Just a misfire for Hawkeyes, not a meltdown

IOWA CITY - Everything about the play was what Iowa wanted. The shot simply didn't go in the basket.

Down 68-66 to Northwestern with the ball and 10 seconds left, the Hawkeyes hustled downcourt. Bryce Cartwright got the ball to a wide-open freshman Josh Oglesby. His 3-pointer at the five-second mark had the look of a game-winner.

“I thought it was in,” Iowa Coach Fran McCaffery said.

“I thought it was in,” Oglesby said.

It wasn't. Northwestern prevailed Saturday in Carver-Hawkeye Arena, 70-66.

“It rattled out,” said Oglesby. “That's what happens.”

Whatcha gonna do? That's what Tony Soprano liked to say about death and disappointments. Losing this game sure wasn't death for the Iowa program. A disappointment, on Senior Day and with the possibility of finishing Big Ten play with a .500 record? Sure. But not a crusher.

It was a fever-pitch game between two teams without winning league records that showed up to play for things that mattered to them. If Northwestern catches some fire in the first couple days of the Big Ten tourney, it can still get that elusive first NCAA Tournament berth. It showed a lot of grit here, that's for sure.

If Iowa beats Illinois in a first-round Big Ten matchup Thursday in Indianapolis, it is assured of its first winning season in five years and first conference-tourney triumph since 2006.

The Hawkeyes' 8-10 league mark could have been better with this or that. But after five nonconference losses of 10 points or more, after getting routed by Campbell, after losing by 20 points at Northern Iowa? You'd have taken 8-10 in the Big Ten without much debate with yourself, wouldn't you?

Oglesby's last shot didn't drop. Iowa gave away a lead that had swollen to 15 points midway through the first half. And Matt Gatens didn't get to make his home-finale a winner. Unless the Hawkeyes play a College Basketball Invitational game or two or as many as five at home.

“What did they finish, 8-10?” Northwestern Coach Bill Carmody said. “Same as us.

“If you would have told me that, I would have said ‘No way,' but McCaffery's done a hell of a job and they're going to continue to get better.”

In the pregame feel-good Iowa scenario, Gatens torches one last foe in his home gym two hours after the Senior Day ceremony before the game, and gets carried off the court by teammates, students, and Herky.

Nonetheless, the 6-foot-5 player who developed into one of the most-popular Hawkeye cagers in a long time gave an effort worthy of, well, himself.

Gatens had 10 second-half points, hit a 3-pointer with two minutes left to pull Iowa within 66-64, and worked his tail off on defense yet again as he helped contained 6-9 Wildcat scoring machine John Shurna to nine points.

“It was epic, is what it was,” McCaffery said. “The energy level that it took to do what he did against a guy who is 6-9 was just one of the most-incredible things I've seen.”

In a game or two or maybe even five or six, Gatens will turn things over to his younger teammates. They ought to be playing for considerably more than a .500 Big Ten record in the first weekend of March in following years.

Oglesby will probably hit one of those game-winners one day.

“I would tell him to shoot it again,” McCaffery said. “That's exactly what he was supposed to do. And I love him. He's going to be great.”

Meanwhile, this season isn't over yet.