surmount a late comeback against No. 7 Michigan State (25-5, 16-3 Big Ten) in a 91-84 loss to the Spartans.

Offensively, the Hawkeyes shot 30-for-63 from the floor, including 9-for-23 from beyond the arc and 15-of-18 from the charity stripe. Defensively, Iowa forced only eight Spartan turnovers with four steals. Iowa also had five blocks.

While Iowa looked impressive in the opening half and carried a 37-30 advantage into the break, a 61-point outburst by Michigan State in the second half powered the Spartans to victory and clinched an outright Big Ten regular season championship for MSU.

With the Hawkeyes suffering another frustrating loss on Thursday, here are three thoughts that summarize the events from Carver.

Iowa basketball’s offensive production diversified

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Unlike many of Iowa’s games in the latter half of the season, Iowa finally found secondary and tertiary scoring outside of Payton Sandfort and Josh Dix as Seydou Traore (15) and Pryce Sandfort (12) stepped up for the Hawkeyes on the offensive end against the Spartans.

While Iowa still came up short in the end, seeing production outside of the top two scorers for Iowa is something they will need to see repeat itself in their do-or-die final game of the season on Sunday.

Payton Sandfort was quiet offensively

Iowa forward Payton Sandfort (20) helps up Iowa guard Josh Dix (4) during a Big Ten Conference game against the Michigan State Spartans Thursday, March 6, 2025 at Carver-Hawkeye Arena in Iowa City.

Even though Iowa received auxiliary scoring against the Spartans, Sandfort had an awkwardly quiet 15-point performance as he shot 4-for-12 from the field, 1-for-5 from deep and 6-for-6 from the…

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Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/article/three-thoughts-following-iowa-basketball-114603237.html

Author : Hawkeyes Wire

Publish date : 2025-03-07 11:46:00

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