Iowa runs away for easy victory

It's hard to say who was run more ragged on Black Friday, the bargain-hunting shoppers at all the area malls or the over-matched basketball team that was mauled at Carver-Hawkeye Arena.

Here's a vote for the Southern Illinois-Edwardsville Cougars (1-5), who were the victims of Iowa's 111-50 drubbing. While there were plenty of milestones for the Hawkeyes (3-3), including the first time to crack the century mark in four seasons and the biggest margin of victory since a defeat of Pepperdine in 1966 by the same score, there was some sobering news on the day.

Starting point guard Cully Payne has a sports hernia, will undergo surgery on Tuesday and will be out indefinitely. Payne, who has struggled this season while shooting 28.6 percent from the field, was replaced by junior Bryce Cartwright. The last signee of new coach Fran McCaffery's initial class now becomes the first man to run his up-tempo offense.

“It's a different role, coming off the bench rather than playing from the beginning,” said Cartwright, who had 11 points and four assists in 21 minutes. “I just have to go out there and lead my team to victory. I try to improve every night, improve on my weaknesses. Get everybody involved early. I'm trying to oversee what coach wants on the court.”

Cartwright almost joined Payne on the injured list after crashing hard to the floor via a vicious intentional foul under the basket by Corey Wickware on a breakaway dunk with 15:27 to play. Cartwright, who said he was fine after the game, made one of his free throws and went to the bench for good.

“I didn't see him in my rear view. I probably should have tried to lay it up,” Cartwright said.

An irate McCaffery quickly went onto the court to confront Wickware, who appeared to go after Cartwright's head.

“I just did not feel like we needed to be in that situation. We're not going to have that,” he said. “We don't need to be chipping people in the head, that kind of thing. So, I voiced my displeasure and the officials did a phenomenal job taking care of it.”

Now, Cartwright, who started 20 games as a freshman at Fresno State, will have to take care of the point. McCaffery said backup help will come from a committee of Devyn Marble, Branden Stubbs and Jordan Stoermer, whose 3-pointer with 3:12 to play pushed Iowa past the century mark.

Having Cartwright in the starting five is fine with his teammates.

“Bryce fits in perfectly with the system,” said Eric May who had 13 points and 7 steals, tying him for the fourth most steals in a game by an Iowa player. “We saw that early, that he's a player. He has a lot on his shoulders but he's able to handle it.”

That's something McCaffery probably knew when he invited Cartwright, who played for Paris Junior College last season, to visit campus in June.

“One of the first things that I wanted to do after I got here was we had to address (the point guard situation),” McCaffery said. “We just couldn't … Think about it. If we didn't go get a point guard and (Payne) has a sports hernia, where does that leave us?”

Payne apparently had been playing with the hernia. “What he told me was that, ironically, it didn't hurt  him that much when he's playing,” McCaffery said. “But what started happening to him was he started getting more and more pain at night trying to sleep, more and more pain during the day when he wasn't playing. It was very, very uncomfortable for him and getting hard for him to live (with it).”

Led by Cartwright and Zach McCabe, Iowa went on three runs (11-0, 12-0 and 13-0) to open a 53-20 halftime lead before an announced crowd of 11,698. The Hawkeyes shot 56.7 percent in the first 20 minutes while SIU-Edwardsville shot 25.8 percent and had 14 turnovers. The only suspense after that was who would get that 100th point.

McCaffery said it was important for Iowa to come out strong after going 1-2 at the Paradise Jam – and taking two days to get home from St. Thomas. Equaling the sixth-largest win in school history even if the opponent was missing its leading scorer from the past two seasons, you could say mission accomplished.

“We saw six guys in double figures, forced 29 turnovers and we felt like we could get them on the glass where we were a substantially bigger team,” he said. “But I think when you go back to all the different contributions that we're able to get, I think that's the thing that has me most excited.”

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