Iowa's Jordan Bohannon goes wild on 3s after injury scare

COLLEGE PARK, Md. — Iowa’s starting point guard was in the hospital Friday, and its star shooting guard’s shoulder has flared up again.

So, of course, Jordan Bohannon and Peter Jok went ahead to combine for 11-for-16 shooting from 3-point range in the Hawkeyes’ 83-69 win at No. 24 Maryland on Saturday.

Bohannon was thought to have suffered a broken left finger while he reached for a steal in Friday’s practice back in Iowa City. He said his entire hand got bent back.

“We sent him for X-rays before we got on the plane, and it was negative,” Iowa coach Fran McCaffery said. “Good thing it was. Maybe he should hurt the other finger.”

The coach was quipping because Bohannon was in one of his shooting zones Saturday.

Already the school’s freshman record-holder for 3-pointers in a season, Bohannon rained in a career-high eight 3-pointers on 10 attempts — some coming from NBA distance.

“Once the game started, I didn’t really notice it,” Bohannon said. “My brothers (who all three played Division I basketball) are telling me that everyone’s banged up at this point, so a finger shouldn’t really bother you. I kind of took that approach."

We've seen Bohannon get hot before on the road. He buried seven 3-pointers at Notre Dame in his first career start. But he needed 15 attempts to get there on Nov. 29; on Saturday, he rarely hit rim.

With swish after swish, Bohannon finished one 3-pointer shy of tying Chris Kingsbury’s school mark of nine 3s in a game (he did it twice in 1994). Bohannon’s eight tied him with Justin Johnson (twice in 2008) and Devan Bawinkel (2009) on the single-game list.

He now has 68 3-pointers this season. Not bad for a first-year point guard.

“When Jordan’s shooting the ball like that, it changes our team tremendously,” teammate Ahmad Wagner said. “The way people are playing Pete, the more people are going to be open. When Jordan’s hitting shots, it makes us really, really hard to guard.”

Speaking of Jok, he was battling through more pain Saturday. His right (shooting) shoulder has been acting up. He’s also been slowed by a bad back, so he was thrilled to let Bohannon (24 points) and Tyler Cook (21) take a central role Saturday.

Jok, still the Big Ten Conference's leading scorer, finished with 11 points on 3 of 6 shooting from 3-point range.

“The guys were rolling tonight, so I didn’t try to force anything,” Jok said. “They actually picked me up tonight. I was really happy for that. Jordan and Tyler were hot.”