Indiana women’s basketball entered the third quarter of its contest against No. 14 Iowa with a 16-point lead. Just over eight minutes later, it was gone.
Third quarter collapses have been a pattern for Indiana. The Hoosiers entered halftime against then-No. 24 Michigan State down five points, and after the third frame, they were trailing by 14. Against Minnesota, they were down 34-28. At the end of the third, Indiana was suffering an 18-point deficit.
While the third-quarter slump was the same, Indiana retained a one-point lead over Iowa when the fourth quarter started — a different position than its previous third-period falls. The Hoosiers had a chance to upset the Hawkeyes. The blueprint was the first half.
But when the final quarter started, Iowa scored a basket in 55 seconds to take the lead back, beginning the start of a back-and-forth closing period. Indiana stayed close with Iowa, but mistakes — miscommunications, turnovers and missed shots — plagued the Hoosiers, and ultimately led to their 56-53 loss to the Hawkeyes on Sunday at Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall in Bloomington.
“I thought our first half was really good,” Indiana head coach Teri Moren said postgame. “As well as we played in the first half, I cannot give you guys an answer for why we couldn’t replicate the second half.”
Those mistakes from Indiana weren’t just suffered throughout the fourth quarter, but in the final seconds when the Hoosiers needed to make a play.
Iowa sophomore guard Chazadi Wright committed a foul with 42 seconds remaining in the contest, giving Indiana an in-bound situation on its possession. Indiana took a timeout to draw a play and sent redshirt sophomore guard Lenée Beaumont to inbound the ball.
Beaumont stood by the Hoosiers’ end of the scorer’s table, looking for an open teammate. She found one — sophomore forward Zania Socka-Nguemen at the top of the key — but when the ball left her hands, it was too late.
An official blew their whistle, signaling a five-second violation and Hoosier turnover.
On the ensuing Iowa possession, Indiana assistant coach Paul Miller repeatedly yelled at the Hoosiers not to foul. Moren crouched by the scorer's table clapping her hands yelling, “We need a stop,” to her squad.
“We didn’t want to put them at the line,” Moren said. “We wanted to play it out because we were gonna have probably 10, 12 seconds left on the clock to come down and get a time out, draw something up.”
But with 38 seconds left in the contest, freshman guard Nevaeh Caffey committed a foul.
After the game, Moren said there was a miscommunication with another member of Indiana’s staff, who told Caffey to foul.
“Nevaeh was told to go foul, and that’s not what the plan was,” Moren said. “We did not want that to happen. Again, us being able to be clear in our communication with them, but messaging's a two-way street, right? They also got to listen and be able to go out and execute what we're doing.”
After the miscommunication, Indiana decided to foul twice more on the possession to put Iowa at the line. Iowa sophomore guard Taylor Stremlow made one of her two attempts, which put the Hawkeyes up four points with 32 seconds left.
After that moment, Indiana had four more shot attempts as it tried to regain a lead. They made just one of those — a 3-pointer from Caffey — but it wasn't enough to erase the miscues suffered throughout the second half.
While it wasn’t a blowout loss like the Hoosiers’ first four Big Ten contests, the loss was an example of how Indiana’s young roster — one with a starting lineup that consists of one senior, a redshirt sophomore, a sophomore and two freshmen — react in high-pressure situations.
And it wasn't the first time pressure got to the Hoosiers, as a similar end unfolded in their five-point loss to No. 25 Nebraska on Thursday. Indiana has avoided the big losses to strong opponents in its past two games, but now, it needs to find a way to pull out the close games with a win.
“We've had to do a lot of more of a lot of different things, whether it's boxing out, whether it's the special situations, amongst other things, but we're far from where we want to be,” Moren said. “We got to keep running. We got to keep working and we got to keep doing better. We got to keep learning. I have to be better. Our staff has to be better because we gotta help these guys.”
Follow reporters Savannah Slone (@savrivers06 and srslone@iu.edu) and Max Schneider (maxschn@iu.edu) and columnist Sean McAvoy (@sean_mc07 and semcavoy@iu.edu) for updates throughout the Indiana women’s basketball season.
