00:00And I want to start by getting your perception coach of Ben McCollum because I'm seeing some, not like Hawkeye,
00:11you know, Hawkeye fan one, two, three, like respected people wonder, is this guy the best coach in the country?
00:18Not most accomplished, but just, you know, throw the ball out there.
00:23Who's going to get the most out of his guys?
00:25Is it McCollum?
00:26What have you made of Iowa's run to the Elite Eight?
00:30And how do you feel they match up with Illinois here in an Elite Eight matchup where it's a Big
00:35Ten battle?
00:36I want people to understand something in regards to offense that Ben McCollum has done this year.
00:43And I don't know if this is going to make sense.
00:46Folks, they shoot 49% from the floor.
00:50As a team, they shoot 49% from the floor as a team.
00:58And they shoot 36% from three and 78% from the foul.
01:02I don't think people understand shooting at almost 50% as an entire team is absolutely wild.
01:09And they can do it in many different ways.
01:12And I think what I think has been really good about them lately, Kevin, is I think they've found a
01:17way to slow games down and win games in the half court, right?
01:22Not winning high-scoring games.
01:24It's almost like his – usually, Kevin, in basketball, particularly when it's a new coach, you've got to lean on
01:33your defense first until your offense gets going, right?
01:37And that's how you kind of build your way up.
01:39It's almost like his offense was going, and then he had to get his defense to catch up.
01:44And now that his defense is caught up, they are playing such great basketball.
01:51Now, I mean, it does help when Freddie Horberg only has a press of four people on it, but that's
01:55the story.
01:56Kevin, I've made that mistake.
01:58Full stop.
01:59I think I did it with six players.
02:01I think I did it with six players, too, once.
02:03But I think I called it a timeout before I got caught.
02:05All right, fine.
02:06Since we're doing a little quick story time here, it's one of my proudest moments as a broadcaster,
02:10and I'm pretty sure it was Iona women, JY, against the Monmouth women.
02:14I'm pretty sure it was.
02:16And I was on the broadcast, and I just wanted to know if they were going to put someone on
02:22the ball
02:23or put two on the inbound because everyone knew the ball was going to go to, I believe, Marina Lizarazu.
02:30And so that's what I was waiting for.
02:33So I picked up on it.
02:34Coach, listen, I know how I might sound.
02:37I think I was the first in the gym to know.
02:38I think I was the first in the gym to know.
02:41And you know Dodgeball where, you know, he goes, well, that's a bold strategy, Cotton.
02:47Let's see if it works out for him.
02:48I dropped that line on the broadcast.
02:51I'm like, well, they're going to try and defend him with four.
02:53We'll see if it works out for him.
02:55But I've seen it before.
02:57We've seen it before, JY, like you've said.
03:00Yeah, I mean, I wasn't on the staff that way.
03:03Maybe right before I was there.
03:06Full stop.
03:08But listen, it's to get back to Ben.
03:10And I want to make sure, and I've gotten to know and become friendly with Fran McCaffrey.
03:17This is no knock on Fran.
03:18Fran's done a fantastic job.
03:20Kevin talked about it before.
03:22For them, for Penn to get to, you know, the tournament in his first year was absolutely fantastic.
03:27But the job this guy is doing, they just, they walk into a gym believing that they have a chance
03:35to win.
03:36And they're going to line up against Illinois.
03:38And you're going to see Wagner and Isovich and Boswell.
03:43You're going to look at all these dudes, and you're going to be like, if we line these kids up
03:47and take their jerseys off,
03:49we're probably taking most of the kids from Illinois first.
03:53But these kids don't care.
03:55And that's what Ben has gotten.
03:57They don't care.
03:59They're going to be in.
04:00They looked at Florida, a team that was, I know they lost to Vanny, that was just kicking teams' tails.
04:07The entire SEC season just said, all right, you know what?
04:10I mean, you know, no big deal.
04:12We'll beat you.
04:14So I just want to give him credit.
04:17I don't know if you could say he's the best coach in the country, but for what he has, Kevin,
04:22and how they're playing,
04:25they're playing the best based off of expectations and where they are right now.
04:30I had a moment, I think, where I was defensive over the fact that I believed in this Florida team.
04:35This is going to sound a little weird, but McCollum was getting so much credit for beating Florida, and he
04:41deserves it.
04:42But also, Florida does have some how-in-the-world-did-that-happen losses that none of the other one
04:48seeds have had this year, right?
04:50Might TCU, Auburn, Missouri come to mind, but the way that game went and the way the Nebraska game went,
05:02it does feel like a special group.
05:05And here's the thing that people talk about, like, oh, there's not a lot of talent on Iowa relative to
05:11opponents.
05:11That's fair.
05:13Bennett Sturtz rocks.
05:16And Bennett Sturtz feels like a classically he's going to go too low guy when we talk about NBA draft
05:23stuff.
05:25I mean, he's all of 6'4".
05:28Like, they didn't lie on the sheet.
05:30Might be 6'5".
05:31Can actually handle...
05:32When you play all 40 minutes, all three games, he's going to do it again tonight.
05:38It's very, very impressive.
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