Getting Better will be Iowa basketball theme

By NICK PUGLIESE SourceMedia Group News

IOWA CITY – If Next Man In was the theme for Iowa's victory against Missouri in the Insight Bowl, get used to hearing Getting Better as the men's basketball team's mantra in 2010-11.

In the wake of Iowa's 87-77 loss to Illinois Wednesday night, you heard disappointment from the Hawkeyes about the outcome of their Big Ten opener. But you also heard words of encouragement from a program that recently has suffered more than its share of poor performances in conference play.

“You know, I thought we kept coming. We kept coming,” first-year Iowa coach Fran McCaffery said after watching the Hawkeyes (7-6, 0-1) fall behind by 19 early in the second half and rally to cut the lead to 6 with 8:21 remaining. “I mean, we lost to a really good team, and a team that I have a lot of respect for and, hopefully, we have learned from this experience and we'll be better the next time out.”

Matt Gatens, who led Iowa with 21 points while playing the entire 40 minutes, said the defense could have been better against an Illinois team that made 13 of 18 3-pointers, many of them uncontested.

“Coach always says if a team makes over 10 3s, it's going to be tough to beat them,” Gatens said. “We didn't close out the shooters as well as we should have. In the second half, we did a much better job locating them and having a sense of urgency of getting out on them and avoid those open looks. It's nice to see we learned from it, but we can't let that happen in the first place.”  

As hot as the 23

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-ranked Fighting Illini (11-3, 1-0) were, McCaffery was even hotter when he quickly called a timeout two minutes into the second half after Illinois outscored Iowa 9-2 to open that 19-point lead. This after Bryce Cartwright's bank shot at the buzzer pulled Iowa within 12 at halftime and had the sellout crowd at Carver-Hawkeye Arena buzzing.

“Disappointed in the start of the second half,” he said. “We felt like we didn't play that well (but) we were down by 12 at halftime. We were right there, even though we didn't play well. And then we started poorly to go down (19) and then can't seem to put it in at the free-throw line so that was unfortunate.”

The Hawkeyes were 8 of 15 from the free-throw line, but three misses particularly stung. First, Eric May missed both ends after being intentionally fouled on a breakaway with Iowa trailing by 8 with 10:46 left. Two minutes later, Devyn Marble's layup cut the lead to 6 – but the freshman guard missed the free throw after being fouled on the play.

 “I feel bad for Eric. He shot a ton of free throws,” McCaffery said. “We have shot more free throws in practice than any other team in America. I guarantee you, and we are drilling them.”

One Hawkeye who wasn't drilling anything Wednesday was freshman forward Melsahn Basabe, who has been ill. He played 12 minutes and had four points and two rebounds.

“I think you could see his energy level is not what it needs to be,” McCaffery said. “He's been sick since the Louisiana Tech game (Dec. 21). I thought we could get some quality minutes out of him. He'll be better. He has not eaten in about five or six days.”

With second-ranked Ohio State up next Tuesday in Iowa City, Basabe and his teammates all better be feeling – and playing – better. McCaffery said having a couple of extra days to prepare for the Buckeyes should help.

“We'll take advantage of it and we will get Melsahn a little bit stronger and a little bit healthier and I think that will help us,” he said. “We will break (the Illinois game) down and that's the only thing we can do is try to make progress.”