Likes and dislikes from Iowa basketball’s win over Oregon

EUGENE, Ore. — Iowa men’s basketball beat Oregon thoroughly 84-66 on Feb. 1.

With the win, the Hawkeyes improved to 16-5 overall and 6-4 in Big Ten play.

Ben McCollum’s Hawkeyes now get two days off before completing the second leg of their Pacific Northwest road trip. Iowa plays at Washington on Feb. 4.

Likes

• Ridiculous performance by Bennett Stirtz: An almost unfathomable display of offensive efficiency by a perimeter player. Stirtz finished with 32 points on 12-of-15 from the field and 4-of-6 from deep. He also had seven assists. Stirtz continues to play at an All-Big Ten level.
• Alvaro Folgueiras: Two games in a row that Folgueiras was in double-figures scoring. After dropping 14 against USC, Folgueiras had 15 off the bench against Oregon. He also added eight rebounds and three assists. Folgueiras has looked much closer to the player Iowa needs him to be these last two games. He raises Iowa’s ceiling when he’s playing at his best.
• 1st-half run: Iowa gained some separation in the back end of the first half. The Hawkeyes once trailed 15-13 but turned that into a 32-21 lead. Folgueiras and Stirtz had their fingerprints all over that run. Iowa led for the remainder of the game.
• Also, a Stirtz milestone: Stirtz eclipsed the 2,000 career points mark. That has come across three stops — Northwest Missouri State, Drake and Iowa.
• Ball security: The Hawkeyes turned the ball over just five times against Oregon. An impressive display of discipline on the offensive end. 
• Brendan Hausen: This is not the starting role that some might have envisioned for Hausen when he committed to Iowa from Kansas State. But he has been giving some positive minutes off the bench recently in a limited quantity. He delivered an impactful sequence toward the end of the first half, drilling a corner 3-pointer and then forcing Oregon to call a timeout on the inbounds with his defensive pressure. That helped Iowa take a nine-point lead into halftime.
• Bench points: Decisively in favor of Iowa 34-18.
• Cooper Koch: 10 points for the sophomore. Just his second time in double figures over the last 12 games.
• Road win: Road wins are not easy to come by in the Big Ten. Iowa has not gotten two in a row after beating Indiana in January.
• No extra drama: Iowa didn’t let Oregon climb back into the game like it did USC. The Hawkeyes slammed the door and won without unnecessary stress.
• Four-game winning streak: After losing three in a row, the Hawkeyes have now won four in a row.

Dislikes

• Second-chance points: Oregon had six more offensive rebounds than Iowa and was more opportunistic with those chances. The Ducks cashed in for 16 second-chance points to Iowa’s four.
• Free-throw discrepancy: Iowa attempted 10 free throws. Oregon shot 16. It wasn’t as if the Hawkeyes weren’t attacking the rim. Iowa scored 44 points in the paint in comparison to Oregon’s 26 (which was another positive for the Hawkeyes).
• Rebounding: There wasn’t much to dislike about Iowa’s win over Oregon, so this is a little nitpicky. But Oregon held a 31-26 advantage on the glass over Iowa.

Follow Tyler Tachman on X @Tyler_T15, contact via email at ttachman@gannett.com