Your are probable more right then wrong, but it was also a roster mismatch as much as a coaching mismatch. Owen at 6-10 was not 100% trying to go against two 7 footers. He is not a dribbler and playing along the 3 point line is not his area of comfort. The small lineup Iowa put on the floor was doing all right playing a man to man defense until Fran decided to play Traore, Koch, and Pryce along with Thelwell and Freeman and insisted on playing a zone.
Freeman and Pryce were the only Iowa players that had been to Madison last year, Owen playing over 32 minutes and Pryce just over 6, the others on the floor at that time were all new players on Iowa's roster. Not a great recipe for success especially when Iowa was shooting free throws poorly.
Sorry, but playing a zone was a terrible decision by Fran against a team that had shooters and having Dix, Harding, and Payton on the bench at the same time was not going to go well for Iowa and it didn't. Iowa was more concerned with Winters and Crowl and rebounding, then Wisconsin's guards and the zone played right into Wisconsin's hands and once the flood gates opened from 3, Iowa had no answer to stop the 3 point onslaught.
The rest of the 1st half I'm not even sure Iowa's players knew what defense they were in, unfortunately for Iowa to win games against teams in the BIG, Freeman, Dix, Harding, and Thelwell have to be on the floor most of the game for Iowa to have any chance to win. Fran has to make a decision in the first half of the game whether Payton is on or not and if not, sit his ass on the bench, if he is not scoring he is a defensive liability. Dembele and Traore are much better defensive players and I'd rather see them with more minutes then Payton, but only if they can concentrate on being around the basket rebounding and making dunks or layups and not roaming around the 3 point line.
I like Koch, but he is a freshman and I saw at times he was trying to find out where he should be on defense, he's just not ready to play extended minutes, and Pryce is just not a player that can handle playing a man to man defense, he's just not quick enough. PICK YOUR POISION, Iowa has lots of flaws and Fran has not shown he is the coach to make the right decisions to put Iowa in the position to win games in the Big Ten.
Nebraska is next on Tuesday, it's not how Iowa's players cope with being whipped by Wisconsin, yesterday, it's how they can flush the lost and regroup to win a game against a very good Nebraska team on Tuesday. Fran can't play the game, we'll see if the players have any resolve to show whether they want to make the tournament or not. These next 4 games could be the most important games for this team.
Continuing to play to make the tournament or playing out the season. Tuesday is not that far away.....
