Iowa women’s basketball’s unprecedented run shows power of believing

CLEVELAND — Caitlin Clark believed. Lisa Bluder believed.

“We were probably about the only two people that believed we would be at a Final Four,” Clark said, looking back at her recruiting process.

But when she stepped foot on campus, that belief became contagious as the star guard learned “how much better you can make people by just believing in them and telling that to them — to their face.”

“Caitlin got them to believe,” Iowa associate head coach Jan Jensen said.

Iowa even had its own “Believe” sign from the hit Apple TV show “Ted Lasso” — a sign that actor Jason Sudeikis climbed on a ladder to autograph when he visited the team in December in Iowa City.

Iowa’s steadfast belief led to unprecedented results as the Hawkeyes went to back-to-back national championship games — something never done before by any Big Ten team, let alone at Iowa. The Hawkeyes lost Sunday to South Carolina, 87-75, in the national championship game.

Looking ahead, the power of belief is one of the things Clark, guard Gabbie Marshall, their teammates and the scores of Iowa fans will carry with them following the Hawkeyes’ run of success that captivated much of the country.

“The belief in yourself, belief in each other — that can take you a long way,” Marshall said at her locker, minutes after the fifth-year senior’s final game in an Iowa uniform.

That belief, fellow senior Kate Martin said, starts with “preparation.”

“We believe in each other because we’ve seen that every day in practice,” Martin said. “It doesn’t just happen out on the court. There’s a lot of preparation that goes into it, so that gives you confidence. And confidence gives you belief.”

  Buy Photo

Marshall also will take away the part of head coach Bluder’s culture that “everyone mattered, no matter your role on the team.” That was evident at the Final Four when the team went out of its way at the end of an open practice to personally thank Iowa’s band and cheer and dance teams.

“No matter what you do after college is over — whether you go on and keep playing or you start your career — it should be about the team,” Marshall said. “It’s always about the team. … (Bluder) was huge on that.”

Iowa’s circle during practices and shootarounds has been a visual metaphor of that element of Hawkeye culture. Each person has a part in the circle, which forms at midcourt. The closeness of the circle resembles the closeness of the team.

“It’s a group effort,” forward Sharon Goodman said. “That’s the point of our circle is that it’s not just one person.”

Goodman also will carry with her another Bluder-ism after college: to “be where your feet are.”

“Wherever you’re at in the moment, be there and be present,” Goodman said. “If you’re in class, be in class — don’t be on your phone. If you’re in practice, don’t be thinking about class. If you’re on the floor, that’s where you’re at.”

Goodman said Bluder “kind of became a mom in this place for me.” Martin praised the “great coaches who have empowered me to be a strong female leader.”

“That goes way beyond basketball,” Martin said.

That has been especially valuable to Martin, who plans to pursue coaching.

“I hope to be half as good of a coach as she is one day,” Martin said. “I’ll take a lot of the values and principles that she’s instilled in us, and I’ll carry those onto my own team.”

  Buy Photo

It may look a little different stylistically when Martin does it, considering Martin thinks “I have a shorter temper than (Bluder) does.”

“I’m sure I’ll have my own Kate-isms at times,” Martin said.

Bluder, Martin said, is a “genius when it comes to strategy and gameplay.”

“But more than anything, I think it’s just the consistency in who she is that helps us be as good as we can be,” Martin said.

As much as the coaching staff has been beneficial for the senior class at Iowa (and beyond), the seniors have left a “profound” impact on the coaching staff.

The “example of the hard work and belief and the magic” that the seniors set, Jensen said, is the “gift for a coach.”

Jensen will miss seeing Clark be “goofy as heck and shoot it from Elliott Drive,” the street outside the Carver-Hawkeye Arena. She’ll miss seeing “Kate Martin be Kate Martin every day.” She’ll miss Marshall “coming in all calm and cool and stealthy on D.”

Goodman is “as good as a human being as I’ve ever been around,” Jensen said. That’s not to mention guard Molly Davis, who “sacrifices going to a place to start to come here and back up Caitlin mostly last year.”

“They will leave here knowing the impact they’ve made was far greater than any banner that can hang,” Jensen said.

Comments: john.steppe@thegazette.com

Sign up for our curated Iowa Hawkeyes athletics newsletter at thegazette.com/hawks.