{"id":682999,"date":"2026-03-27T22:28:26","date_gmt":"2026-03-27T22:28:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/682999\/"},"modified":"2026-03-27T22:28:26","modified_gmt":"2026-03-27T22:28:26","slug":"hawkeyes-final-four-path-is-unlike-any-in-40-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/682999\/","title":{"rendered":"Hawkeyes’ Final Four path is unlike any in 40 years"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Iowa Hawkeyes men’s basketball team advanced to the Elite Eight for the first time since 1987 with a 77-71 win versus the Nebraska Cornhuskers men’s basketball<\/a> in the South Regional semifinal at the Toyota Center on Thursday.<\/p>\n

As a No. 9 seed, Iowa became the lowest-seeded Big Ten team to advance this far and just the sixth No. 9 seed in tournament history to reach the Elite Eight. They have now defeated three higher-seeded teams, No. 8 Clemson, No. 1 Florida, and No. 4 Nebraska, to reach this stage.<\/p>\n

The Hawkeyes will face the Illinois Fighting Illini men’s basketball for a place in the Final Four, pursuing their first appearance since 1980. The matchup will also be the first time in 40 years a team has faced conference opponents<\/a> in both the Sweet 16 and Elite Eight, a feat last accomplished by Kentucky in 1986.<\/p>\n

Iowa improved to 24-12 on the season, tying the fifth-most wins in program history, and moved to 7-1 on neutral courts. Furthermore, the team has won three NCAA Tournament games in the past seven days after winning just three total tournament games over the previous 20 years.<\/p>\n

Against the Cornhuskers, the Hawkeyes overcame a 12-2 deficit and trailed 46-43 at halftime despite shooting 60% from the field and 63.6% from three-point range in the opening half. Iowa tied the game multiple times in the second half before Bennett Stirtz gave them their first lead, 68-65, with 2:10 remaining. He finished with 20 points, his 19th 20-point game of the season, four assists, and no turnovers.<\/p>\n

Freshman Tate Sage recorded a career-high 19 points and eight rebounds, hitting 4-of-7 from beyond the arc, while Alvaro Folgueiras contributed 16 points on near-perfect 6-of-7 shooting, including a clutch three-point play after Nebraska momentarily had only four players on the court. Cooper Koch scored 11 points as Iowa placed four players in double figures.<\/p>\n

The Hawkeyes shot 51.9% overall, made a program NCAA Tournament record 13 three-pointers, and converted 83.3% of their free throws. Defensively, they held the Cornhuskers to just 25 second-half points on 28.1% shooting.<\/p>\n

The Iowa Hawkeyes men’s basketball team advanced to the Elite Eight for the first time since 1987 with a 77-71 win versus the Nebraska Cornhuskers men’s basketball in the South Regional semifinal at the Toyota Center on Thursday. As a No. 9 seed, Iowa became the lowest-seeded Big Ten team to advance this far and just the sixth No.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Iowa Hawkeyes men’s basketball team advanced to the Elite Eight for the first time since 1987 with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":683000,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3723],"tags":[7,217,23250,7456,231,772,1544],"class_list":["post-682999","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ncaa-basketball","tag-basketball","tag-college-basketball","tag-iowa-basketball","tag-march-madness","tag-ncaa","tag-ncaa-basketball","tag-ncaab"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116303502010262486","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/682999","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=682999"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/682999\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/683000"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=682999"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=682999"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=682999"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}