SETON HALL 91, IOWA 83: COOK’S IN THE KITCHEN

Give credit to Seton Hall. It won 25 games last year and the Big East tournament. We knew they had a talented corps of players coming in this year, and they would be a match for this young Hawkeye team.

Iowa was able to keep pace for about ³⁄₄ of the game, but mistakes that you see a young team make — like turnovers, poor free-throw shooting and atrocious defense — reared themselves in front of a less-than-stellar crowd at Carver.

Peter Jok had a career-high 30 points and his first career double-double, but somehow his game was overshadowed by the freshman Tyler Cook, who notched 24 points and did things like this:

Cook could have had an even louder night when you consider he was 5-12 from the charity stripe.

Overall, Iowa was just 19-32 for its free-throws, and it could have been even uglier! Seton Hall was just as bad from the line, going 17-31.

Seventeen turnovers certainly didn’t help either. Iowa’s lackadaisical attitude with the ball showed itself early in the second half, where the Hawkeyes coughed it up on three straight possessions. We don’t like to point out player deficiencies, but Jordan Bohannon has got to be smarter with the ball. There was a time where it felt like he was in the game just to get him experience, which I get, but it’s still frustrating to watch as a fan.

The defense as a whole left a lot to be desired; there were times where the Pirates were able to exploit serious mismatches on the interior and perimeter. Fifty of Seton Hall’s points came inside the paint, as Khadeen Carrington was damn near impossible to stop when he drove to the hoop. There were enough times when Seton Hall was able to kick it out to freshman Myles Powell, who finished the night shooting 5-7 from three and with 26 overall.

I’m still optimistic, though. A lot of the mistakes Iowa made are easily fixed. The Hawkeyes certainly have the talent to play with competition on the same level as Seton Hall, it’s just learning how to be smarter with the ball ... and free throws. Seriously, it seems like every year Iowa has trouble there.

Other notes:

-People were worried about Dom Uhl’s lackluster performance in Iowa’s first two games, but he looked pretty good tonight. He had a nice 17-footer to start off contest, and finished with 8 points on 2-5 shooting with 10 boards. He only played 25 minutes due to some foul trouble. I expect Uhl to be fine all year.

-Nicholas Baer ... yeah, he’s still good. He had 6 points and 6 boards, but it felt like he made his presence known on defense. The stats say he had one block, but I thought he had at least three? Whatever, I look forward to him becoming a catalyst this year.

-Christian Williams is clearly the man at point guard right now, but that isn’t stopping Fran from trotting out Bohannon every now and then ... for now.

-I was really expecting to see more out of Cordell Pemsl. He played just 6 minutes, and recorded 2 fouls during that time. He was also able to grab 5 boards, so his absence was a little puzzling.

Iowa’s next game is against Texas-Rio Grande Valley on Sunday, and that school doesn’t sound made up at all. Good thing it’s on BTN+