Iowa's Devyn Marble drives towards the hoop against Boise State.
By Ben Schuff
benjamin-schuff@uiowa.edu
Aaron White walked down the floor with a smile on his face during the closing seconds of Iowa’s 81-72 victory over Boise State on Thursday. The 6-8 forward looked over towards the Iowa bench with 12 seconds remaining and clapped his hands until his teammates followed suit.
It was the end to the Hawkeyes’ hardest fought victory of the year, and White knew it.
“I try to keep my teammates smiling,” he said. “I’m goofy off the court. I was just trying to get a smile out of them. This was a good win for us.”
While White gave his teammates and the 13,122 in attendance plenty to smile about inside Carver-Hawkeye Arena, very little was goofy in a game that saw 14 lead changes and 11 ties.
Iowa (8-5) needed superb performances from White, Devyn Marble, Melsahn Basabe and Matt Gatens to beat a Boise State (9-4) team playing without leading scorer Anthony Drmic. The four Hawkeyes scored 66 of Iowa’s 81 points in the team’s third win in six days.
Click here to view an exclusive photo slideshow.
The deciding moment occurred at about the five-minute mark of the second half. With Iowa leading 63-57, Boise State’s Tre’ Nichols drove the lane for a lay-up but had his attempt blocked by Basabe. Marble grabbed the ball off the backboard, dribbled down the floor and found a streaking Gatens for a lay-up of his own between two Bronco defenders.
“After the block, I would say that we had it,” said Basabe, who finished with 14 points, 11 rebounds, and a season-high 4 blocks. “I saw in the second half … with maybe 10 minutes left, it looked like they wouldn’t have enough to outlast us if we outlasted them. I kind of sensed that they were running out of juice.”
Marble and White played crucial roles for the Black and Gold in the first half, combining for 19 of the Hawkeyes’ 33 points before halftime. White made an instant impact after subbing in for Zach McCabe when the latter picked up two fouls in the first 3:30 of the game. White jumped a passing lane on his first defensive play and drove to the other end for a two-handed dunk. The freshman converted a lay-up on Iowa’s next possession, with help from a Marble pass on a fast break.
White finished with 18 points on 6-of-8 shooting in a season-high 27 minutes of play.
“I think one of the problems he had up until now was not his ability — it was fatigue, it was stamina [and] sustaining the effort that he gives you right when you put him in the game,” Iowa head coach Fran McCaffery said. “What’s happened is as he’s gotten more minutes and he’s had more success, he’s understanding how to manage his wind.”
The play of Marble and White was met by a Boise State team that seemed it would never go away. The Broncos consistently stayed within a few points of Iowa throughout the opening period before ending the first half on a 11-4 run to tie the game at 33.
When asked about his team’s ability to keep the game close, Boise State head coach Leon Rice said, “We’re growing in that way because we’ve gone on the road three times and didn’t do that … With a young team you can see the growth right there.”
Marble continued to show his evolution and improvement as Iowa’s starting point guard, tying White with a team-high 18 points. The sophomore also stuffed the stat sheet with 8 rebounds, 5 assists, 3 blocks, and 3 steals.
“He made some big shots,”Rice said of Marble. “He made a couple of those shots that are break-the-back shots. If he misses them, we’re still right there and we’re still in the game — but he didn’t.”
