Gen Z. thoughts

[Vallholl]

My son's friends (23/24 yr olds) have a text chat going around with two questions:

1) What would Steve Alford do with this team?

2) Is this the most talented Iowa men's basketball team?

I am not sure on question 1, but I was prepared to answer question 2.
The 1987 Team had 4 players who played multiple seasons in the NBA (Marble, Armstrong, Gamble, Lohaus) and Jones and Jepsen also played in the NBA.

1986-87 Iowa Hawkeyes Men's Roster and Stats | College Basketball at Sports-Reference.com

Check out the detailed 1986-87 Iowa Hawkeyes Roster and Stats for College Basketball at Sports-Reference.com

www.sports-reference.com

They also had the best nicknames "The Vanilla Gorrilla", "Sir Jamalot" and "Thrill Hill".

The 1970 Team "Six Pack" had two NBA players: Fred Brown and John Johnson. Chad Calabria played briefly in the league and Glenn Vidnovic was drafted.

1969–70 Iowa Hawkeyes men's basketball team - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

The 1980 Final Four team also had two NBA players: Ronnie Lester and Bobby Hanson.

1979–80 Iowa Hawkeyes men's basketball team - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[SotaHawk87]

Talented is a good question. I do feel like this team and the most weapons when CJ is fully healthy.

 

[kceasthawk]

My son's friends (23/24 yr olds) have a text chat going around with two questions:

1) What would Steve Alford do with this team?

2) Is this the most talented Iowa men's basketball team?

I am not sure on question 1, but I was prepared to answer question 2.
The 1987 Team had 4 players who played multiple seasons in the NBA (Marble, Armstrong, Gamble, Lohaus) and Jones and Jepsen also played in the NBA.

1986-87 Iowa Hawkeyes Men's Roster and Stats | College Basketball at Sports-Reference.com

Check out the detailed 1986-87 Iowa Hawkeyes Roster and Stats for College Basketball at Sports-Reference.com

www.sports-reference.com

They also had the best nicknames "The Vanilla Gorrilla", "Sir Jamalot" and "Thrill Hill".

The 1970 Team "Six Pack" had two NBA players: Fred Brown and John Johnson. Chad Calabria played briefly in the league and Glenn Vidnovic was drafted.

1969–70 Iowa Hawkeyes men's basketball team - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

The 1980 Final Four team also had two NBA players: Ronnie Lester and Bobby Hanson.

1979–80 Iowa Hawkeyes men's basketball team - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

The hot shooting we've seen from the Hawks in a few games was an every game event for the 70's Hawks with Freddy Brown and Johnson averaging 27 a game (without the three pont line!) for a team that AVERAGED 100 points in conference play. That said I think the league from top to bottom is much stronger now. Unlike football, basketball additions from the east in Maryland and Rutgers have added strength. I think this may be the best BENCH that Iowa has had, ailthough the 86-87 team had some pretty damn good players coming in as well....

 

[BirdistheWord]

I was a freshman at Iowa during the 86-87 season, so got to see that master piece up close.

I do find it difficult to compare, but here would be my observations:

86-87:
Better Athletically
Better Rebounding
Better Creating Own Shot
Better Defensively

Current:
Better Shooting
Better Passing
More Efficient on Offense
Elite Low Post Player

I think the final verdict is very subjective. I believe the older team was more balanced offensively and defensively, while current is heavily weighted for offense. As far as entertainment value, older team was clearly more high flying, while current team is like a well oiled machine.

I guess we will have to wait and see how far we can go this year

 

[HerkysDad]

Hard to compete with the 69-70 team. Not as deep, but they could score points.

 

[twindman]

Yep, when you consider the 70 team's FOURTH high scorer got something like 17 ppg, that is a lot of firepower!! Current team fourth best is Nunge with 7.8!!!

 

[Herky T Hawk]

Those old teams were doing that in an era where the best players almost all went to college, and almost all of them stayed 3 or 4 years. Plus they didn’t all congregate at one of a handful of schools like today. So the talent was better and more spread out.

Imagine if every NBA player less than 4 years out of high school was playing for a college today and at one of the usual good schools. Duke, UNC, Kentucky, Kansas, MSU, and others would probably all be having good seasons instead of what they are currently experiencing. This same team of ours would be top 25, but not challenging for top 10. We have a few players with borderline (for today’s era) nba talent and our defense would get exposed regularly by teams with current nba talent on them.

 

[Bee93]

Love this year’s team’s shooters. But if you played a hypothetical game with ‘86-‘87, I think this year’s team struggles mightily. We all know that when we are overwhelmed athletically and more importantly physically, this team wilts. No answer for Marble or Gamble. And to think of having Ed Horton as a bench player. The stars were aligning for that team until...no, still too painful.

 

[Bee93]

Those old teams were doing that in an era where the best players almost all went to college, and almost all of them stayed 3 or 4 years. Plus they didn’t all congregate at one of a handful of schools like today. So the talent was better and more spread out.

Imagine if every NBA player less than 4 years out of high school was playing for a college today and at one of the usual good schools. Duke, UNC, Kentucky, Kansas, MSU, and others would probably all be having good seasons instead of what they are currently experiencing. This same team of ours would be top 25, but not challenging for top 10. We have a few players with borderline (for today’s era) nba talent and our defense would get exposed regularly by teams with current nba talent on them.

Agreed. That’s what made ‘86-‘87 so great. BJ, Roy, and Eddie were sophomores, so they would still have been in school. Lohaus needed his 5 years to hone his shot and coordination. Guys like Wright, Lorenzen, Moe, and Reaves weren’t gonna be pros. Gamble and Jones developed their NBA games in the CBA. All this and we were still on the cusp of FF against a college game of teams stacked with pro potential.