Men's Hoops Falls to No. 12 Iowa, 78-53

AMES, Iowa - Iowa and Reggie Evans proved to be just as formidable as Iowa State coach Larry Eustachy had feared.

Evans had 24 points and 17 rebounds and No. 12 Iowa overpowered Iowa State inside in beating the Cyclones 78-53 on Saturday.

Luke Recker and Glen Worley each scored 14 points for Iowa (7-3), which bounced back from an upset at Northern Iowa to hand the Cyclones a loss that matched their biggest ever at Hilton Coliseum, which opened in 1971.

"I told our players that we would catch Iowa as determined as they were to date," Eustachy said. "We hooked a tiger and we knew it. We had to play a perfect game to win it. We didn't and this is the result you get."

Iowa held Iowa State (5-4) to 34.7 percent shooting and had a 47-24 rebounding edge, mainly because the Cyclones had no one who could match up with the 6-foot-8, 245-pound Evans.

Iowa State got the lead down to five early in the second half, but Iowa countered with a 12-4 run and won going away to match the margin in Vanderbilt's 105-80 victory over Iowa State at Hilton in 1975.

"That's the way this team can guard. That's the way this team can punish someone," Iowa coach Steve Alford said. "We just punished a very good rebounding team and beat them by 23 on the boards in their building."

Tyray Pearson led Iowa State with 20 points but scored only six in the second half. Shane Power added 17 points for the Cyclones, who had only six assists and were 0-for-8 from 3-point range. Iowa was 9-for-15 on 3-pointers.

"This is what we wanted to do at Northern Iowa, but for some reason it didn't happen," Alford said.

Jake Sullivan, Iowa State's leading scorer, returned after missing three games with a sprained right knee but was ineffective. He wasn't as mobile as usual and scored only eight points on 2-for-8 shooting while playing 34 minutes.

Evans, on the other hand, was constantly in motion. He muscled his way inside to make 8-of-16 shots and sank 8-of-11 free throws. Every time a ball bounced off the rim, Evans seemed to get his hands on it.

"He's a tough player, but I thought we kind of broke down on defense a lot," Pearson said. "We let him get to spots where he could get the ball and we let him get offensive rebounds."

Iowa State stayed with the taller, deeper Hawkeyes early and trailed 18-17 after Marcus Jefferson scored with 10:39 left in the half. The Cyclones then went scoreless for more than four minutes and Iowa ran off eight straight points, Worley finishing the run with a 3-pointer to make it 26-17.

With that cushion, the Hawkeyes held off Iowa State the rest of the way. Rod Thompson's 3-pointer in the final minute of the first half gave Iowa a 40-28 lead and the Hawkeyes answered whenever Iowa State threatened in the second half.

"This will be something good for us," Recker said. "We shouldn't have lost that UNI game. Not taking any respect away from them, but we were the better team. They had more floor burns after the game than us and that's why they won. We played hard tonight."

Ricky Morgan fed Omar Bynum for layup to cap a 7-0 run that drew Iowa State to 42-37 with 15:09 left, but Iowa responded immediately.

Recker hit Evans for a layup in transition, Evans sank two free throws and Recker followed with a pair of foul shots, stretching the lead to 48-37.

Baskets by Sullivan and Pearson cut the lead to 48-41, but Iowa answered again, this time with consecutive 3-pointers by Worley and Ryan Hogan. Chauncey Leslie's 3 from the left wing started a 7-0 run that made it 61-43 with 6:58 remaining and Iowa went on to lead by as many as 27.

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Players Mentioned

Omar Bynum

Omar Bynum

Marcus Jefferson

Marcus Jefferson

Ricky Morgan

Tyray Pearson

Tyray Pearson

Shane Power

Shane Power

Jake Sullivan

Jake Sullivan

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