Iowa men’s basketball team cruises past UMass-Lowell in final tuneup before Big Ten Conference play

IOWA CITY - Ya gotta make sure you devour the cupcakes, which the Iowa men’s basketball team did this season.

A 90-62 win over Massachusetts-Lowell at Carver-Hawkeye Arena on a frigid Monday afternoon meant the Hawkeyes went 7-0 against such opponents, also known as mid-majors or Quad 3/Quad 4 opponents in the NET rankings. The closest call, and it wasn’t close, was a 19-point win over Western Illinois way back in early November.

Now it’s the Big Ten Conference the rest of the way, beginning with UCLA here Saturday afternoon at 5 p.m. Iowa split its two early Big Ten games this month, falling at Michigan State and beating Maryland.

“I think it’s good. We’ve learned a lot about our team,” said Iowa’s Bennett Stirtz. “But I don’t think we’ve done much, yet. We’ve got a lot to prove. We’re going to go head first into Big Ten play.”

“This is why everyone joined the roster,” said Iowa’s Alvaro Folgueiras. “For these (upcoming) kinds of games.”

The Hawkeyes are 11-2 overall, losing only to top-10 teams Iowa State and Michigan State on the road, going into this holiday week ranked 25th in the country. Are they ready for what’s ahead?

Sure seems that way. Though if that translates to wins, a shot at a conference title and a NCAA tournament berth is anyone’s guess.

Let’s find out.

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“That’s really a tricky question because you don’t think that way as a coach,” said Iowa Coach Ben McCollum, when asked where he thinks his team fits in the Big Ten. “Because you think you can win every game. I’d like to replay the two games that we lost, would like to play them over. I think that’s the mentality you have to have as a coach, to feel like you can win every game, whether you are going to or not.

“There was an old tennis coach that used to be at Northwest (Missouri State) that said ‘If you don’t believe in yourself, who will?’ So you need to believe in yourself and believe that we can do something.”

Iowa shot 69.2 percent from the field in a first half that concluded with it leading 47-30. The thing about the Hawkeyes’ 18 made field goals was that 16 of them were from point-blank range.

Seriously, five feet or closer: layups, transition layups, dunks, power moves low, pick-and-roll stuff, you name it. The exceptions were 3-pointers from Stirtz and Isaia Howard, two of only four attempted.

“We were kind of picking and choosing our spots, and that’s what they gave us,” Stirtz said. “They were kind of overplaying and going over the screens, so the paint was open.”

“It was being patient in the paint and finishing with authority,” Folgueiras. “

Stirtz led Iowa with 22 points, Manyawu and Alvaro Folgueiras 14 each and Tavion Banks 12. Stirtz also had eight assists to give him 500 in his college career right on the nose.

This was Iowa’s first game in nine days because of the holidays, and it looked like it in spots.

“That’s why you play that game,” McCollum said. To try and improve, kind of get the Christmas out of you. We gave them five days, which is a lot. We kind of saw that in that one stretch where we weren’t crisp, we weren’t clean, didn’t get to the next action. But we did come out pretty good.

“I think (the schedule) has prepared us. I think we’ve gotten better. Guys have really improved, grown. We know what it is. Our two road games were fantastic for us to play, got us ready. Now we’ve just got to carry it over to Big Ten play.”

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