IOWA CITY — Just over two minutes into the game, Caitlin Clark rose to shoot from the left wing well behind the three-point line. Itâs a scene that has played out countless times over the past four seasons in Iowa City and all throughout the country.
This shot was different from the rest. This shot would live on forever. In highlight reels. In record books. And in the memories of the 15,000+ people in attendance.
Clarkâs three moved her past Kelsey Plum as NCAA womenâs basketballâs all-time leading scorer. But she wasn’t done breaking records. Clark’s big night continued and she ended up scoring 49 points to break Megan Gustafson’s program record for most points in a game. Clark also broke Hannah Stuelke’s mark for most points scored in a game in Carver-Hawkeye Arena set just one week ago. For good measure, Clark added 13 assists and five rebounds.
Clark’s big performance propelled Iowa to a 106-89 victory over Michigan on a night Iowa fans will remember forever.
“You all knew I was going to shoot a logo three for the record,” Clark said with a smile after the game.
Clark came into the game needing seven points to tie Plumâs record and eight points to surpass it. If she could score five early points, she’d have an opportunity to break Plum’s mark with one of her signature shots. Sometimes fate plays out exactly like you hope.
Clark made her first shot just nine seconds into the game on a layup. She followed that with a three 30 seconds later.
Because no one is perfect, Clark was quiet on Iowaâs next two possessions: “I thought about doing it a couple possessions earlier, but I was tired. I needed to catch my breath a bit,” said Clark.
Clark had caught her breath by the time Gabbie Marshall tracked down a rebound just over two minutes into the game. Marshall found Clark in the perfect position to push in transition. From there, history awaited:
But Clark wasnât done. Far from it. After a brief pause to recognize Clarkâs achievement, the game got going again and so did Clark.
“During warmups my shot felt pretty good,” Clark said. “Usually as a shooter you know. The ball just comes off your hand some nights better than others.”
Clark hit seven other shotsâincluding four more three-pointers â in a remarkable first quarter that saw her score 23 points and dish four assists.
Clark wasn’t done after the first quarter, either. Just last week, she saw Hannah Stuelke set a Carver record for points in a game. The NCAA’s all-time leading scorer couldn’t let that stand.
“She asked why I had to do that,” Clark said of Stuelke’s reaction to her record being broken. Then Stuelke turned it into a joke, as Clark noted that Stuelke said “she said she passed the torch to me.”
Clark’s late three did more than surpass Stuelke. It also lifted her above Megan Gustafson’s prior program record of 48 points in a game.
Clark has occasionally been chided for the volume of shots that she takes, but tonight no one could question her. Clark shot 16-of-31 from the floor and went 9-of-18 from 3-point range. She also added 13 assists because breaking three different scoring records in the same game just wasn’t enough.
“I don’t know if you could script it any better.” Clark said.
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Clark’s record and her masterful performance will occupy every headline, but this was also a big game for Iowa as a team. The Hawks sit one game behind Ohio State in the loss column in the Big Ten standings. The only team to defeat the Buckeyes in Big Ten play so far this season is Michigan. If Iowa didnât play at its best, this was absolutely a game that could have ended in an upset. One more loss would have almost certainly ended Iowaâs Big Ten championship aspirations.
Offensively, at least, the Hawkeyes were at their best in this game. Kate Martin was consistent as ever, scoring 20 points on 7-of-11 shooting, including a red hot 4-of-5 effort from 3-point range. Stuelke scored 13 points on just six shots. Gabbie Marshall even broke out of her recent shooting slump, hitting a couple big threes.
As a team, Iowa shot 53% from the floor and a sizzling 51% from 3-point range, making a stunning 18 triples on the night. Iowa also had 25 assists on 34 made field goals, turned 14 Michigan turnovers into 26 points, and out-scored the Wolverines 25-7 in fast break points. This game was an example of the Iowa offense at its best.
READ MORE: Social Media Reacts to Caitlin Clark Breaking the NCAA WBB Scoring Record
After the game, Coach Lisa Bluder took time to praise how Michigan handled the moment.
“They gave Caitlin a gift after the game and every one of (their) players wrote her a note,” Bluder said in her press conference. “I am so glad that we have people in the Big Ten that understand the importance of this and the importance for women’s basketball… that was a really classy way for them to handle this. I appreciate Kim and what she did.”
“There was like no one here,” Clark said of her first college game in Carver Hawkeye Arena against Northern Iowa. That’s not technically true, of course. The official attendance was 365. But compared to the capacity crowd of tonight, it might as well have been no one.
We will never know how many people might’ve attended Clark’s debut had it not been for the COVID restrictions in place at the time. We can say with certainty, though, that it wouldn’t have been close to a sellout.
