By Susan Harman

IOWA CITY, Iowa – Iowa women’s basketball coach Lisa Bluder explained her team’s big victory at Michigan by saying the team had played four good quarters. She was talking about consistency in performance through the whole game, something that hadn’t necessarily been Iowa’s hallmark.

After the next two games against Northwestern and Penn State Bluder doubled down and said the team had played 12 good quarters in a row.

What had been the difference in those three games?

Admittedly two of the three opponents are in the bottom half of the Big Ten, but Michigan (then 13-2) was ranked 14^th and playing at home before its biggest crowd of the season. Iowa was significantly better in terms of production:

*Shot .576 percent in those three games. Iowa averages 50 percent overall and .535 in Big Ten games;

*Shot .415 from 3-point range. Team averages .375 overall and .419 in Big Ten;

*Rebounding margin averaged +8.6. Team averages +5.7 overall and +7.7 in Big Ten;

*Turnovers were the same as the team average (14) in Big Ten play, while assists were up to 23.6 per game from an overall average of 20 and a Big Ten average of 22.

“We’ve been shooting the ball well,” Bluder said. “I think that makes a difference when you’re shooting the ball well from three. Before we were inconsistent, and now we have a lot of people who are stepping up and shooting threes, and we’re shooting at a good rate. That’s been the difference for us.

“And like it or not sometimes when your offense is flowing it just helps your defense. You have more energy. You don’t want that, but it’s a reality. I think we’ve been rebounding a little bit better as well.”

In the loss at Illinois the Hawkeyes were too dependent on Caitlin Clark and Monika Czinano. Those two took 69 percent of Iowa’s shots. Iowa also lost the rebounding margin by six. But that lopsided distribution of shots came back to haunt Iowa. What Bluder has seen since that game is a different model.

“Sharing the ball. Our assists have been really high,” she said. “We’ve gotten other people involved in scoring.”

Then Bluder spoke about some intangibles that coaches have to hope come along at the midpoint of a season.

“I just think it’s at a point where their confidence is growing, and they’re really comfortable playing with each other this time of year,” Bluder said. “We’re seeing that swag a little bit. So it can be a mental part of the game, and I think that’s where we are right now. We have a veteran team, but maybe now we’re just a little bit more comfortable with each other. They’re having fun out there right now.”

Another big factor is production from the bench. Iowa’s bench scored 34 against Northwestern and 42 against Penn State. Again, part of that is the increased minutes available in two blowouts. But players like Hannah Stuelke, Molly Davis and Sydney Affolter have established their value.

“I think (bench play) is a large part of it,” Bluder said in addressing the three-game streak. “Our people coming off the bench have outscored our opponents’ bench in the last several games (NW, PSU). It’s so important. It makes you so much harder to guard when you can go to your bench and they can score.”

Stuelke scored 11 against PSU despite foul trouble, and Affolter scored 12 in 14 minutes.

“It’s one thing to have depth,” Bluder said. “It’s another thing to have depth you can count on, and Syd is that person we can count on, and we know she’s going to come in a provide a spark off the bench.

“When we get into February that’s going to be huge because we have game after game after game. We have a really challenging schedule. In January we’re kind of having our weeks with not as many games.

Can Iowa take this era of good feeling on the road to Michigan State on Wednesday, a place in which it has lost 10 of its last 12 games?

“Obviously it’s been a tough place for us to play in the past,” Bluder said. “Right now they are 2-4 in conference, but it really is weird. They seem to play to the level of their competition, like beating Indiana and losing to Wisconsin and being in a tight game at Maryland.”

Iowa knows the ingredients to its recent success, and it just has to make sure they all get into the pie.