Winning in Chapel Hill usually means you're at least decent and this year is no different. The Hawks are probably a tourney team.
Iowa vs. ISU predictions
- Thread starter kyle22kjs
- Start date
Winning in Chapel Hill usually means you're at least decent and this year is no different. The Hawks are probably a tourney team.
I'm expecting a 74-69 game to the Clones-no doubt you have a more talented team. Hope its a good game.
They would be a 4-7 seed right now, but they haven't battled against their coach for an entire season yet. Could very well end up a bubble team again after facing that long and draining test.
I tried to put together a good post, but I honestly have only watched about 10 minutes of Iowa basketball this year, and that 10 minutes was an atrocious 10 in the second half against UNC. From the limited viewing, here is what I feel like I saw:
- Our guards (Monte, Naz, Thomas) are better than theirs (Gessel, Clemmons, Dickerson, Ogelsby)
- BDJ is awesome, and has been incredibly so lately. Uthoff is pretty damn good too, and will be the best player BDJ will have had to guard this year
- Their bigs (White, Olesani, SHHHH!) are awful offensive players, but they are very tall and play pretty big (Woodbury looks like a T-Rex out there, but he's still 7'1"). Hogue, Niang, Nader, Edozie are going to struggle on the glass
Ball movent and transition will be key.
- Our guards (Monte, Naz, Thomas) are better than theirs (Gessel, Clemmons, Dickerson, Ogelsby)
- BDJ is awesome, and has been incredibly so lately. Uthoff is pretty damn good too, and will be the best player BDJ will have had to guard this year
- Their bigs (White, Olesani, SHHHH!) are awful offensive players, but they are very tall and play pretty big (Woodbury looks like a T-Rex out there, but he's still 7'1"). Hogue, Niang, Nader, Edozie are going to struggle on the glass
Ball movent and transition will be key.
This. I'm going to say Cyclones 83 Iowa 78, but I'm really not too confident about that. Iowa's slow down and zone defense could be a nightmare for ISU.
I don't think I've ever predicted a Cyclone loss. In other news, my football prediction record is really, really, really bad.
Anybody have a guess on match ups? Here's mine:
Monte <> Clemmons /Dickerson
Naz / Thomas <> Gessel / Ogs
BDJ <> White
DH / Edozie <> Olesani
Niang <> Woody
I guess my big question is will Fred have BDJ guard White?
Monte <> Clemmons /Dickerson
Naz / Thomas <> Gessel / Ogs
BDJ <> White
DH / Edozie <> Olesani
Niang <> Woody
I guess my big question is will Fred have BDJ guard White?
Gessel is kind of the wild card. Iowa's other guards have been consistently a non-factor. Gessel has had some horrible games and some very very good games. He looked like the best player on the court @UNC much of the game yet in other games this year he looked like a marginal D1 player.
If the UNC game Gessel shows up (and why wouldn't he for their superbowl) we're in for a real dog fight on the road. If they don't get anything from their backcourt like the did in some early games we could have a pretty great day in the guard matchups even on the road.
I just expect their bigs to shoot a ton of FTs at home regardless of how we defend them. Even without McKay, Edozie and Nader give us a couple big strong bodies to throw in there which makes me feel better. I'm excited to see what Edozie can do, they have a significant height advantage but Edozie is the strongest and toughest big man in this matchup.
They've won @UNC, and their two losses are to Texas (neutral) and Syracuse (neutral but in NYC).
Their resume doesn't look any worse and maybe even slightly better than ours. We're ranked higher, in large part because we started way higher.
Despite the fact Iowa isn't a very good overall basketball team, their defense is solid. Their length will give us issues for most of the game. However, we're quite a bit more talented and pull away in the last 10 minutes. Probably win by 8-12 points due to additional free throws at the end of the game.
Syracuse is looking like a bad loss right now. Lost at home to St Johns and on a neutral court to Cal (jury is out on both of those teams), plus lost to Michigan which isn't impressing people early on
I fully expect fran to try to mimic what Maryland did against us. Edozie better be prepared to give us 10-15 minutes since I see Niang being attacked early and often defensively. I really like Monte keeping Gessell in check though.
White scares me a bit. His last two games against us, he has gone for 25pts 17 rebs and 18pts 7 rebs. Even though Hogue had a good game on the glass last year getting 16 boards, we were still outrebounded 49 to 35. We can't lose the rebound margin by that this year and expect to win. I'm betting there is alot of basket trading in the first half with Iowa holding a 5 pt advantage at half.
The second half, things change. After a BDJ alley-oop to open the 2nd half, Niang, Thomas, Long and BDJ all catch fire from outside. Fran tries to go small to try to match up outside and things just get worse for him. We win 86-74.
Moments later, watching the game by himself in some remote bar, Zach McCabe throws a guy next to him off his barstool and tells him to suck a fat one.
White scares me a bit. His last two games against us, he has gone for 25pts 17 rebs and 18pts 7 rebs. Even though Hogue had a good game on the glass last year getting 16 boards, we were still outrebounded 49 to 35. We can't lose the rebound margin by that this year and expect to win. I'm betting there is alot of basket trading in the first half with Iowa holding a 5 pt advantage at half.
The second half, things change. After a BDJ alley-oop to open the 2nd half, Niang, Thomas, Long and BDJ all catch fire from outside. Fran tries to go small to try to match up outside and things just get worse for him. We win 86-74.
Moments later, watching the game by himself in some remote bar, Zach McCabe throws a guy next to him off his barstool and tells him to suck a fat one.
The way I see this game is playing out pretty similarly to last years. Both of these teams aren't terribly different from then, minus the star power of last years game. If the game plays out that way I'd be inclined to take Iowa on their home court after seeing them play pretty solidly in Hilton last year. I really don't know how this will play out and i'll take Isu 89-80.
