Illinois 73, Iowa 68 (OT)
Tell me that wasn't exciting - I think Buffalo Wild Wings was louder than most Carver-Hawkeye crowds. After stepping off the roller coaster that was the second half and overtime, I felt there were two ways to look at tonight's outcome. Obviously, there's the "we blew a great opportunity to knock off the #1 team" view. But there's also the "we made a great comeback against an excellent team in Assembly Hall and came up just short" outlook. Being the indifferent character that I am, I'll ride the fence throughout my post.

First, some positive notes. Yesterday (this morning?) I looked at a few things I thought Iowa could do to maximize their chances of victory (which were decidedly more concrete than Steve Lavin's "catch a break" gem). Did Iowa follow the Hawkeye Hoops plan of attack?

One of my keys was establishing a perimeter game. It was doubtful that Iowa could hold all of Illnois's shooters in check, and they didn't want to be in a situation of trading twos for threes. Enter Adam Haluska and Jeff Horner. Two guys who had been as cold as Embarrass, MN managed to hit 50% of their threes. Even Pierre Pierce dropped a couple deep shots on the left wing.

Find a shooter.......check.

One suggested strategy was to drive to the basket and get some Illini starters in foul trouble, forcing the Illini to use their thin bench. It seemed like Haluska heeded my advice and was trying to penetrate and draw contact, but he just couldn't get the calls in the second half. Iowa did manage to get Dee Brown and Deron Williams in a little foul trouble. Williams picked up his fourth with about 8:30 left in regulation, but still only missed about six minutes of the game. Brown picked up his third early in the second half and only played 30 of the game's 45 minutes.

Get Illinois in foul trouble..........so-so.

Next key to victory - limit Illinois's offensive rebounds. Hmmmm. Iowa gave up a lot of offensive boards (18), but Illinois also missed a lot of shots (45 FG and 2 live FT). So the Hawks let Illinois retain 38% of their missed attempts. More than you like to see, but not enough to put you away. Big Jack Ingram (check out that 'stache!) grabbed 4 offensive boards in only 12 minutes, and James Augustine added four of his own, giving Illinois 18 offensive rebounds to Iowa's 29 defensive rebounds. Is there anything as frustrating as holding a great offense in check for 30 seconds and then having Augustine pull the rebound away from Hansen?

Keep Illinois off the offensive glass.........so-so.

Related to that (but not mentioned yesterday), Iowa's offensive rebounding was anemic. They managed 9 offensive rebounds, or 24% of their chances.

One more thing I suggested - avoid careless turnovers. Iowa had 22 turnovers in about 81 possessions. Yikes, that's a 27% TO rate. You're not going to beat Northwestern with a performance like that, let alone Illinois. I know Pierce was going back to his home state and wanted to play hero and everything. Heck, I'll even give him credit for keeping Iowa in the game with a lot of his big shots. But how many potential points did he cost the team with his 7 TO's and futile 1-on-2 and 1-on-3 drives? And Horner doesn't get off the hook either - he had at least a couple terrible passes en route to 5 TO's. Give Illinois's trapping some credit too.

Eliminate stupid mistakes.........is that possible with Pierce playing 45 minutes?

In a surprising twist, it was free throws that made the biggest difference. Illinois shot 19 more free throws than Iowa, which I never would have expected. Iowa came in basically tied with Penn St for first in the Big Ten for FTA/FGA, while Illinois trailed everyone but Ohio St. Missed free throws also kept Iowa in the game, as Williams and Brown combined to miss 3 of 4 in the last minute of regulation.

So yes, Iowa certainly had a chance to steal a win from a great team, but shot themselves in the foot with their turnovers and poor rebounding.

But there are positives to draw from the game, too. Iowa held the country's best offense to 37 adjFG% on 22-67 FG and 6-28 3ptrs. They also forced 18 turnovers from one of the best ballhandling teams around. That's a 22% TO rate if you're scoring at home, or if you're by yourself. Iowa has held it's last two opponents to a combined 38 adjFG%. You have to like that.

You also have to like the upcoming schedule - Purdue, @ Northwestern, Indiana. Iowa looks like a team that should be better than its 1-3 conference record, but the next three games give them a good shot at climbing back above .500 and into the first tier of Big Ten teams.

Coming tomorrow or Saturday - preview of Saturday's Purdue game.

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