In their biggest win of the season, Indiana’s NCAA Tournament resume got a necessary addition when the Hoosiers climbed out of a second-half hole to beat Iowa 85-78 in Bloomington on Thursday night.
It was a balanced attack for IU (20-5, 10-2) as five players scored in double-figures, allowing them to withstand a surge from the Hawkeyes’ (19-5, 10-2) Jarrod Uthoff, who exploded for 24 points on the night. Iowa erased a 16-point deficit, taking the lead as things wound down late, but a closing surge from Yogi Ferrell and company was enough to save the day.
Indiana now owns nine wins over the RPI top 100, including three against the top 25–though they still do have losses against Wake Forest (132), UNLV (122), Penn State (131). With questions swirling around the program as to whether they’d actually turned a corner in Big 10 play or had simply been beating up on the conference’s bottom feeders, Thursday’s win was a statement that the Hoosiers are officially improved from earlier in the season, where at times it seemed like they couldn’t even guard their own shadow.
Recent weeks hadn’t suggested that IU was on the outside looking in to the Big Dance, but there’s no doubt that Indiana’s NCAA Tournament resume needed a crowning achievement, and beating Iowa could just be that.
Tom Crean’s group still has to travel to Michigan State and Iowa, along with facing Purdue and Maryland at home, so the chances to add more to the resume are still there. However, with that, there’s also a chance to lose momentum and a handful of opportunities.
