Remember we wanted to hire Steve Prohm?
It sounded like he wasn’t interested, but I would’ve taken him over Juwan. Glad I’m not in charge.
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30 point wins against power 5 opponents impress me. 34 points on 13-14 from the floor impresses me. Maybe that’s just me.
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Yeah, I’m not taking anything away from what Luka is doing statistically.
I’m just saying Iowa State is a crappy team that didn’t come close to covering against Arkansas Pine Bluff (lost by 43 at Northwestern) and lost to South Dakota State. They won’t be a Top 100 KenPom opponent when you look at KenPom in a couple of weeks (or tomorrow?).
Is Iowa going to be a legit Big Ten title contender? Maybe, but I’m not sure anything has happened yet this season that does anything to convince me they are different than the team we all thought they were.
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I’m excited for the Gonzaga Iowa game next week. I just feel like thus far they have passed the “can they improve” eye test. Garza is at another level from what he was last year as ridiculous as that sounds. Weiskamp and Fredrick are both making > 50% from three. Bohannon hasn’t been great but his presence alone I think is an upgrade from the point spot last year. And the defense, while bad, doesn’t seem like it’s “one of the worst in the country” bad.
I’m itching for a game against a team that people don’t think is bad at this point haha
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Thanks for alerting me to that. Count me among those who remain skeptical of Iowa.
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Hard to say they’ve improved defensively when the only decent offensive team they played is UNC, who can’t exploit Iowa’s weakness. Iowa defense is basically letting people shoot of a bunch of wide open jump shots and UNC can’t shoot. UNC is 213th in eFG%, 222nd in 3P%, 190th in 2P%, and 241st in FT%.
Iowa has not looked improved defensively from anything I’ve seen.
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Iowa’s offense has been as advertised. Possibly even better. I do think it’s too early to draw conclusions on their D. I came away from their last 2 games thinking that UNC was not that good and Iowa State looked like they had never seen a zone before.
I get why people poke fun at Iowa and the chic thing is to criticize their D. Their team is a fair bit different this year (pending health) Bohannon/McCaffrey/Nunge will contribute better minutes (2 of them based off experience), Keegan Murray has been solid as a frosh. Those guys replace Pemsl/Evelyn/Kreiner and fewer minutes for Weiskamp and Fredrick will help. People talk about Garza but Iowa has never had a returning player of the year type guy and that’s big.
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The last time Iowa had a player of the year type player on their roster they were a fringe top 25 team.
Who is that guy?? Nobody was talking last year about Garza being a POY type guy going into the year coming off 13ppg and 4 rebs a game.
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weren’t aaron white and jared uthoff both like 2nd place for B10 POY or something?
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POY and B10 POY are not equivalent most of years. This IOWA team is legit, most teams simply cannot slow down Garza.
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This will likely be the best Iowa team we ever see during the Fran era. We probably need to throw out some of the previous (and totally warranted) shade we throw at them. They’re still Iowa, and are going to win by trying to outscore you…but I think this year they’re going to be particularly good at outscoring you.
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Or a skinny Cherokee Parks.
It was Garza last year when he finished 2nd in NPOY and Iowa was only a fringe top 25 team.
You never understood my post I will leave it at that.
I understood it completely. The only thing having a returning NPOY candidate does is help establish a teams floor, not it’s ceiling.
There is really no difference between having a NPOY type guy and then having him return.
Luka’s averaging 30.4 & 9.2 in 26 minutes a game at 68% from the floor and 69% from three (!!!) at over 3 attempts per game.
Last year he was at 24 & 9 on 54/35 splits in 32 minutes per game. Those numbers will come back to earth in conference play I am sure but he is clearly at a different level than he was last season, which is ridiculous!
The same people who said Iowa couldn’t get better from last year were the ones projecting Franz Wagner to improve sensationally. Again, it’s 5 games in, so maybe Garza returns to just “incredible” instead of “nuclear” and maybe Weiskamp/Fredrick stop shooting 50% from three and end up exactly in last year’s form. Maybe every team Iowa beats this year is really bad. Maybe Franz is a first round pick and an all big ten player even if he continues shooting 30% from three and remains fourth on the team in scoring, or maybe starting Sunday he becomes the superstar we thought he could be.
Orrrrrrrr maybe Iowa got marginally better and that makes them a legit Big Ten title threat. I’m down to wait and see 
Who has said Iowa can’t get better? Don’t think I’ve read that in here. There is a big difference between improving from a fringe top 25 team to a top 10-15, and a top 5 team.
I certainly expected some marginal improvent from last year, but marginal improvent isn’t enough to make them a top 5 team, big ten favorite, and legitimate national title contender like so many were predicting preseason.
And Garza has played one game against a team with a top 150 defense, there’s almost nothing he could do in games like that to show he’s made any big jumps.