Fran McCaffery credits the mental toughness of Iowa

Assembly Hall isn’t a gym you can just walk into and win with ease. With that said, Iowa made it look pretty simple in their 90-68 victory over No. 15 Indiana, which gave them a season sweep over the Hoosiers.

After the game, Fran McCaffery credited his team for doing everything they needed to do to win in Bloomington. He knows how hard it is to go on the road in the Big Ten and win but, based on the numbers, the Hawkeyes gave themselves a great chance as they ended up running away with it.

“I look at it like this. I’ve been coming down here a long time…We haven’t won too many times in here. But I look at it like if you sign up to play in this league? You want to play in this type of environment,” McCaffery said. “That’s what you’ve agreed to, that’s what you sign up for. And you have to want to compete against a really good team who’s playing well.”

“The fact that we outrebounded them says a lot about how we competed tonight,” pointed out McCaffery. “We only turned it over 10 times. And you go on the road and you make 13 threes? That’s hard to do and we had a bunch of different guys making them.”

Iowa put on an offensive clinic as they shot 55.6% from the field and 56.5% from three. They made five more field goals overall than the Hoosiers, including 11 more makes from three with 13 total. Mix in a rebounding edge of 12, an assist margin of eight, and only 10 turnovers and, comparatively, it’s not hard to see how McCaffrey’s team took this 22-point blowout back to Iowa City.

Indiana cut it to a four-point deficit with 10 minutes to go in the first half but, from there, it was all Hawkeyes as they averaged 45 points between the two halves.

Iowa’s offense has been one of the best in the nation and they proved it again at IU. The most important thing, though, as it gave them their second straight win as they will now return to Carver-Hawkeye Arena to end their regular season against Nebraska this weekend.