Johnson’s career-high 22 carries Hawks

Morgan Johnson could be the key to just how well the Iowa women's basketball team fares this season.

The sophomore center scored a career-high 22 points to lead No. 22 Iowa beat winless Northeastern 87-59 on Saturday in the first round of the KCRG-TV9 Hawkeye Challenge before 5,911 fans at Carver-Hawkeye Arena.

“I thought Morgan was very good today,” said Iowa Coach Lisa Bluder. “I was really happy to see her kind of come out of her shell this year and really give us a great performance.”

Iowa (4-0) will meet Central Michigan (3-0) today at 2 p.m. for the tournament championship. Central Michigan edged Northern Colorado, 78-74, in the other tournament game Saturday. Today's game will be televised on KCRG-TV9.

Johnson's offensive burst has been missing in the early part of the season. The Hawkeyes are blessed with several strong outside shooters, but the 6-foot-6 Johnson is Iowa's lone true inside player. When she plays well on offense, it creates more problems for opponents.

“It's enormous,” said Bluder of Johnson's importance on offense. “For us, if we have that inside presence that opens up the outside even more because they have to focus on her.”

Kachine Alexander added 21 points and 12 rebounds and junior forward Kelly Krei chipped in 18 points for the Hawkeyes, who overcame 19 turnovers by outrebounding the Huskies 51-27.

Northeastern (0-3) trailed 40-35 early in the second half. But Iowa went on a 9-2 run, capped by a Johnson jumper, to move ahead by 12.

The Hawkeyes used an 18-5 spurt to take an 80-55 lead with 2:49 left.

Kashaia Cannon had 16 points for the Huskies and Afreyea Tolbert added 12.

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