Hawkeye men dominate second-half, get 84-73 win at Rutgers behind Josh Dix’s 26 points

(This story was written in Cedar Rapids.)

Iowa got its first men’s basketball road win of the season Wednesday, downing Rutgers 84-73 at Jersey Mike’s Arena in Piscataway, N.J.

Iowa, which had lost its first five conference road games, improved to 14-10 overall, 5-8 in the Big Ten. Rutgers is 12-13, 5-9. Iowa had lost its last three games and six of its last seven.

The Hawkeyes were dominant in the second half, outscoring the Scarlet Knights, 51-31.

“We only turned it over twice (in the second half), Iowa Coach Fran McCaffery said in his postgame press conference. ”We made shots. We rebounded, we defended. We did all that better. We locked in both on offense and defense in the second half.“

Junior guard Josh Dix had 26 points for Iowa. Senior teammate Payton Sandfort added 20. Sandfort turned an ankle and left the game, but quickly returned and resumed contributing.

“This is about as hard a season as I’ve gone through, in my years of basketball,” Sandfort said in a posgame Zoom conference.

“We’ve stayed together in the locker room. It’s been tough. There’s been a lot of outside noise that a lot of guys, including myself, have struggled dealing with. ... It’s been a grind of a year. And this league is as good as it’s ever been.”

Freshmen Ace Bailey and Dylan Harper, who both came in averaging over 19 points per game, had 13 and 11, respectively.

“We were locked in to those guys,” McCaffery said in his postgame press conference. “Either of them didn’t see a lot of daylight.”

On BTN, McCaffery said “There are times in your career when you’re really proud of your team. The way we fought was really impressive.”

The Hawkeyes played without starting point guard Drew Thelwell, who sprained an ankle last Saturday in Iowa’s loss to Wisconsin. Brock Harding got most of the minutes for Iowa at the point. He scored 13 points and had a game-high seven assists.

“We’ve had injuries, we’ve had some setbacks,” McCaffery said. “So do other teams. But it’s how you respond.”

The Hawkeyes trailed 50-41 with 15:35 left in the game, but took a 56-53 lead with 9:46 remaining after Dix capped a run of 10 straight points by himself with a 3-pointer. Dix put up those points in the space of 3:31, on a jumper, a layup and two 3-pointers.

Rutgers briefly regained the lead, but Iowa outscored the Scarlet Knights 26-15 in the final eight minutes. The Hawkeyes scored the game’s last eight points.

Pryce Sandfort and Ladji Dembele made several big plays each for Iowa, scoring 10 and 9 points, respectively.

Rutgers broke to a 10-2 lead, but Iowa scored 10 straight points for a 23-20 edge midway through the first half.

Rutgers made eight of 14 3-pointers in the half, but were 2-of-11 after that. Iowa made three of its first four 3-pointers, but missed its final nine tries before the break and its first five of the second half. It got a very big three, however, from Payton Sandfort for a 76-71 with 1:40 left. His team brought the win home.

“It feels good, for sure,” Sandfort said.

Iowa’s next game is Sunday at 4 p.m. (Iowa time) at No. 25 Maryland (18-6, 8-5).

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