No. 22 is now No. 2: Clark moves up to second on NCAA all-time scoring list in win at Northwestern
The Caitlin Clark Experience came to Evanston on Wednesday evening, as Iowa’s star basketball guard tallied 35 points and 10 assists in a 110-74 win over Northwestern University.
Along the way, the 6-foot standout moved from fourth to second on the NCAA all-time scoring list in front of 7,039 spectators. The turnout was the most ever to see the NU women’s team play and more than quadruple a normal home game crowd at Welsh-Ryan Arena.
With the win the No. 3-ranked Hawkeyes moved to 20-2 on the season, 9-1 in Big Ten play. NU is 7-14, 2-8 in the conference.
Iowa shot 56% from the field, including 46% from beyond the 3-point line. The Wildcats shot 41.5%, including 39% outside the arc. The statistic that Iowa coach Lisa Bluder said she liked most was 28 assists versus only five turnovers for her offense.
Meanwhile, NU took good care of the ball, with only seven turnovers, though the team relied more on difficult 1-on-1 offensive play than the crisp passing that marked Iowa’s offense.
With a layup midway through the second quarter, Clark moved ahead of Kelsey Mitchell of Ohio State for second place all-time in NCAA scoring history and No. 1 in the Big Ten. She ended the game with 3,424 points, 103 shy of the No. 1 mark held by Washington’s Kelsey Plum. In the first quarter, she’d supplanted Missouri State’s Jackie Stiles as the No. 3 scorer, a status that lasted only until the next quarter.
Clark converted only 3 of 12 from 3-point land, prompting her to drive to the hoop increasingly as the game wore on. Usually she would make a layup, dish to an open teammate or draw a foul. She was 8 of 10 on 2-point tries, made all 10 of her free throws and had a game-high 10 assists.
Clark fed teammates liberally in the fourth quarter. That’s how, with 4:25 left, she found herself under the hoop with nobody guarding her.
After pivoting and looking for a teammate on the perimeter, she turned back toward the hoop without a defender draped on her, as was the Cats’ custom most of the night.
“Obviously in the fourth quarter I think they knew I was hunting assists a little bit. I faked them out. I faked myself out,” Clark said. “I don’t know if I’ve ever been so open and so many people screaming at me to shoot it. Usually that’s not a problem.”
A majority of the fans were delighted by the outcome — at least three-quarters of the fans were on Iowa’s side and gold and black garb vastly outnumbered NU purple.
“It would be nice to see every game … having the fans was energy-boosting for us,” said NU guard Melannie Daley, who had a team-high 19 points. “I would hope that after seeing us play, even though it wasn’t the outcome that we wanted, we’re a fun team to watch and they’ll come back.”
Iowa outscored NU by six to nine points in each of the first three quarters before a 37-24 fourth-quarter spree.
“I thought it was going to be a much closer game,” said NU forward Paige Mott. "We didn’t show up for 40 minutes…this was a rare occurrence that’ll never happen again.”