From the Gazette, following the loss to Nebraska:
Finishing games is a tough proposition no matter how much experience a team has. Finishing games on the road is an even tougher one.
The Iowa men’s basketball team found that out on Thursday night at Pinnacle Bank Arena against Nebraska in a 93-90 loss in double overtime. Just days after the Hawkeyes (9-7, 1-2 Big Ten) were able to finish one in overtime against Michigan, Iowa saw multiple chances at closing out a victory slip through their fingers.
* There was the final play at the end of regulation, where Peter Jok went up for a shot on the baseline and it resulted in a turnover.
* There was the stretch at the end of the first overtime, where the Hawkeyes had the ball up four with less than a minute to go and took an empty possession.
* Then there was the Iowa possession with 18 seconds to go, down one, in the second overtime, where Isaiah Moss drove the lane and turned the ball over.
No one play decided the game, but the series of events that led to Thursday’s loss left Iowa’s players frustrated, to say the least.
Finishing is tough in the Big Ten, but the Hawkeyes expected more from themselves.
“We’ve got to finish. Even in the first half, there were things we have to clean up. … We can’t do that and expect to win,” Cook said. “We should have won. It hurts. We had a lot of opportunities to close it out and we didn’t.
“You’ve got to learn from it, grow and get better tomorrow.”
Cook wasn’t the only one to lament Iowa’s inability to finish. Jok said the same, once again taking a lion’s share of the blame for a few turnovers he had late in the game.
McCaffery acknowledged there were multiple things his team would have liked to have done differently, but didn’t go into specifics on many. He did talk a bit about Moss’ drive in the second overtime that ended up a turnover, though. Moss said after the game he wanted that possession back, adding, “We’ve got to be smarter with the ball. I was just being aggressive. If I could take it back I would — I should’ve just held the ball.”
From McCaffery’s perspective, he said it’s hard to be too hard on Moss for that play because it’s what the staff has asked Moss to do. Moss had 15 points in the first half playing that aggressive style, after all.
“That’s a tough situation for that kid,” McCaffery said. “We’ve been trying to get him to be aggressive and if he’s not aggressive in the first half, we're probably down 15 to 17 points. He bails us out in the first half so you got to be careful in how much you go after the kid on the play. It wasn’t the play we wanted; he knows that now.”
“There’s a lot of things to talk about and you don’t want to accentuate one thing. You have to talk about all the things that were good and all the things that were not so good and try to get better,” McCaffery said. “The message is ‘to always stay positive’. You win an overtime game on Sunday, you’re sort of ecstatic. It doesn’t mean you played a perfect game. You lose in overtime, it doesn’t mean that everything is a disaster. You have to respect your opponent in both situations and recognize ‘OK, if there’s some things we could do over we’d do it differently. Make sure when we are in that situation again, we do it better, execute it a bit better at both ends.’ I think that’s the message.”
Finishing games is tough. That’s the lesson, Jok and Cook said.
“We had chances to end the game, but we didn’t execute down the stretch and gave them chances to come back and win it,” Jok said. “It comes down to executing. When he calls plays, we have to execute. Down the stretch, I don’t think we did that. Part of it is guys being young and not being in this position before, but we’re going to learn from it.
“It’s the Big Ten, man. It’s a grind. We have to move on. … We had a lot of chances to win it, but at the end of the day (Nebraska) came down and won. It’s going to hurt for us, but we’ve got to get back in film and get ready for Sunday.”
The whole story: http://www.thegazette.com/subject/s...t-nebraska-live-updates-how-to-watch-20170105
Finishing games is a tough proposition no matter how much experience a team has. Finishing games on the road is an even tougher one.
The Iowa men’s basketball team found that out on Thursday night at Pinnacle Bank Arena against Nebraska in a 93-90 loss in double overtime. Just days after the Hawkeyes (9-7, 1-2 Big Ten) were able to finish one in overtime against Michigan, Iowa saw multiple chances at closing out a victory slip through their fingers.
* There was the final play at the end of regulation, where Peter Jok went up for a shot on the baseline and it resulted in a turnover.
* There was the stretch at the end of the first overtime, where the Hawkeyes had the ball up four with less than a minute to go and took an empty possession.
* Then there was the Iowa possession with 18 seconds to go, down one, in the second overtime, where Isaiah Moss drove the lane and turned the ball over.
No one play decided the game, but the series of events that led to Thursday’s loss left Iowa’s players frustrated, to say the least.
Finishing is tough in the Big Ten, but the Hawkeyes expected more from themselves.
“We’ve got to finish. Even in the first half, there were things we have to clean up. … We can’t do that and expect to win,” Cook said. “We should have won. It hurts. We had a lot of opportunities to close it out and we didn’t.
“You’ve got to learn from it, grow and get better tomorrow.”
Cook wasn’t the only one to lament Iowa’s inability to finish. Jok said the same, once again taking a lion’s share of the blame for a few turnovers he had late in the game.
McCaffery acknowledged there were multiple things his team would have liked to have done differently, but didn’t go into specifics on many. He did talk a bit about Moss’ drive in the second overtime that ended up a turnover, though. Moss said after the game he wanted that possession back, adding, “We’ve got to be smarter with the ball. I was just being aggressive. If I could take it back I would — I should’ve just held the ball.”
From McCaffery’s perspective, he said it’s hard to be too hard on Moss for that play because it’s what the staff has asked Moss to do. Moss had 15 points in the first half playing that aggressive style, after all.
“That’s a tough situation for that kid,” McCaffery said. “We’ve been trying to get him to be aggressive and if he’s not aggressive in the first half, we're probably down 15 to 17 points. He bails us out in the first half so you got to be careful in how much you go after the kid on the play. It wasn’t the play we wanted; he knows that now.”
“There’s a lot of things to talk about and you don’t want to accentuate one thing. You have to talk about all the things that were good and all the things that were not so good and try to get better,” McCaffery said. “The message is ‘to always stay positive’. You win an overtime game on Sunday, you’re sort of ecstatic. It doesn’t mean you played a perfect game. You lose in overtime, it doesn’t mean that everything is a disaster. You have to respect your opponent in both situations and recognize ‘OK, if there’s some things we could do over we’d do it differently. Make sure when we are in that situation again, we do it better, execute it a bit better at both ends.’ I think that’s the message.”
Finishing games is tough. That’s the lesson, Jok and Cook said.
“We had chances to end the game, but we didn’t execute down the stretch and gave them chances to come back and win it,” Jok said. “It comes down to executing. When he calls plays, we have to execute. Down the stretch, I don’t think we did that. Part of it is guys being young and not being in this position before, but we’re going to learn from it.
“It’s the Big Ten, man. It’s a grind. We have to move on. … We had a lot of chances to win it, but at the end of the day (Nebraska) came down and won. It’s going to hurt for us, but we’ve got to get back in film and get ready for Sunday.”
The whole story: http://www.thegazette.com/subject/s...t-nebraska-live-updates-how-to-watch-20170105
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