Iowaâs 2019 season opener against Florida Atlantic had an official attendance of 3,334. For the 2021 season opener against New Hampshire in Clarkâs sophomore season, the attendance was 6,789.
Tonight, every seat in Carver was taken, and ticket prices on the secondary market reached insane levels:
In less than four years, #22 has transformed womenâs basketball. Tonightâs game was more than a record or a moment. It was a celebration of four years that have helped change womenâs basketball forever.
“There’s no way I could imagine this,” Bluder said when asked what her childhood self would say of tonight. “There’s just no way you can even fathom this as a little kid growing up pre-Title IX.”
Given Clark’s talent and charisma, it’s fair to say that she isn’t done growing the game just yet, either.
5 key issues the Iowa Legislature faces in the 2026 session
Eminent domain, property taxes and DOGE cuts are all on the table for legislators this session.
Repeat offenders convicted of multiple serious crimes would receive a mandatory 20-year prison sentence under a bill passed by House lawmakers.
House lawmakers debated for more than an hour about high costs, lack of prison space and the bill’s impact on Black Iowans before voting 68-23 to pass House File 2542, sending it to the Iowa Senate.
Seven Democrats, including Minority Leader Brian Meyer, D-Des Moines, joined Republicans in voting in favor of the bill.
“It will put public safety first,” said the bill’s floor manager, Rep. Steven Holt, R-Denison. “It will ensure that the debt to victims and society is paid. It will prioritize victims and public safety over criminals. It will establish real and effective deterrence that is nonexistent in our current system. It will reduce chaos and violence in our society.”
Here’s what to know about the bill.
Iowans who accumulate three strikes would face a mandatory 20-year prison sentence, with no parole, under the bill.
That would replace Iowa’s current law that says habitual offenders must serve a minimum three-year prison sentence before they are eligible for parole.
All felonies, as well as aggravated misdemeanors involving sexual abuse, domestic abuse, assault and organized retail theft would be considered level-one offenses that are worth one full strike.
Other aggravated misdemeanors, as well as serious misdemeanors involving assault, domestic abuse and criminal mischief would be considered level-two offenses worth half a strike each.
Lawmakers amended the bill to remove theft, harassment and possession of a controlled substance from the crimes that would count toward a person’s strikes.
And the amendment specifies that the bill would only apply to convictions that occur beginning July 1, 2026.
If someone is arrested and convicted of multiple offenses, only the most serious charge would count towards the defendant’s strikes.
Convictions would not count toward someone’s total if more than 20 years passes between a prior conviction and their current conviction.
Rep. Ross Wilburn, D-Ames, tried unsuccessfully to amend the bill to say that only a violent crime would qualify as someone’s third strike, but Republicans rejected the amendment.
“The bill still scores murder, felony embezzlement and felony theft the same, even though they are very different crimes,” Wilburn said. “One point is one point and three gets you 20 years with no ability for parole or judicial discretion.”
Holt said the legislation leaves room for judicial and prosecutorial discretion.
“There are deferred sentences, there are plea bargains,” he said. “There is plenty of opportunity for grace and judicial discretion in the legislation that we are proposing.”
A fiscal analysis of the bill by the nonpartisan Legislative Services Agency said it could cost Iowa nearly $165 million more per year by 2031 based on the cost of housing inmates for longer prison stays.
The agency said if the bill had been in effect between fiscal year 2020 and fiscal year 2025, there would have been 5,373 people who qualified for the 20-year mandatory minimum sentence.
“An increase in the prison population due to increased (length of stay) will require the DOC to build additional prison(s),” the agency states. “The size, security and other features that a future prison may require cannot be determined, but costs would be significant.”
The analysis noted that South Dakota appropriated $650 million last fall to build a 1,500-bed prison.
As of March 1, the Iowa Department of Corrections’ website describes the state’s prison system as being overcrowded by 25%, with 8,705 inmates compared to a capacity of 6,990.
The Office of the State Public Defender could see a projected cost increase of $1.6 million due to an increased number of trials resulting from the legislation.
But the agency’s estimates come with a caveat — the Department of Corrections did not respond to its requests for data.
“The LSA has not received a response to multiple requests for information from the DOC,” the note states. “Without additional information, the LSA cannot estimate the total fiscal impact of the bill.”
Holt called the fiscal note “an embarrassment to the Department of Corrections” and “an agenda masquerading as math.”
“It is clear, in my judgment, that because they did not like the legislation they went all out and extreme to create a fiscal note that cannot be taken seriously in its assumptions,” he said. “It assumes that nothing will change, that there will be no deterrent factor and that the numbers will continue as usual.”
