The Tri-Center Trojans boys basketball team ended their season with a 51-49 loss to the Woodbine Tigers in the second round of the Class 1A-Region 8 bracket. The Trojans were led in scoring that night by freshman AJ Harder who had 15 points.

Tri-Center will be losing five seniors to graduation this year: Avery Reed, Christian Dahir, Zach Murley, Matt Eikenberry and Isaac Wohlhut.

Trojans coach Chad Harder talked about the close loss in the post season to Woodbine.

Coach Harder had this to say to his team in the locker room after the Woodbine game.

Coach Harder commented on how well freshman AJ Harder has played this season.

Coach Harder found out his Trojan broke a record this season by making 171 made three pointers surpassing the previous record of 165 three pointers.

Coach Harder says he doesn’t really set concrete goals for next season but says his goal is be the best you can be.

The Trojans did end the season with an overall record of 14-9 and went 9-8 in the Western Iowa Conference. The players are going to work hard over the summer and play around 20 summer league games.

AMES, Iowa – Iowa State 184-pounder Will Feldkamp has received an at-large bid to the 2024 NCAA Championships March 21-23 in Kansas City, Mo.

Feldkamp, ranked No. 12 nationally by InterMat, becomes Iowa State’s ninth NCAA Qualifier for next week’s tournament. His selection marks the fourth time under head coach Kevin Dresser that nine Cyclones have qualified for the national tournament and ISU’s sixth consecutive season with at least eight qualifiers.

A Dexter Township, Mich. Native, Feldkamp will wrestle in his third NCAA Championships after competing in the tournament twice at Clarion prior to transferring to Iowa State. Feldkamp placed seventh at last season’s national tournament.

Feldkamp placed sixth at the 2024 Big 12 Championship, one spot shy of automatically qualifying, and has a 12-9 record with five falls and three tech falls this season.

The full 2024 NCAA wrestling Division I championship brackets will be revealed during a selection show streamed live on NCAA.com Wednesday, March 13 at 7 p.m.

NEW ORLEANS, La. — The University of Iowa women’s golf team fired a final round 298 – its best round of the tournament – to conclude play Tuesday at the Tulane Classic presented by Chad Brownstein. The Hawkeyes finished in sixth place (out of 17 teams) at the English Turn Golf and Country Club, posting 54-hole score of 905 (300-302-298).

Sophomore Madison Dabagia finished as the team’s low scorer at 6-over par. The Indiana native shot a one-over par 73 on Tuesday to move into a tie for 11th place, finishing with a 222 (79-70-73).  Dabagia finished the round with three birdies and 11 pars.

It is the third straight tournament that Dabagia has either tied for or led the team.  She has posted three straight top 20 finishes.

Sophomore Shannyn Vogler tied for 30th place as she shot 74 (+2) – her best round of the weekend — in the tournament’s final round. Vogler’s play was consistent throughout the tournament, carding rounds of 75-77-74 over the course of three days.

Freshman Ximena Benites, competing individually, tied for 18th place with a seven over par 223 (74-71-78).  It is tied for the best finish of Benites’ career.

Colorado State won the tournament by a single shot over Cal Poly, finishing with an 18-over par 882.  Missouri’s Fluer van Beek was the individual medalist with a three-under par 213, two shots better than Notre Dame’s Lauren Beaudreau.

UP NEXT

The Hawkeyes will have three weeks off before resuming their spring season in Tennessee at the Chattanooga Classic from April 7-9.

Iowa forward Owen Freeman has been named the Big Ten Freshman-of-the Year. The native Moline, Illinois, is averaging better than 10 and-a-half-points and six and-a-half rebounds for an Iowa team that takes an 18-13 record into this week’s Big Ten Tournament in the Twin Cities.

Freeman says his confidence grew during this season and hopes to take his game to another level next season.

Freeman says his faith has been a big part of his success on the court.

Iowa coach Fran McCaffery was not surprised Freeman had immediate success.

McCaffery says Freeman had no trouble adapting to the college game.

