By Hawk Fanatic

Enjoy and savor this Hawkeye fans because it hasn’t happened very often for far too long as you know.

For just the sixth time since 2000, the Iowa men’s basketball team has won an NCAA Tournament first-round game, defeating Clemson 67-61 on Friday in Tampa, Florida.

Iowa improved to 22-12 under first-year head coach Ben McCollum and is now just one win from advancing to the Sweet 16 for the first time since the 1998-99 season.

However, standing in the way on Sunday will be No. 1 seed Florida, which crushed No. 16 seed Prairie View A&M 114-55 on Friday. It was the second biggest victory margin in NCAA Tournament history.

Sunday’s game in the Round of 32 will tipoff at approximately 6:10 pm CST.

But worry about that later.

Iowa just won an NCAA Tournament game for the first time since 2021 and that is something worth celebrating while you can.

“Proud of our guys,” Ben McCollum said. “Sometimes it’s not always pretty. Sometimes we don’t always work with a high level of intelligence. But no one will question our fight. That’s what we recruited. And I don’t mean they’re dumb players. They’re not dumb players; they’re smart players. But sometimes we do things that are just, like, out of this world.

“What we never forget to do is fight, though. That’s probably more what the compliment is meant to be. Certainly loved coaching them tonight. I’m going to love coaching them again on Sunday. It’s still win or go home, and we’re excited about the chance.

Friday’s game between No. 8 seed Clemson and nine-seed Iowa looked to be close on paper, but then Iowa came out hot from three, making four of its first six shots from behind the arc, and bolting to leads of 18-6 and 22-10.

Clemson (24-11) only made four of its first 19 shots from the field, with many of the misses coming from close range.

The Tigers finally started hitting some shots late in the first half, making three of their last four threes in the half and trimming the deficit to 32-25 at halftime.

But Iowa would go on to protect the lead throughout the second half, though Clemson made multiple runs, cutting the deficit below five points several times.

Senior point guard Bennett Stirtz led three Iowa players in double figures with 16 points, but it was junior guard Kael Combs who set the tone early as he scored 11 of his 15 points in the first half.

Combs also made a basket to give Iowa a 63-57 lead with 56.5 seconds remaining, and that lead would hold up, helped by junior forward Alvaro Folgueiras making two free throws in the final seconds, expanding the lead to, 65-57.

Folgueiras finished with 14 points.

“I just try to do whatever the teams needs me to do to win, Combs said. “And if that’s going to get 50/50 balls and playing defense, running the offense, getting people open, that’s what I’m going to do.”

Iowa had a 40-27 rebounding advantage, including 15-10 in offense rebounds, taking advantage of Clemson being without starting center Carter Welling, who suffered a torn ACL in the Atlantic Coast Conference Tournament.

Iowa als0 made 24-of-31 free-throw attempts, while Clemson was just 8-of-12 from the free-throw line.

The 6-foot-4 Combs came out on fire offensively, making all four of his shots from the field in the first half, including two threes.

Stirtz scored eight points in the first half, but was just of 2-of-7 from the field.

Clemson only made 9-of-26 shots from the field in the first half, including 3-of-10 from three.

McCollum joins Tom Davis as the only Iowa head coaches to win at least one NCAA Tournament game in their first season as head coach.

They’re also the only Iowa coaches to make the NCAA Tournament in their first season.

Davis led Iowa to the Elite Eight in 1986-87, winning three games along the way.

Stirtz has now led two different teams to a win in the NCAA Tournament as he led Drake to a win last season with McCollum as his head coach.

Stirtz also played his first two seasons under McCollum at Division II Northwest Missouri State.

“It’s super special,” Stirtz said on the TNT post-game interview. “I mean it’s why you play in the tournament, especially coming from d two. You don’t get to say that a lot. Just taking it all in.”