With hype dampened, will Hawkeye droughts end?

IOWA CITY - Maybe it was for the best that it rained on the day of Iowa men's basketball's annual media day.

Last year, it was 80 degrees and dry on the same occasion, and the Hawkeyes' droughts proceeded to continue. No winning season in the Big Ten since 2006. No NCAA tournament victory since 2001.

Yes, they made their first NCAA appearance since ‘06. But their stay ended at a Wednesday play-in - excuse me, first-round - game. It was like finally getting a reservation in the best restaurant in town, eating an appetizer, then turning around and going home.

It's 13 seasons without a win in the NCAAs, the thing that college basketball revolves around. Big Ten teams have won 115 NCAA games since the day Iowa was eliminated in the second-round of the 2001 tournament. Michigan State has won 29 NCAA games in that time, Wisconsin 20.

Hawkeye hoops have thoroughly changed under Fran McCaffery. Last season alone, the Hawkeyes got into the Top Ten for the first time in 12 years. They won at then-No. 3 Ohio State. They beat then-No. 10 Michigan by 18 points at home.

They have reversed the image of a team that was deadly dull before McCaffery arrived. They had 11 home sellouts last year. They had a player taken in the NBA draft for the first time in seven years, and Devyn Marble will be the first Hawkeye to stick in the league since Reggie Evans was a rookie in 2002.

But the drought lingers. When will this program field a genuine Big Ten title-threat? When will it make it to a Saturday of a Big Ten tournament, which hasn't happened since 2006? When will it win a game in the big tournament? Or even reach the Sweet 16, like Northern Iowa and Iowa State have done in this decade?

Why not now? With 'now,” of course, meaning five months from now?

Last year's media day felt like the blastoff on a rocket ride to the moon and stars. The Hawkeyes really were in the Top Ten, they really were 8-4 and near the top of the conference standings two-thirds of the way through the league season.

Then came the thud of a splashdown. Just one win in the final eight games, a dreadful Big Ten tourney loss to Northwestern, and the fast exit in the NCAAs.

Was it burnout? Bad chemistry? Nah, McCaffery said here Thursday. It was insufficient defense.

'We give up 95 in Minnesota,” he said. 'We scored 89. But you've got to stop people, especially on the road.

'And you could say, ‘well, OK, was the leadership a factor in it?' You could argue it, I guess. But the reality is we didn't defend the way we need to defend to consistently win. That's why we were 9-9 and not better than that. And I think that's got to be the challenge for this team.”

Thursday's media day was low-key. McCaffery, often a friend to optimistic hyperbole, offered none. And that could be a very good thing.

Let someone else carry the weight of expectations. This is a veteran, deep team. As good as Marble was, this could be a better unit without him as several players who sort of stood in his shadow are required to expand their roles and move the ball around more.

What happens if Aaron White is better? What happens if Iowa finds the right guard rotation? What happens if Jarrod Uthoff takes off the way many believe he can and will? What happens if big men Adam Woodbury and/or Gabe Olaseni go from being useful players to consistently resembling vital forces? What happens if Josh Oglesby shoots twice as many 3-pointers as last season but makes 40.3 percent of them for the second-straight year?

Wisconsin is the popular pick to win the Big Ten with so many good players back from its Final Four team. But the Hawkeyes are a lot closer to the Badgers than they are the dregs of the conference.

Wouldn't it be ironic if the volume started lower this time, and the Hawkeyes flew a lot higher?

l Comments: (319) 368-8840; mike.hlas@thegazette.com