Despite the Iowa Hawkeyes (19-13, 11-9) bowing out early in the Big Ten conference tournament, they still landed squarely in the field of 68 with an 8 seed in the Midwest bracket. They’ll play the Auburn Tigers (20-12, 10-8) in Birmingham, AL on Thursday with a time to be revealed later.
Like Iowa, the Tigers are looking to the tournament to rewrite the final month or so of their season. They started hot, at 16-3 & 6-1 in the SEC before finishing 4-9 in the final 13 games of their season. The storyline will be Iowa taking on Bruce Pearl who was entangled in a the Deon Thomas recruiting scandal while on Tom Davis’ staff at Iowa.