Redbirds rumble, will face Knights
with a season-high 22 assists.
“Our senior leadership has been the key to our season the entire year and continues to be,” said ISU coach Dan Muller. “If you look across the country in this tournament there have been a lot of ‘upsets’ because they don't have the leadership we have.
“We, as coaches, try to do our job as far as mindset and motivation, but in the end our leadership is why we played well tonight and all year.”
Lee knew before the game Hawkins would be ready.
“Going through layup line, I could tell his whole facial expression when he was, like, let’s get this ‘W,’” said Lee. “That feeds off on the whole team because when we see Deontae going, it makes everyone want to go.“
The Redbirds were in attack mode from the opening tip. Defensively, ISU tried to force the tempo early by using full-court pressure that Muller said the players wanted to do.
“I’ve been preaching to be aggressive for a long time now,” said Muller. “It's contagious in some ways to see that ball go in.”
UC Irvine (21-15), the Big West Conference regularseason champion, was led by Jaron Martin's 24 points. Luke Nelson, the Big West Player of the Year, added 17 points. Both went 5-of-10 from 3-point range as the Anteaters hit 42.4 percent of their field goal attempts.
“Those two guards were really good and hit some incredible shots,“said Muller. ”All you want to do on defense is force a team to take tough shots. If they make them or not, you can’t control that.“
ISU, which led by nine at halftime, quickly expanded the lead to 58-40 after Hawkins and Lee sank backto-back 3-pointers with 15:35 left.