Hlas: Hawkeyes salvage state’s Saturday hoops-athon

A Saturday men's basketball television triple-header, with all three state schools on the road. Six hours and 30 minutes, three different ESPN channels, two very glassy eyes when it was over.

Wichita State 74, Northern Iowa 60

Synopsis:

The billed-by-many Game of the Day in all of college basketball was a one-sided affair that was painful for Panther fans to watch. Until ...

Until the Panthers went on a 12-0 run to cut the Shockers' lead to 53-49 with 9:17 left. But Wichita State hit three 3-pointers from the 6:33 to the 4:31 marks, and pulled away again.

TV talk:

'These are high-major programs in mid-major leagues. These two teams can play with anyone.” ESPN's Seth Greenberg late in the game.

Synopsis:

Wichita State is the 2015 Missouri Valley Conference regular-season champion, and that's that. But this will be a season in which the league's tournament champion will be the big winner.

Why? Because the Panthers and Shockers split in the regular season, both winning at home. The winner between the two on a St. Louis neutral court in the MVC final gets a 2-1 series edge and the best win of the three. That's assuming neither gets upset before next Sunday's title game. It's hard to imagine either will.

Tweet: 'Too early to look forward to Wichita State-Northern Iowa Round Three? Nah.” -- Nicole Auerbach, USA TODAY Sports

Kansas State 70, Iowa State 69

Synopsis:

Iowa State had a 60-48 lead with 10 minutes left and couldn't close the deal. The Cyclones, played their way out of second place in the Big 12 and totally played their way out of Big 12 title-contention.

TV talk:

'One thing you can't do on the road is turn the rock over,” -- ESPN2 analyst Stephen Howard early in the game. It seemed like meaningless jabber at the time, but it rang loudly on Iowa State's next-to-last possession when Georges Niang threw a bad inbounds pass that K-State's Wesley Iwundu stole for an easy dunk that proved to be the game-winning score.

Tweet: 'Kansas State wins again. Wow. ... And what on earth is wrong with Iowa State?” -- Myron Medcalf, ESPN.com

Summation:

This is a brutal loss for the Cyclones. They had double-digit leads in both halves, but never were in control. Kansas State got way too many easy baskets, and Iowa State's ball handling was uncharacteristically cavalier at times.

At least the Iowa State women's team beat No. 3 Baylor Saturday.

Iowa 81, Penn State 77 (OT)

Synopsis:

Compared to the rout at Nebraska that began Iowa's week, this was almost the opposite in difficulty. But every road win is a good win.

Iowa fell behind 23-11, grinded its way back, was pushed to overtime, and never trailed in the extra period for a

fourth-straight win.

TV talk:

'It's a lot easier to win three games instead of four.” -- ESPNU's Sean Harrington, on Iowa trying to earn a top-4 finish in the Big Ten standings so it can bypass Thursday at the league tourney and go straight to Friday's play.

Simple math is the best.

Tweet: 'Iowa's Aaron White had 68 points, 34 rebounds and 6 steals this week. His team got three wins. A pretty, pretty good week.” -- Me, @Hlas.

OK, that was immodest. Here's one from Austin Narber:

'Iowa this morning: MVC CHAMPS AND LET'S CATCH KU AND CURB STOMPING PENN STATE AND YEAH Tonight: iowa won by 4 yay let's go play checkers”

Summation:

White's clever steal of a Penn State inbounds pass with 29 seconds left in overtime was the play of the game and one of the Hawkeyes' plays of the season.

He then made the first two of six straight foul shots he would hit from then until the game's end.

Iowa is trending up, as they say. This is the Hawkeyes' first 10-win season in the Big Ten since 2006.

My fervent desire about this season hasn't changed. Send all three Iowa teams to the NCAA tourney opening-week site in Omaha.

Thank you, and good night.

Facebook afficionados: Subscribe to my page at Mike Hlas - The Gazette.