Hawkeyes hammer Terps
On Thursday night, Tony Perkins had a game he would like to forget.
On Sunday afternoon, the junior guard had a game he will likely remember for a long time. Perkins lead Iowa with 22 points and in a 81-67 victory over Maryland. The victory moves the Hawkeyes to 12-6 on the season and they are now 4-3 in conference play.
Against Michigan, Perkins was, to borrow form Fran McCaffery, sideways. He was sent to the bench early in the second half for not playing strong enough defense and appeared to exchange words with his head coach.
He ended up playing 16 minutes in the win over Michigan, but only 4:32 in the second half and scored just two points. Instead of sulking and letting that poor performance linger. Perkins came out with a purpose on Sunday against Maryland.
With leading scorer Kris Murray on the bench with two first half fouls and Filip Rebraca joining him in the later stages of the half, Perkins took over the scoring load with 19 of his 22 points scored in the first twenty minutes of action.
After struggling at the start of games in the last few weeks, it was just the opposite for Iowa in this game. Both teams were slowed out of the gate before Iowa pushed ahead with a 7-0 run to go up 19-10. An Ahron Ulis bucket put Iowa up ten, 29-19 and then Ulis followed that with a three pointer and Connor McCaffery joined him and suddenly the Hawkeyes were up 35-21.
Maryland cut into the lead after Perkins put Iowa up 37-21. The Terps put together a 5-0 run with Jahmir Young knocking down a three pointer. Young then hit a free throw to make the score 43-33 at the break.
The Terps came out of the gate red hot in the second half, scoring the first eight points to cut the Hawkeyes lead to two points. But, the Hawkeyes would never relinquish the lead, pushing it back to double figure at 55-44 after a Kris Murray layup capped an 8-0 run by Iowa. Murray finished with 19 points, 17 of them in the second half.
Iowa is now riding a four game winning streak in conference play. They look to move it to five straight on Wednesday night when they host Northwestern.
