“One of the hardest environments to play in”: NCAA analyst credits Iowa crowd for inspiring win vs USC

No Caitlin Clark, no problem. Despite missing Clark this season, the Iowa Lady Hawkeyes remain a force to be reckoned with as their Sunday victory over the USC Trojans proved. Iowa got an important upset over No. 7 USC, beating the Lady Trojans 76-69. It was also a day to celebrate, as Clark was back at Iowa City for her jersey retirement.

Speaking about the victory NBC Sports' show Got Next, college basketball analyst Meghan McKeown gave her take on what makes Iowa such an scary opponent (from 16:18):

"It's one of the hardest enviroments to play in. Like even, to put this into perspective, back when I played in 2010 to 2014 we won at Iowa one time. It's one of the hardest places because the fans have been showing up forever and now obviously season tickets are sold out... It was Caitlin Clark's jersey retirement...

"I'll never forget one time we lost so bad at Iowa my sophomore year our coaches took our, its a three and a half hour bus drive from Iowa City back to Chicago, our coaches took our phones and made us rewatch the game twice on the bus. I'll never forget it was the most... brutal drive back. And it's cause that atmosphere is so tough to play in front of and teams just crumble"

McKeown played for the Northwestern Wildcats from 2010 until 2014.

Caitlin Clark reacts to having her jersey retired at Iowa

Turnout was enourmous at Iowa City as it was to be expected, given that Caitlin Clark was scheduled to make an appearance for her jersey retirement ceremony. When speaking with the media, Clark reminisced about her time with the Hawkeyes:

"It’s been fun looking back on this whole past year and everything that's been able to happen. Just the journey we went on,"

She also took some time to thank the fans who attended the game:

"I'm pretty overwhelmed but there are so many people to thank."

Lucy Olsen was the standout for the Iowa Hawkeyes, scoring 28 points and recording four rebounds and four assists as they took down the seventh-ranked team in the nation.