(Eugene, OR) — It is not easy when a Big Ten eastern team travels out west but the Iowa Hawkeyes had no such difficulty in beating Oregon 84-66 in a Big Ten men’s basketball game on Sunday night.
Bennett Stirtz had a career high 32 points to lead Iowa (16-5, 6-4) on 12 of 15 shooting and added 8 assists as the Hawkeyes won their 4th game in a row.
The Hawks led 35-26 at the half and the Ducks came out strong out of the locker room — Kwame Evans hit a three pointer, Dezdrick Lindsey got a dunk and Evans hit another three as Oregon scored 8 of the first 12 points of the second half to cut the lead to 39-34. That is when Stirtz took over — scoring 13 points in the next five plus minutes and Cooper Koch hit a runner in the lane to make it 59-43 Iowa with 10 minutes left. The lead never went under 9 the rest of the game.
Alvaro Folguerias added 15 points off the bench and Brendan Hausen scored 11 off the pine — Iowa’s bench outscored Oregon’s 34-18. Koch added 10.
Oregon (8-14, 1-10) has been devasted by injuries with four players out of the line-up that would have been in Dana Altman’s rotation. Evans led the Ducks with 18 points, Takai Simpkins had 16 and Lindsey added 10.
