By JOHN BOHNENKAMP

As painful as this week has been for Iowa’s men’s basketball team, the double-digit losses at Purdue on Monday and Iowa State on Thursday are lessons for the young players in the Hawkeyes’ rotation.

Iowa features four freshmen — Brock Harding, Owen Freeman, Ladji Dembele and Pryce Sandfort — along with sophomore Josh Dix, who is getting significant playing time early this season.

Getting to play against one of the best teams in the nation in Purdue, and then getting to experience being on the road in the in-state rivalry against Iowa State, is only going to help, coach Fran McCaffery said on Saturday, with the week-in, week-out schedule of the Big Ten coming up.

“They very definitely learned a lot,” McCaffery said. “There’s a different level of intensity, and I think you see that execution is really important. Every possession is even more valuable.”

The results were mixed, but certainly understandable given the intensity of both road games.

• Freeman had 17 points and 12 rebounds.

“The other night, I know he didn’t play well when he first went into the game,” McCaffery said.
“But at the end of the game, I’d say he played well, he had 11 (points) and eight (rebounds). He really impacted the game in the second half. He figured it out.”

• Harding had 12 points along with four assists and three turnovers. He was called for two intentional fouls in the second half of the Iowa State game.

“I thought Brock Harding really competed,” McCaffery said. “He made some mistakes, but I thought he made more good plays than bad, and he grew.”

• Dembele went scoreless and had just two rebounds.

“I want to see Ladji do a little more on the glass,” McCaffery said. “And he was looking to score, and I want him to score.”

• Sandfort had eight points, hitting 3-pointers late in both games.

“It was good to see Pryce make those threes late in the game,” McCaffery said.

• Dix got the start against Iowa State, with five points and two assists, along with two turnovers.

“He didn’t play well at the start of the game, but he played really well when I put him back in there,” McCaffery said.

The freshmen have already faced three road games and two neutral-court games in the opening weeks of the season. The Hawkeyes are 5-4 overall, 0-1 in Big Ten play, heading into Sunday’s 3:30 p.m. game against Michigan at Carver-Hawkeye Arena, and it’s another chance for the younger players to see what is ahead. 

“There’s just no substitute for that kind of experience and that kind of atmosphere, because obviously they’re going to see it a lot the rest of the year,” McCaffery said.

Photo: Iowa’s Owen Freeman shoots during Thursday’s game at Iowa State. (Brian Ray/hawkeyesports.com)