WAR ROOM: RFootball out recruiting, RHoops bounce back

RHoops HC Steve Pikiell on his team's defense versus Iowa: "We blocked shots. These guys did a fantastic job with the gameplan. And playing an elite that runs and they get to the free throw line, real proud of them. Just found a way to get stops and really as good a defensive effort as I’ve seen. The home crowd too was just tremendous. That effort was pretty good. We need to take care of the ball better. But we have more in the tank too defensively. A great effort against a team that can really score. I told the team in timeouts, a real old-fashioned grinder. Cliff made great rebounds in traffic. We made the plays when we had too.”

Pikiell on the environment inside of Jersey Mike's Arena: "The environment was great today, I’m very thankful for our students, the cheerleaders, the dance team and all the people that make this place a tough place to play. A great college basketball game. Iowa is really good, a very talented team with the leading scorer in the country. Old fashioned, defensive game. The guys willed us to a win. Great defense from start to finish. I thought we had some makeable shots but we just couldn't seem to find the bottom of the net on some of those possessions. But we figured out a way to win. And you know, that's life here in this league. Just figure out a way to win. All these guys contributed, Cliff with 14 rebounds, Ron steps up, Geo does a great job. Caleb holds Bohannon to 2-for-10. Everyone that checked in helped. Ralph, he comes in and gives us some good minutes. Dean, some good minutes. Aundre, five rebounds. We’re on the to the next one."

Iowa Hoops HC Fran McCaffery on the foul at the end of the game: "It was a really physical, hard fought game. It shouldn’t come down to that. We should have been going into overtime. Both teams played hard, Steve’s team played hard. They made it hard for us to score, I thought we also played good defense. They got us pretty good in the second half on the glass, we didn’t rebound as well as we should have. We were right there, and that’s where you want to be on the road against a really good team, we had a chance."