Bohannon, Cook lead Iowa past Minnesota 94-80
Published 7:43 am Wednesday, January 31, 2018
IOWA CITY, Iowa — Don’t look now, but the Hawkeyes are inching toward respectability in the Big Ten — at least at home.
Jordan Bohannon led six Iowa players in double figures with 20 points and the Hawkeyes rolled past Minnesota 94-80 on Tuesday night, its second straight win in Iowa City by double digits.
Tyler Cook scored 17 points with 10 rebounds and Isaiah Moss had an encouraging 16 points on four 3s for the Hawkeyes (12-12, 3-8 Big Ten), who’ve split their last six league games after starting 0-5 in the conference.
“It’s great to see Isaiah Moss be aggressive. We’re a different team when he’s playing that way,” said Iowa coach Fran McCaffery, who picked up his 400th career win.
Iowa opened the game on an 11-1 run before it resorted to its typical shoddy defense, allowing Minnesota (14-10, 3-8) to jump back out front late in the first half. But Iowa rallied with a 13-4 run to open up a 50-37 lead.
The Gophers tried to keep pace, but the Hawkeyes caught fire from beyond 3-point range — at one point hitting five out of six in the second half to go up 70-58.
“We were and have been connected on offense…we were better defensively, but we need to be even better than we were (Tuesday),” McCaffery said.
Jordan Murphy had 21 points and 17 rebounds and Davonte Fitzgerald scored 16 for Minnesota. But Nate Mason was a ghastly 2 of 13 from the field, and Gophers sophomore guard Amir Coffey (14 points per game) sat out after tweaking his injured right shoulder in a loss to Northwestern last week.
“It’s hard when you’re best player is 2 of 13, and obviously we just were down. But I’m proud of my guys. They’re fighting,” Minnesota coach Richard Pitino said. “I’m happy with my guys’ effort. I really am.”