Iowa star Caitlin Clark keeps adding to her NCAA Tournament legacy, and along the way, she’s making her university’s football team look even worse.
According to TexasFootball.com, Clark has now scored 235 points across eight Big Ten and NCAA Tournament games, while the Hawkeyes managed just 230 points across 12 regular-season games and a Music City Bowl appearance in 2022.
Only eight FBS teams averaged fewer points per game than the Hawkeyes football team (17.7) last season, and they finished at 17 points or below in seven games en route to their 8-5 record behind quarterback Spencer Petras.
Clark, though, hasn’t struggled to string together points — and, specifically, 3-pointers — throughout Iowa’s postseason, which will reach its final game Sunday night in the national championship game.
In the Elite Eight and Final Four rounds against Louisville and South Carolina, respectively, Clark totaled 83 points. She even compiled a triple-double against the Cardinals.
Her performance against the Gamecocks — previously undefeated and entering as the No. 1 overall seed on a 42-game winning streak — set a record for points in a national semifinal, and the junior either scored or assisted on all 18 of Iowa’s fourth-quarter points in its 77-71 victory.
“We had nothing to lose. I have all the confidence in the world in this group, and they believe right back in me, and that’s all you need,” Clark told reporters following the game, according to the Associated Press. ”All we do is believe in one another and we love each other to death, and that’s what a true team is. If you want an example of a team, that’s what this is.”
Clark’s five-game, record-setting NCAA Tournament stretch marked the sixth time since 2000 that a player has scored more than 150 points and recorded more than 50 assists across any five-game span, according to ESPN Stats & Info.
The other five occasions have also been by Clark.
She has averaged 27.7 points per game in her third season with the Hawkeyes, earning the 2023 Naismith Player of the Year award as well as a second consecutive Big Ten Player of the Year award.
The Hawkeyes will face the Tigers on Sunday in Dallas, as LSU advanced to the title game by defeating No. 1-seed Virginia Tech in the earlier Final Four game on Friday.
