Iowa beats 12th-ranked Louisville on Maui
Associated Press
LAHAINA, Maui — Iowa stayed close in the first half against Louisville yesterday in the opening round of the Maui Invitational. The Hawkeyes dominated the next 20 minutes.
Jeff Horner scored 11 points in a 4 1/2-minute span of the second half, part of a nine-minute stretch when Iowa held No. 12 Louisville without a field goal, and the Hawkeyes went on to a 76-71 victory.
In other opening-round games, No. 15 Texas defeated host Chaminade, 84-62; No. 11 North Carolina routed Brigham Young, 86-50; and Tennessee stopped Stanford, 69-57.
Iowa (2-0) will play Texas and North Carolina faces Tennessee in the semifinals today.
"I thought in the second half we performed extremely well," Iowa coach Steve Alford said. "I thought our defense went to another level and we executed offensively."
That happened after a challenge from the coach to his players.
"At halftime I told them we were down four points to a team that shot 61 percent. I told them they weren't going to shoot 61 percent again so we had to step up, concentrate and play defense," Alford said. "I really challenged Jeff, Adam (Haluska) and Pierre (Pierce). I wouldn't trade those three guys for anybody and I thought in the first half they weren't themselves. They did what we knew they would, they responded to the challenge."
Juan Palacios scored inside with 11:39 to play to give Louisville (1-1) a 48-42 lead. That was the Cardinals' last field goal for nine minutes as Iowa went up 67-56. Louisville missed 10 shots in that span and managed just eight points, all on free throws.
"Give them all the credit, they played a much better second half," Louisville coach Rick Pitino said. "We played a good first half and then did not run our offense efficiently, did not get as much enjoyment out of our passing and they did a much better job on defense in the second half."
No. 11 NO. Carolina 86, Brigham Young 50
Raymond Felton made quite a difference for North Carolina.
After missing the season-opening loss to Santa Clara because of an NCAA suspension, the junior guard returned to anchor North Carolina's defense in an easy victory over BYU.
North Carolina (1-1) opened against BYU (0-1) with a 25-3 run and led by as many as 39. Felton finished with six points and seven assists in 26 minutes. Sean May added 18 points and eight rebounds.
No. 15 TEXAS 84, CHAMINADE 62
Texas was having trouble with fouls and Chris Reaves' 3-point shooting. The 15th-ranked Longhorns were able to overcome both and beat Chaminade
"We came in knowing there's a lot of things we have to work on and we got in foul trouble early and had to work through it," Texas coach Rick Barnes said. "We had a couple of guys trying to do too much and they just have to learn to let it come to them."
P.J. Tucker had 15 points and 11 rebounds for Texas (2-0).
Reaves hit his first six 3-point attempts, finished 8 for 10 from long range and had 33 points for the Silverswords (1-1).
Tennessee 69, Stanford 57
Scooter McFagdon scored 21 points and keyed big scoring runs in each half to lead Tennessee (1-0) over Stanford (1-1).
McFagdon had seven points in the 11-0 run that gave the Volunteers a 17-6 lead midway through the first half. He scored the final six points of a 12-2 run midway through the second half.
