Iowa Hawkeyes’ uphill climb reaches top of Big Ten women’s soccer

Solon’s Josie Durr and three Iowa Hawkeyes women’s soccer teammates gave head coach Dave Dilanni a Gatorade shower Sunday afternoon.

Dilanni responded with gleeful emotion, physically and verbally. His players jumped around and got even wider smiles from his roaring response, and they already had a lot to be giddy after their 1-0 win over Wisconsin in the Big Ten tournament’s championship game in University Park, Pa.

“We grabbed it and went with it,” Durr said by phone Sunday while her team enjoyed dinner before going to the State College airport and returning home to prepare for the NCAA tournament, which starts April 27 in Cary, N.C. The field and pairings will be announced Monday. Iowa’s win Sunday gave it the Big Ten’s automatic berth.

She could have been talking about the Gatorade jug, but instead was referring to the opportunity to play in the Big Ten tourney.

Of all Iowa’s Big Ten championships in all sports over the years, this may be the unlikeliest. In a normal year, the 12th-place Hawkeyes wouldn’t have been in the Big Ten tourney with their record because just the top eight teams advanced. This season, though, all 14 were admitted.

Iowa grabbed it and went with it.

The Hawkeyes defeated Illinois and Minnesota in a West regional “mini-tournament,” then upset fourth-ranked and top-seeded Penn State 1-0 last Thursday. It was Iowa’s third win over the traditional national-power Nittany Lions in 29 games over the years, and first at Penn State.

Wisconsin outshot Iowa 10-4 in Sunday’s first half, but the game was scoreless at halftime. Jenny Cape scored on a rocket of a shot off her left foot in the 64th minute, and the Hawkeyes made the 1-0 lead stand up.

“We waited our chance to get that goal to put us ahead,” said Durr, a redshirt junior and starter. “We capitalized when it came, and then played well the last 25 minutes.”

It isn’t as if Iowa has come from nowhere. The Hawkeyes were 15-5-1 overall and 7-3-1 in the Big Ten in 2019, reaching the most-recent NCAA tourney as an at-large invitee. But this season, postponed from last fall because of the COVID-19 pandemic, was going nowhere for a while.

Iowa didn’t score in its first six games, earning just one draw. It averaged just 0.27 goals per game entering the Big Ten tourney. Then it beat the conference’s top three seeds before finishing the job Sunday against the Badgers.

“We were just young, trying to find our identity,” Durr said. “I think early in the season we were trying to figure out a new game plan, because something wasn’t working.

“Toward the end of the season we were climbing up that hill fast, playing a new game of soccer. It was really just a belief in the team and the program.”

This is Iowa’s first Big Ten tourney title after runner-up finishes in 2013 and 2014. Of all the Hawkeyes teams to hold the championship trophy, it was one of the least likely. Or was it? A season is a work-in-progress, and this team grew more competitive as the regular season grew older.

“We knew if we fought for it we could do this,” said Durr. “I just think the chemistry this team has been able to play with is amazing. Sharing this moment with this team is everything I could ask for.”

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