 ST. LOUIS, Mo. –Drake junior Anna Miller has been rewarded for a stellar year in the classroom and on the court as the recipient of the 2023-24 Missouri Valley Conference Women’s Basketball State Farm Scholar-Athlete of the Year.

Miller highlights the six-person Scholar-Athlete First Team and is one of four Bulldogs included between First, Second, and Third Teams plus honorable mention.

The Rochester, Minn. native owns a 4.0 grade point average as a health sciences major at Drake. She is among the top overall players in The Valley with 13.2 points and a league high 9.9 rebounds per game. Miller is second in the conference with a .543 field goal percentage and has been the premier rim protector with 83 total blocks and 2.7 per game.

Other Bulldogs included on the MVC Scholar-Athlete Teams include Katie Dinnebier (Second Team), Courtney Becker (Third Team), and Anna Brown (Honorable Mention).

The criteria for nomination to the MVC Scholar-Athlete Team voting matches the College Sports Communicators standards. Student-athletes must be at least a sophomore academically and athletically and must be enrolled at their school as an undergraduate of graduate student. The full list of this year’s Scholar-Athlete student-athletes is listed below.

First Team

Kiley Bess, Sr., Indiana State

Grace Boffeli, Jr., UNI

Tuti Jones, Sr./RJr., Belmont

Anna Miller, Jr., Drake

Tessa Miller, Jr., Belmont

Barbora Tomancova, Gr., Evansville

Second Team

Olivia Brown, 5Yr., Valparaiso

Kate Bullman, Sr., Illinois State

Katie Dinnebier, Jr., Drake

Ella Sawyer, 5Yr., Indiana State

Katelyn Young, Sr., Murray State

Third Team

Courtney Becker, Sr., Drake

Paige Clubb, Jr., Southern Illinois

Leah Earnest, Sr., Valparaiso

Cailyn Morgan, Sr., UNI

Callie Ziebell, Jr., Bradley

Honorable Mention

Anna Brown, Gr., Drake

Ryley Goebel, So., UNI

Kayba Laube, Jr., UNI

Adrianna Katcher, Sr., Southern Illinois

Maya McDermott, Jr., UNI

Taryn Wharton, So., UNI

The Drake women will begin a quest for a second straight Missouri Valley Conference Tournament title in the Quad Cities Friday afternoon. The top seeded and regular season champion Bulldogs will play the winner of Thursday’s game between Indiana State and Southern Illinois.

That’s Drake coach Allison Pohlman. One of the strengths for the Bulldogs is depth and that will be a plus when needing to win three games in three days.

Pohlman says the Bulldogs are focused on their first game and not the entire bracket.

Pohlman says one of their preseason goals was to win the tournament and return to the NCAA Tournament.

Drake is 26-5 overall and finished 19-1 in the Valley regular season race.

In the age of the transfer portal in college basketball Northern Iowa coach Ben Jacobson will be spending the next couple of weeks finding out who will be returning. Nearly the entire roster could return from a team that finished 19-14 after a loss to Indiana State in the semifinals of the Missouri Valley Conference Tournament.

Jacobson says it may take a few weeks to determine what next season’s roster will look like.

IOWA CITY, Iowa — University of Iowa forward Owen Freeman was named the Big Ten Freshman of the Year and a total of five Hawkeyes earned All-Big Ten honors, it was announced Tuesday by the league office.

Freeman was named the Co-Big Ten Freshman of the Year by the league coaches along with Indiana’s Mackenzie Mgbako (Freeman was the sole honoree by the league media). The Moline, Illinois, native is the second Hawkeye in program history to earn the distinction, joining Jess Settles in 1994.

Senior Tony Perkins earned second-team All-Big Ten laurels by the coaches (and was honorable mention by the media) and junior Payton Sandfort was a third-team selection by both the media and coaches.  Sophomore Josh Dix (media), Freeman (coaches, media) and graduate Ben Krikke (media) earned honorable mention all-conference accolades.

Freeman was also selected to the Big Ten All-Freshman Team — Iowa’s first honoree since 2020 and seventh in the Fran McCaffery era — and Krikke was tabbed as Iowa’s Big Ten Sportsmanship Award recipient.

