By Blake Dowson
To put up as many 3-point shots as the Iowa men’s basketball team did on Sunday against Savannah State, there had to be a bunch of guys coming off the bench with fresh wrists — that much shooting gets tiring, after all.
Head coach Fran McCaffery did use a lot of bodies from his bench in Iowa’s 116-84 win — 13 players got minutes.
Of those 13, 12 of them recorded 10 or more minutes.
That’s about as balanced as a team can be, but when McCaffery and Company head into Big Ten season, or even the matchup against Seton Hall on Thursday, will the rotation slim down at all?
Looking at the minutes each player got on Sunday, who can expect either an uptick or reduction of minutes going forward?
19-23 minutes — Peter Jok, Jordan Bohannon, Christian Williams, Isaiah Moss
Jok will be the owner of the most minutes on the team all season unless he gets in foul trouble often. He is the best scorer and most experienced player by a mile.
Bohannon and Williams, the two point guards, combined to play 40 minutes, meaning one of them was on the court at all times.
The Savannah State press had something to do with that, but it will most likely be the case down the road as well until Maishe Dailey or Jok proves he can handle the ball.
At this point, Williams seems to bring a little more to the position with his length and ability to push the ball.
With McCaffery employing a platoon system (five substitutes at a time), Moss was used as the scorer of the second unit. If he had shot well, he would have filled up the scoring column.
15-18 minutes — Cordell Pemsl, Brady Ellingson, Ahmad Wagner, Tyler Cook, Nicholas Baer
Pemsl and Ellingson were Iowa’s two most efficient players on Sunday.
Pemsl scored 18 points and grabbed 9 rebounds, all while not missing a shot, in 18 minutes of work.
Ellingson was the game’s leading scorer, putting in 23 points on 7-of-9 shooting in 17 minutes.
McCaffery said after the game Ellingson’s performance was nothing to be surprised by — it’s just an accumulation of the work he’s put in.
Both Pemsl and Ellingson earned themselves more minutes on Sunday.
Cook, who played 15 minutes, will play much more than that down the road. He only played eight minutes in the first half and looked tired after playing seven in the second. His conditioning will need to improve.
Wagner and Baer are a lot alike as players. Both hustle and crash the boards well. Baer is in the starting lineup because he can stretch the floor.
Baer, who played 15 minutes, will see more than that in the future.
10-13 minutes — Dom Uhl, Maishe Dailey, Ryan Kriener
Uhl — the final starter on this list — wasn’t crisp on Sunday. That’s probably why he only played 13 minutes. McCaffery has the luxury to sub guys out if they aren’t performing.
Dailey and Kriener benefited from the score, playing quite a bit late in the second half. Once conference season starts and the rotation slims, the two freshmen could see their minutes dwindle.
One more thing of note — senior Dale Jones did not play on Sunday as he continues to rehab, but he is expected to make a significant impact once he returns.
