Top-five showdown awaits surging Iowa women’s basketball team at No. 2 Indiana
By Susan Harman
IOWA CITY, Iowa – The Iowa women’s basketball team could really help itself with a victory Thursday night at No. 2 Indiana. Both teams have just one conference loss, but IU (12-1) is a half-game ahead in the standings because it has played and won one more game.
Fifth-ranked Iowa still has to visit No. 8 Maryland, a place where it hasn’t won for 30 years. Iowa (19-4, 11-1) has never beaten Maryland in College Park while the Terps were members of the Big Ten. Iowa has a road game remaining with a streaky Nebraska team and plays host to the Hoosiers to finish the regular season.
Indiana (22-1) still must visit Ohio State, but the Buckeyes (20-4, 9-4) have inexplicably fallen off a cliff ever since Iowa beat them in Columbus. IU also plays host to Michigan, a team it defeated by nine in Ann Arbor, and rival Purdue, who it throttled by 23 points Sunday at Purdue.
So, it’s likely that the rest of the conference will not provide any help to Iowa. If the Hoosiers win Thursday, Iowa probably has no room for error on its road to repeating as Big Ten champion.
Iowa did beat Indiana three times last year, all within the span of 15 days, but the Hoosiers have a few new parts.
“They’ve done a really, really good job replenishing themselves,” Iowa coach Lisa Bluder said. “Sydney Parrish transferring from Oregon is a big get for them. She was a Miss Indiana Basketball and is a tremendous 3-point shooter and a tremendous player all around.
“And then they have a freshman from Israel who is on the Israel national team, Yarden Garzon, and she is a very, very good basketball player and plays much more mature than her (freshman status) just because she’s played in international basketball.”
Parrish, a 6-foot-2 junior, averages 13 points, six rebounds and shoots 37 percent behind the arc. The 6-3 Garzon shoots 49 percent from 3-point range (3rd in the nation) and averages 12 points and five rebounds.

“They are just a better 3-point shooting team than they were,” Bluder said. “That was their Achilles’ heel. They just didn’t have a consistent 3-point shot. That makes a difference in how you have to guard them. Because we all know Mackenzie Holmes is a great player.”
Indiana has all-Big Ten returners in the 6-3 Holmes (22 ppg, 8 rpg) and 6-0 Grace Berger (11 ppg, 4 rpg, 6 assists). They are joined by 5-11 sophomore Chloe Moore-McNeil, who Bluder said has made a big jump since her freshman season.
The marquee matchup is in the post with Holmes battling Iowa’s Monika Czinano.
“The addition of 3-point shooters has helped (Holmes),” Bluder said. “I think she’s always been a really good post player. She’s very accurate; she’s shooting 69 percent.”
Holmes is agile, runs the floor, has all the post moves and can move away from the basket and shoot jumpers. With the floor spread with perimeter shooters, Czinano and Hannah Stuelke will have to handle Holmes.
“Mon will have a big game. I love that matchup between Mon and Makenzie Holmes,” Iowa’s Kate Martin said. “If we can double any time, we will. But also putting ball pressure on the guards so they can’t get the ball inside as easily.”
Czinano had the best of the matchup last year scoring 83 points to Holmes’ 35 in the three games.
IU has four players who score in double figures and two more who average nine points. Bluder anticipates IU will play man-to-man and double the post. She thinks it’s likely that Moore-McNeil will be guarding Iowa All-American Caitlin Clark.
“They are a very talented defensive team,” Bluder said. “They’re excellent at help (defense). It’s not like they do anything crazy; it’s just that they’re really good and they’re long.”
Bluder said the teams match up well and have similar personnel, but that Indiana’s guards are taller and make targeted passing more difficult.
Handling a full, hostile arena with a loud crowd will be as big a key as X’s and O’s.
“We love it,” Martin said. “We feed off of that, definitely.”
“I think they like it; I really do,” Bluder said of her players. “I think they enjoy it. I think they are used to playing in a loud environment here at Carver. A hostile environment, where people are yelling stuff, sometimes I think it brings out the best in (Clark).”
Tipoff is at 5:30 p.m. and it will be shown on the Big Ten Network.