Hawkeye seniors Jordan Bohanon, Connor McCaffery persevered to reach Monday’s Senior Night

Four hip surgeries. Eleven seasons. A lot of victories.

Those are combined numbers for two Iowa men’s basketball players who will be part of Senior Day ceremonies Monday night before the Hawkeyes’ 2021-22 home-finale against Northwestern.

Along with teammate Austin Ash and three team student-managers, Jordan Bohannon and Connor McCaffery will be honored in the pregame at Carver-Hawkeye Arena.

This is Bohannon’s second Senior Day. He went through the ceremony last year when only family members were allowed to attend in person, but chose several weeks later to take advantage of the NCAA’s COVID-19 year waiver and play another season.

McCaffery, meanwhile, has not decided whether to use the extra season available to him. Ash has the option to stay at Iowa or play a fifth season somewhere else, like former Hawkeye Michael Baer is doing this season at Siena.

Bohannon has been part of 118 Iowa wins, Connor McCaffery 99. Bohannon cut short his fourth college season, in 2019-20, to have his second hip surgery. He has played the last two full seasons.

He is the NCAA’s all-time leader in games played at 171. He is the Big Ten’s leader in career 3-point field goals with 431. He is Iowa’s career leader in assists (687) and free throw percentage (. 887). He has scored 1,938 points, third behind Luka Garza and Roy Marble on Iowa’s career list.

Connor McCaffery had both hips operated on last offseason. He returned to be an integral part of Iowa’s player rotation this season.

“Those surgeries are painful and the rehab is extensive,” Iowa Coach Fran McCaffery said Sunday. “It takes tremendous commitment to want to get back to doing what you love to do, but to be able to do it at the highest level. Because if you shortcut it, you’re not going to be successful when you get back on the court, you’re not going to be able to physically do it.

“To watch them both kind of endure and come out the other end successfully, this I think speaks to their character.”

Bohannon and Connor McCaffery both had other injuries during their Iowa careers. Bohannon had plantar fasciitis that he played through in his sophomore season. McCaffery’s first season was cut short. He had an emergency tonsillectomy, and a second throat surgery. He was 19 years old and lost over 20 pounds.

Then, over three years later, there were the hip surgeries.

“I’ve definitely dealt with some stuff,” Connor McCaffery said, “but at the end of the day I feel like those kinds of setbacks don’t outweigh the feeling of winning on the road or seeing your name revealed on Selection Sunday.

“Going through the hip surgery, I did that so that I could come back and be a part of this team regardless if I was going to be 100 percent or not.

“The hip surgeries are pretty serious and it’s going to take a long time for me to get back completely healthy, and that is what happened. But that was expected. … I knew I wanted to come back and be a part of this team because I knew we could be pretty good.”

Perhaps McCaffery’s best play of the year has been the last three games, when he’s gone 6-for-6 from 3-point distance and Iowa has won at Ohio State, beaten Michigan State at home, and won at Nebraska, all by double-digits.

“All of these things make it worth it 10 times,” he said. “It’s not even close.”

He, Ash and Bohannon are Iowa high school basketball products and longtime friends.

“I’m excited,” about being part of Monday’s game and ceremony, Connor McCaffery said, “but I know that at some point I’ll probably be emotional and somewhat sad.”

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