Freeman has been the Big Ten’s best rookie, leading the league in rebounds (203), blocks (56) and double-doubles (5), while ranking second in steals (30) and field goal percentage (.636) and third in scoring. Freeman is averaging 10.6 points, 6.5 rebounds and 1.8 blocks per game. He has been in double figures in 15 games with two 20-point contests.

Over the course of the season, Freeman earned nine Big Ten Freshman of the Week honors, which are the second-most all-time in Big Ten Conference history.

Perkins has enjoyed a breakout senior season, ranking in the top 17 in the league in scoring (14.5), assists (4.9) and steals (1.7). He is one of seven players nationally to have 450+ points, 140+ assists, 130+ rebounds and 50+ steals. The Indianapolis native has scored in double figures in 27 games with eight 20-point games.

Sandfort has emerged as Iowa’s go-to scorer, leading the team in scoring (16.2 points) and rebounds (6.5). The forward has made a Big Ten-best 83 3-point field goals, while shooting 37.1 percent from distance. Sandfort made Iowa history in February, recording the first triple-double in program history, finishing with 26 points, 10 rebounds, 10 assists and three blocks against Penn State. He has been in double figures in 25 games with a team-best 10 20-point games and four double-doubles.

Dix garnered honorable mention honors after averaging 8.9 points on 56.6 percent shooting and 44.1 percent from 3-point range. The Council Bluffs, Iowa, native came on down the stretch, pouring in three 20-point games at the end of the regular season.

Krikke also earned honorable mention accolades after averaging 13.5 points and 4.7 rebounds during his first Big Ten season. The Valparaiso transfer has reached double figures in 21 games, including seven 20-point contest and has three double-doubles.

Iowa (18-13) heads to Minneapolis as the No. 7 seed for the TIAA Big Ten Tournament. The Hawkeyes open play Thursday, facing 10th-seeded Ohio State at 5:30 p.m. (CT) at the Target Center. The game will be televised live on BTN.

CHICAGO, Ill. – For the first time in network history, the Big Ten Network had two women’s athletic events bring in over one million viewers. On Saturday, March 9, the semifinal matchup between Iowa and Michigan delivered 1,075,000 viewers, making it the most-watched women’s athletic event in BTN history. The game between Iowa and Penn State on Friday, March 8, saw 1,040,000 viewers tune in to the quarterfinal matchup.

The two tournament games rank as the second and third most-watched basketball games in BTN history. The all-time record of 1.2 million viewers was set during the 2022 men’s tournament in a game between Michigan State and Wisconsin on March 11, 2022.

The previous record for a women’s athletic event of 657,000 viewers was set earlier this year on Feb. 8, 2024, in a women’s basketball matchup between Iowa and Penn State.

For the third consecutive season, Big Ten regular season women’s basketball and the TIAA Big Ten Women’s Basketball Tournament were the most watched in Big Ten Network history. Viewership of the TIAA Big Ten Women’s Basketball Tournament on BTN was up +141% year-over-year, averaging 361,000 viewers per game.

2023-24 regular season women’s basketball coverage on the Big Ten Network averaged 101,000 viewers per broadcast, a year-over-year increase of +46%.

All viewership data is attributed to Nielsen Media Research.

The Iowa State women will play fifth ranked Texas in tonight’s Big-12 Championship in Kansas City. The Cyclones shot a blistering 58 percent, including 12 of 23 from three-point range, to beat 17th ranked and regular season champion Oklahoma 85-68 in Monday’s semifinal round.

That’s ISU coach Bill Fennelly. The Cyclones avenged a 14-point loss to the Sooners in Ames a month ago.

Tonight’s game against Texas will be a rematch of last year’s title game won by the Cyclones 61-51.

Freshman center Audi Crooks led the Cyclones with 25 points and added nine rebounds.

Point guard Emily Ryan had 12 points and 10 assists and talks about playing in the title game for the second straight year.

The Longhorns advanced to the title game with a 71-64 win over Kansas State.