By Blake Dowson
Tonight is Dale Jones bobblehead night at the Iowa men’s basketball game against Indiana.
That should be happy news, right? The underlying problem is that Iowa always honors seniors (or, people who are done with the program after that season) with bobblehead nights.
The question was raised during head coach Fran McCaffery’s media availability on Monday whether Jones would still be with the program next season.
That was just one topic of discussion at the press conference, though.
Where will Dale Jones be next season?
McCaffery put it very plainly that he didn’t know what Jones’ plans are for next season.
“That’s not been decided yet, but it’s [transferring] a possibility,” McCaffery said. “That would be his call. He will graduate. If you graduate, you have the opportunity to go wherever you want. Does he want to come back; does he want to go somewhere else; does he want to play professionally? Once you graduate, it’s your call. I’m happy he’s going to graduate. He’s done everything we’ve asked him to do.”
The hope all along with Jones was that he would turn into a keycontributor off the bench. He can shoot the 3-ball with enough proficiency to warrant other team’s attention when he is on the floor, and he adds another big body to the lineup.
However, injuries and the emergence of a load of freshmen in the frontcourt have cut his playing time substantially, and Jones could pick and choose what school he wanted to transfer to and get more minutes, if that’s what he decides to do.
Christian Williams finding a role off the bench
Williams was in the starting lineup for the season-opener against Kennesaw State. Since then, freshman Jordan Bohannon has emerged as a reliable floor general who can also knock down his fair share of 3-point shots.
The move to a bench role hasn’t fazed Williams one bit, according to his head coach.
What Williams brings to the table is elite defense, and he has been on top of his game lately.
“He’s been incredibly professional. He just keeps grinding,” McCaffery said. “Put him on the scout team; put him on the second team; put him in the lineup. Jordan tweaks something and give him the ball, ‘Whatever you need me to do.’ That’s a special character that he has.”
During a 30-second span in the loss at Michigan State, Williams stole the ball three times, resulting in points for the Hawkeyes.
Spurts such as those make the Iowa coaching staff think he could be special.
“I’ve been sensing [playing better defense] for a while now,” Williams said. “Coach [Kirk] Speraw, since I’ve been here, has been telling me I could be Big Ten Defensive Player of the Year. I just got to have more confidence in my abilities, and that’s what I’ve been trying to do.”
This part of the season is difficult for freshmen
Iowa is lacing up for game No. 28 tonight. A typical high-school season involves somewhere between 20-25 games.
That means the Hawkeye freshmen are in somewhat uncharted waters.
Each team in the Big Ten plays freshmen; there’s no excuse to be made that that’s why Iowa is on a three-game skid. But not all teams play five freshmen and give them tons of minutes.
Even so, Cordell Pemsl said it shouldn’t matter and shouldn’t even be talked about.
“What we hear everyone talking about is ‘These guys can be really good, they’re going to be really good in the future.’ We want our future to be our next game,” Pemsl said. “We want to be good now, not wait for something to happen … we’ve shown glimpses of being a really good team, but we’ve also shown glimpses of what you would call being a young team. It’s too late in the season for us to be considered a young team.”
