Iowa women’s basketball fans likely had mixed feelings about Sunday’s victory.
On one hand, the Hawkeyes continued their best start in Big Ten play in more than 30 years, improving to 9-0 after thumping Ohio State, 91-70, at Carver Hawkeye Arena in Iowa City. It was the fifth Quad 1 win of the season for coach Jan Jensen’s team, which has the look of a real contender.
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But on the other hand, Iowa played most of the game without starting sharpshooter Taylor McCabe, who played less than 30 seconds before going down with a non-contact injury. On Monday, Iowa’s worst fears were confirmed: McCabe will need season-ending surgery after suffering an ACL tear in her left knee.
“This isn’t how I imagined my senior season ending, but adversity has always been part of the game,” McCabe said in a statement. “I’m committed to my recovery and to supporting my teammates in every way I can for the rest of this season. I’m grateful for the love and encouragement from my coaches, teammates, and everyone who has been with me throughout this journey at the University of Iowa.”
More: In the post-Caitlin Clark era, Iowa finds a different winning formula
McCabe, who is a senior, will go down as one of the top 3-point shooters in program history. She made 40.7% of her 3s in her career, tied with Kristi Smith for the best in Iowa history. She attempted 423 3-pointers, compared to 33 2-pointers in four seasons.
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McCabe was averaging 8.1 points, 3.5 rebounds and 2.3 assists a game this season. In Iowa’s win last Thursday at Maryland, McCabe sank four 3-pointers and grabbed five rebounds.
Sunday was an all-around bummer for the McCabe family. Taylor’s sister Peyton — who plays at Drake — exited the Bulldogs’ loss to Murray State on Sunday after suffering an apparent ankle injury. The sophomore guard fell awkwardly at the end of the first half and had to be carried off the floor. Drake hasn’t issued a statement about her status.
High Point could bust your bracket
There are a few well-established mid-major powers in women’s college basketball. Teams that regularly make the NCAA Tournament, occasionally win games and often take down Power 4 opponents in non-conference play.
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Before departing for the Dallas Wings, Jose Fernandez built USF into one of these programs. Aaron Johnston has molded South Dakota State into a dominant Summit League team over his lengthy tenure. Lisa Fortier has done it at Gonzaga. Carly Thibault-DuDonis seems on her way to turning Fairfield into one, too.
Chelsea Banbury came from one of these types of programs — Florida Gulf Coast. As a player and then assistant coach for 11 seasons, she got an up close look at how Karl Smesko built the Eagles into a program that no opponent wanted to see in the NCAA Tournament.
Before leaving in 2024 to coach the Atlanta Dream, Smesko built FGCU into a team that went to the NCAA Tournament in 10 of his final 13 seasons, and won their opening round game four times. Smesko had opportunities to leave for a richer program in a bigger conference, but stayed at FGCU and made them into the David that regularly slayed Goliaths.
Now, Banbury is trying to build her own version of a mid-major power in North Carolina. She’s been the head coach at High Point since 2019 and won 63.6% of her games. Her tenure has been highlighted by three regular season Big South titles and the program’s first two trips to the NCAA Tournament in 2021 and 2025.
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And it seems like she’s staying at High Point. Ahead of last season’s NCAA Tournament, she agreed to a contract extension before the coaching carousel ramped up.
“Honestly, this university, there’s not many like it, especially at the mid-major level,” Banbury told USA Today Sports. “I am a firm believer of the grass isn’t always greener on the other side just for a paycheck. I did work for Karl Smesko. He stayed at FGCU and he made it his own, and made it into something that everybody recognizes. And I do see that in High Point. I think it can be a special place. I think it’s somewhere that you can build something pretty incredible.”
Banbury should have the resources to keep raising the bar at High Point. It’s one of five Big South programs that opted into the House Settlement, allowing them to share revenue directly with athletes. And with no football team, that leaves more funds for basketball.
So far this season, Banbury’s Panthers are 18-2 with their only losses coming at Houston and Davidson. All but three of their wins this season have been by double figures. High Point is excelling on both ends of the floor, ranking 28th nationally in effective field goal percentage (52.1) and 11th in points allowed per play (0.68). Macy Spencer, a transfer from UNLV who leads the Panthers in scoring with 18.9 points per game, ranks 10th nationally in 3-pointers made per game with 3.1.
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Put more simply: High Point is a team capable of pulling off a first round upset in the NCAA Tournament. They’re dominating in the Big South, they nearly escaped non-conference play unscathed, and the Panthers have what it takes to bust brackets in March.
“That’s definitely our goal going into every year and we try to recruit a team and maintain a team that we think can make that happen. We try to bring players in that can do that and I think that’s what we’ve done,” Banbury said.
Keep an eye on the Panthers as March Madness draws closer.
Winter weather impact
If Duke women’s basketball coach Kara Lawson and N.C. State men’s basketball coach Will Wade share something in common, they had the chance to talk about it on Saturday.
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Due to the impact of Winter Storm Fern — and because Duke and N.C. State were flying out of the same airport and playing in the same arena on Saturday — Lawson’s Blue Devils and Wade’s Wolfpack shared a charter flight to Pittsburgh.
Both Duke and N.C. State left Pitt with victories, and the shared flight was one of the many ways the winter storm that blanketed much of the East Coast affected college basketball this past weekend. Elsewhere in North Carolina’s Research Triangle, the UNC men and N.C. State women also considered sharing a chartered flight to Charlottesville, Virginia, but both wound up taking buses instead.
Games were moved around and rescheduled. Some were closed off to fans, and others had smaller TV crews working the game. The clash between UNC and Syracuse played on Sunday in Chapel Hill on ACC Network Xtra was presented with no broadcast team and a single camera panning back and forth across the court at Carmichael Arena. Fans that still tuned in — and perhaps synced up the stream with the radio call from UNC’s Matt Krause — saw the Tar Heels win in overtime behind 21 points and 11 rebounds from Nyla Harris.
Two games of consequence were pushed back.
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George Mason was set to host Richmond on Sunday in a battle between two of the top three teams in the Atlantic 10, but the game was rescheduled for Feb. 16.
In the SEC, Ole Miss was supposed to travel to Tennessee on Monday night, but the game has been postponed and a new date has yet to be set. While the Rebels have an open bye date on their schedule — Sunday, Feb. 8 — the Volunteers do not because they used their baked-in open date in SEC play to schedule UConn in a non-conference clash.
Tip-ins
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Riley Weiss had the best game of her career on Saturday for Columbia, pouring in a program record 40 points and grabbing a career-high eight rebounds in an 89-32 win over Dartmouth. She shot 9-of-13 from behind the arc, which tied the Lions’ program record for 3-pointers made in a single game.
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Duke guard Taina Mair joined some elite company this weekend, becoming the third Blue Devil in program history to tally at least 1,000 points, 500 rebounds and 500 assists in a career. The other two players to do that are former All-Americans Alana Beard and Lindsey Harding. Mair is one of seven players this season averaging at least 11 points, five rebounds and five assists per game.
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East Carolina has won 11 of its last 12 games and is 7-1 in the American, its best start to conference play in 40 years.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Around women’s hoops: Iowa starter lost, storm interrupts schedule, more
