The last time I saw 22 in Carver Hawkeye Arena, I watched through bloodshot eyes as Caitlin Clark and her teammates trudged through a messy matchup against a West Virginia team that was playing well above their weight class with nothing to lose and everything to prove. While I don’t really remember the ins and outs of that game in their entirety, I do remember that I was three months (almost to the day) into figuring out how to manage two-under-two and that it felt like I had just played West Virginia every night since Christmas.
But going into Sunday afternoon’s matchup with USC, things were much different for CC, the Iowa Women’s Basketball program and myself.