By Susan Harman

MINNEAPOLIS – Caitlin Clark didn’t score a basket until halfway through the second quarter and didn’t make a three until the fourth quarter. Yet Iowa beat Penn State 95-62 in a Big Ten Tournament quarterfinal Friday at the Target Center.

“Caitlin had an off night, and I’m just so glad that her teammates picked up the slack,” Iowa coach Lisa Bluder said. “It just gives us so much more confidence moving forward and makes it so much harder to guard when we play like we did tonight.”

OK, Clark did contribute 24 points, 10 rebounds and seven assists. So it’s not like the Gong came out and removed her from the building. But she was cold from the floor, making 5-of-19 shots overall and only 2-of 14 threes.

“Sometimes as a shooter you can feel it’s off, but I felt like my shots were right there,” Clark said. “I thought I probably could have got to the basket more, but honestly they were packing the paint really, really hard, and they were gapping really well.

“I thought we played really well. Shooting is just one part of the game, and I thought I did really good in this game with letting it go. Sometimes it’s hard to get up there and shoot the next one. And I was going to make one before the buzzer even if it took 20 of them.”

When Clark finally hit a three in the fourth quarter the pro-Iowa crowd erupted, and she broke into a quasi-embarrassed grin.

“So what our game plan was is going to be take Caitlin out of her rhythm and hope the role players stayed in check, and tonight they stepped up,” Penn State coach Carolyn Kieger said. “So kudos to them.”

The Hawkeyes, the rest of them, came to play and play they did.

Junior Sydney Affolter, getting her fourth start, was really good, scoring a career-best 18, grabbing nine rebounds and making five assists. Affolter made all five of her foul shots and was 3-for-4 behind the arc.

How about Gabbie Marshall? Marshall sank four 3-pointers in seven tries and finished with 15 points while providing her usual stellar defensive job on the perimeter. She has had four threes in three consecutive games.

“Confidence,” Marshall said when asked what spurred her recent spate of 3-point shooting. “That’s the biggest thing, being confident in myself and just playing free out there. I think when you miss some shots and kind of get into a little bit of a slump you can become tense, and I feel like that’s kind of what my problem was. And I just told myself, just play free. Have fun, enjoy every little moment on the court, whether it’s picking up my teammate or giving up an open shot for a teammate. I think that just kind of switched my mentality.”

Taylor McCabe played 15 minutes and scored 12 on four 3-pointers.

“I don’t think anyone doubts that the next ones are going in for (Clark), but I think it’s more of a ‘she trusts in us type of situation,’” McCabe said. “I think she knows that she doesn’t have to be perfect all the time. That’s why she has us. I thought we did a good job of pulling them out of the box-and-one and out of the zone and out of the press. That’s what matters.”

Kate Martin had 11 points and nine rebounds and as usual mixed it up down low.

Hannah Stuelke, who scored 47 in the previous matchup with the Nittany Lions, was held to eight because Penn State packed the lane and brought a double for every touch.

All this production flowed with Molly Davis on the bench with crutches.

“I was just really proud of the energy we came out with,” Bluder said. “There was so much good play out there tonight.”

Iowa outrebounded Penn State by 12.

Iowa (27-4) will play Michigan Saturday in the semifinal round. Iowa beat Michigan in the teams’ only meeting this season.  Penn State retires with a 19-12 record.

The Hawkeyes got out to a 10-0 lead and led 31-13 after one quarter. But the Hawks hit a dry spell, failing to score in eight of their next nine possessions. Clark hit a shot from the wing, her first field goal of the game and the team’s first of the second period with 4:46 left in the half.  The Lions scored five points, and the media timeout came with the lead only nine.

“I don’t think we scored for five minutes,” Clark said. “So I think it was ‘slow down’. We made a lot of threes and made some shots early in the first quarter. We just kind of continued to launch in the second quarter when we needed to move the ball, get some drives, cut to the basket. So that was kind of the message.”

Message received. Iowa scored on its next six possessions for a 13-2 run. Affolter had a rebound follow, and Clark hit four free throws. Marshall drained a three, Kylie Feuerbach drove for a basket and Stuelke hit two free throws. At halftime Iowa led 46-26 and it really got out of hand in the fourth quarter.

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Notes.  McCabe said she played three different positions as the Hawkeyes moved around to take up the minutes left when Davis was hurt against Ohio State.

“With Molly out it opens up a lot of weird spots and shifts people around a lot differently,” McCabe said. “I played the one, two and three today, which is very unusual. But I told them I was going to do whatever it takes to get out there. That’s kind of what it’s been from everybody.

“Everybody wants to be involved; everybody wants to be out there. I think that just makes all of us excited because we know that everyone wants to be out there, and everyone wants to contribute. When you have so many that are that driven, it builds a good culture.”