Sixth-ranked Michigan State closed the first half on a 16-2 run and the Spartans buried the Iowa Hawkeyes 95-61 in Big Ten play in East Lansing. It was Michigan State’s 15th straight win and they improve to 4-0 in the league race.
The Hawkeyes committed 21 turnovers in falling to 2-3 in the Big Ten. Iowa coach Fran McCaffery says there were too many breakdowns in too many areas. “Our trapping ball screens was ineffective, our rotations were very poor, that we’ve got to get corrected. I thought we had some individuals who fought hard, but collectively we didn’t fight the way I would’ve liked,” McCaffery said.
The Hawkeyes won’t have long to lick their wounds. They host 13th ranked Michigan on Saturday. McCaffery says he’d like to see the team rebound better than they did after the loss to Ohio State, as he says his team didn’t defend Michigan State as hard as they were defended.
Freshman Aaron White came of the bench to score 15 points for the Hawkeyes who dropped their second straight lopsided game to a rated foe. “Obviously we are disappointed, but we are going to stay together, we’ve got Michigan coming up and in this league you can’t dwell on losses,” White said.
White says the Spartans came out and took it to the Hawks with their physical play. “That’s something we have to learn from them, if they’re doing that to us, we can do the same thing to to them.