Iowa lost to the Fighting Illini in Illinois' Assembly Hall last week. Iowa lost to the Hoosiers in Indiana's Assembly Hall Tuesday night.
It's mid-January, and the Hawkeyes still haven't won a true road game all season. That's not good.
That first-half of the Hawkeyes-Hoosiers game was brutal, ending with Iowa behind, 29-17. The teams picked up the pace after halftime. Well, Indiana did. Iowa followed later. Much later, as it turned out. The Hoosiers won, 71-64.
Brent Musburger was screaming and laughing the whole game. Unlike many viewers, I like Musburger. But he was weird this night. Weird and giddy. Really giddy. Didn't he realize he was in Bloomington, Ind.? But I kid Bloomington.
If you needed your palate cleansed from the Iowa game, the Texas-Oklahoma State game on ESPN2 was the ticket. It was the first time I've seen Texas 6-foot-9 freshman forward Kevin Durant. It won't be the last. This kid is sensational. Durant came into the game averaging 33 points over his previous three games and 23.7 over the season. He bumped that average upward with 37 points in the Longhorns' 105-103 loss to the Cowboys in triple-overtime. He may already be the best freshman in Big 12 history.
The Big Ten could use a super freshman like Durant. Wait, it has one. His name is Greg Oden (www.gregoden.com, www.gregodenonline.com), and he plays for Ohio State. Which hosts Iowa Saturday night. If Indiana big man D.J. White could do to Iowa what he did Tuesday (10-of-13 from the field, 23 points, 12 rebounds), what 7-foot Oden do on Saturday?
The horror. The horror.