The Legislative Services Agency analysis says the bill “may disproportionately impact Black individuals if trends remain constant.”
Of the 29,438 people convicted in fiscal year 2025 of felonies and aggravated misdemeanors that constitute a level one offense under the bill, the agency said about 70% were White, 22% were Black and 9% were other races.
Iowa’s overall population is 83% White, 4% Black and 13% other races, the agency said.
It’s not clear how the bill’s impact would change to account for the House amendment removing some crimes from counting towards the three strikes.
“Expanding three-strike laws will intensify disparities — and that’s what this statement shows — by mandating longer sentences, limiting judicial discretion,” Wilburn said. “We already have a habitual offender statute. We already have one in place. We have a 10-year low in recidivism in our correctional system.”
Rep. Angel Ramirez, D-Cedar Rapids, said California’s three strikes law, passed in the 1990s, worsened racial disparities, and “Iowa is about to repeat the same mistake.”
“I urge every member here, do not pass legislation that our own minority impact statement tells us will deepen inequality in our state,” Ramirez said.
Holt said minority communities in Iowa are impacted by crime and that the legislation “will make citizens of all colors safer.”
And he said the minority impact statement “tells only one side of the story, doesn’t it? It tells the criminal’s story. What about the victim’s story?”
“What about the mother who will continue to tuck her kids in at night and read them Bible stories because she never became the next victim of a violent career criminal?” he said. “Where is that data point in the minority impact statement?”
House lawmakers also approved separate legislation that would increase Iowa’s statewide bond schedule, Senate File 2399.
That bill passed on a vote of 74-19.
Iowans would have access to more information about judges’ rulings ahead of the state’s judicial retention elections under a separate measure, House File 2719, which passed on a 73-19 vote.
The Iowa secretary of state’s office would be required to publish information including:
The data would have to be displayed with a five-year trend line beginning five years after the bill takes effect.
The Secretary of State’s Office would also be required to maintain a searchable database of all judicial opinions and orders for the judge’s current term and the preceding six years. The decisions would be redacted when appropriate.
And judges would have the opportunity to write a 2,000-word personal statement on their judicial philosophy or data trends present in their rulings.
Stephen Gruber-Miller covers the Iowa Statehouse and politics for the Register. He can be reached by email at sgrubermil@registermedia.com or by phone at 515-284-8169. Follow him on X at @sgrubermiller.
CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (KCRG) – Luke Truesdell’s attorney has filed as of Sunday to appeal his sentence to the Iowa Supreme Court.
Truesdell was sentenced last week to three consecutive life sentences plus 50 years for the deaths of four people killed in rural Linn County.
A jury convicted Luke Truesdell, 36, in November on the first-degree murder of Brent Brown, 34; his girlfriend, Keonna Ryan, 26, of Cedar Rapids; and Amanda Parker, 33, of Vinton. They also found him guilty of second-degree murder in the death of Romondus Cooper, 44, of Cedar Rapids.
His attorneys previously argued multiple reasons for a retrial that could potentially be brought up again.
They said that one juror was overheard talking about news on the case.
They also said the prosecutors inflamed the jury, rather than focusing on the facts.
His lawyers said there is no direct evidence that Truesdell committed the murders.
Truesdell’s defense also pointed to Truesdell’s father, Larry Tuesdell, who was found covered in blood at the scene but never fully investigated. Authorities have not been able to locate Larry.
The state disagreed, citing overwhelming evidence including DNA on the murder weapon, eyewitness testimony and video of Truesdell entering the garage where the four people were found dead.
Copyright 2026 KCRG. All rights reserved.
Ballard boys basketball players talk qualifying for state
Ballard’s Jude Gibson, Parker Miller and Evan Abbott discuss a 79-45 3A Substate 7 final win over Oskaloosa to punch the Bombers’ ticket to state.
The Iowa high school boys state basketball tournament is just around the corner and the full field has now been set.
By March 13, four teams will be crowned state champions and there are plenty of worthy squads vying for the title. On Tuesday, the final brackets were released and we now have a clear picture of the eight teams in each class hoping to take home the trophy.
Here’s a look at the first-round pairings and the full state tournament schedule for next week’s IHSAA action.
State quarterfinals, Monday, March 9
Tuesday, March 10
State semifinals, Thursday, March 12
State championship game, Friday, March 13
State quarterfinals: Monday, March 9
State semifinals, Wednesday, March 11
State championship game, Friday, March 13
State quarterfinals: Wednesday, March 11
State semifinals, Thursday, March 12
State title game, Friday, March 13
State quarterfinals: Tuesday, March 10
State semifinals, Thursday, March 12
State title game, Friday, March 13
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