Hawkeyes land last punch of slugfest, drop Wisconsin in overtime, 88-86

IOWA CITY — It was “Beauty and the Beast.”

The beautiful part from the perspective of the Iowa men’s basketball team was Tony Perkins finishing a drive and, for all practical purposes, Wisconsin in the Hawkeyes’ 88-86 overtime win over the No. 20 Badgers.

Perkins apologized to his teammates for his first-half play. He spent the last seven seconds of overtime getting them the victory.

He drove down the right side of the lane against Chucky Hepburn, spun, briefly lost the ball and quickly regained it while losing Hepburn in the process on a spin move, then banked in the game-winner.

The beast? That was Hawkeye freshman center Owen Freeman. At least that’s what Perkins called Freeman in a postgame press conference. Six times, in fact, which wasn’t as much as he called him that during the game.

“I told him ‘Every time when you get fouled, get a rebound, get a bucket, I looked at him. You are a beast. Act like you are a beast,’ Perkins said.

“He goes for the ball, he can score, hit free throws, dunk on somebody. Just the type of player he is, he works hard. … So he’s a beast.”

The 6-10 Freeman made all six of his field-goal tries, and notched team-highs of 20 points, 12 rebounds, six assists, four blocked shots and two steals.

A beauty of a performance. And, a beauty of a win for Iowa considering it trailed by 13 points midway through the first half, it scored last in regulation to send the game to overtime, and erased a four-point deficit in the OT to get the win.

Iowa improved to 7-8 in the Big Ten, 15-11 overall. Wisconsin, which lost for the fifth time in its last six games, is 9-6, 17-9.

Never this season had the Hawkeyes shown the kind of emotion after a win that they displayed Saturday. The hugging was fierce and joyous. Freeman slapped hands with fans on his way out of the arena area.

Iowa had surrendered a 12-point lead in losing at Maryland three days earlier, so they had that sting to heal. Plus, this was the Hawkeyes’ first win of the season over a Top 25 team.

“In this league, every game is so difficult,” Iowa Coach Fran McCaffery said. “This was a ranked opponent, we have a huge (sellout of 14,998 fans) crowd and they were awesome.”

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Perkins got beat on defense a few times in the first half, which was the norm for his team as the Badgers made 12 of their first 15 shots and hit five 3-pointers in the first seven minutes. Iowa was behind 35-24 with 7:05 left when McCaffery subbed out Perkins for freshman Brock Harding.

“He played phenomenal,” Perkins said.

Harding scored six points and was very good for the rest of the half, and the Hawkeyes closed to within 47-43. Perkins then had something to say to his teammates.

“I walked in the locker room at halftime and I was like ‘That’s on me. I’m bringing us down right now and I’m not being much of a leader or much of who I am.’”

Perkins scored the first points of the second half. Wisconsin made just one 3-pointer after halftime while Perkins scored 16 of his 18 points.

“A lot of guys, a coach takes them out and they’re not playing well,” McCaffery said. “They pout and are complaining and start whining on the bench, try to get other people to agree with them.

“You know what? (Perkins) said ‘It’s on me.’ That’s character. … He was angrier at himself than I was.”

And what did the beast, Freeman, have to say afterward?

“I love Tony Perkins.”

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