Best of times, worst of times for Iowa’s Peter Jok

INDIANAPOLIS — Peter Jok's basketball day was a juxtaposition of outstanding basketball and inopportune timing.

The Iowa junior guard connected for 29 points on 10 of 16 shooting, including four 3-pointers in the Hawkeyes' 68-66 loss to Illinois in the Big Ten Tournament on Thursday. During one stretch he scored 15 consecutive points for Iowa and brought the Hawkeyes back from an 11-point deficit to a three-point lead late in the first half.

That part of the game was after a rough early stretch when he missed a couple of shots and went to the bench. He didn't score for the game's first 12 minutes, 50 seconds.

'I just started out slow, sloppy,' Jok said. 'Coach (Fran McCaffery) took me out.'

'The interesting thing is, he got off to a slow start, missed a 3 early, wasn't really himself,' McCaffery said. 'I took him out. I left him out for a few minutes. And he got a little bit of rest, came back in and caught fire. And he was the difference in the game for us because we were struggling offensively everywhere else. And we just kept going to him. He was making everything, and in the second half, he put it on the deck a little bit, got to the free-throw line a little bit. And that changes things for the team,'

Jok continued his torrid pace after halftime. He scored 10 of Iowa's first 12 points. That completed a sequence where he scored 27 of Iowa's 34 points. Even on a 11:46 second-half stretch where Iowa scored five points, Jok had two.

Then, disaster struck. Already with four fouls, Jok was elbowed by Illinois' Kendrick Nunn with 4:02 left in the game. Jok shoved Nunn, and both were assessed technical fouls. Jok was out.

'You have no idea how much I would like to describe my frustration,' McCaffery said. 'Leave it at that.'

'He'd been doing that all game,' Jok said. 'Coach had been talking to the refs and told them to try to watch it. He just got the best of me in that possession, and I didn't know I had four fouls so he fouled me out.'

Jok's 29 points tied a career high he set at Rutgers in January.

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