Iowa football coach Kirk Ferentz met with the media Monday, as the teams prepares to begin spring drills Wednesday. The Hawkeyes lose five starters on offense, three on defense and must find a new punter.Ferentz says the good thing about graduation is that it creates new opportunities for the returning players as they says goodbye to those who graduated.

The players have 15 spring practices to show their stuff. “One thing about football, our opportunities to practice football, to be in helmets is so limited. So, be it in the spring and then certainly preseason — those opportunities are very limited. Each and every workout is important, each and every practice, the meetings that we have that go along with it, as well as our strength and conditioning work that continues is very important to the players. And I think they understand that,” Ferentz says.

Ferentz says the lines return experience, but they’ll need to find players to complement them. He says they are very young and inexperienced on the perimeter from the receivers to the defensive backs. “I’d throw the quarterback situation right in there with it… we will have a new quarterback, I”m not sure who that’s going to be right now.”

Receiver Matt Vandeberg won a redshirt year after being injured last year, but has been sidelined again with another foot injury and will miss the spring practices. Ferentz says it wasn’t a matter of him trying to come back too early. “He really had a chance to play in the bowl game, that thing was well healed when he got back in January. That’s just one of those things that happens occasionally and there’s not much we can do about it,” according to Ferentz.

The Hawkeyes announced they will hold an open practice for the fifth year in a row at Valley Stadium in West Des Moines on April 7th. Ferentz says they are excited to go back to central Iowa and says it’s a small way to says thank you to the fans who come from the area to Iowa City in the fall. He says they also decided to move the spring game to Friday night as something the fans might like.

Iowa is coming off an 8-5 season where they lost their fifth straight bowl game. They open the 2017 football season September 2nd hosting Wyoming.

(Learfield Sports)

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The St. Louis Cardinals announced three transactions following Monday night’s 12-6 win over the Houston Astros in West Palm Beach. Outfielder Todd Cunningham and catcher Gabriel Lino were re-assigned to minor league camp while infielder Breyvic Valera was optioned to Memphis (AAA). The transactions reduce the number of players in the team’s Major League camp to 44, including 12 non-roster invitees.

Sunday afternoon, the Cards optioned outfielder Anthony Garcia and right-handed pitcher Rowan Wick to the Memphis Redbirds (AAA) roster and re-assigned right-handed pitcher Josh Lucas and left-handed pitcher Zach Phillips to their minor league camp.

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — There was bound to be a glitch or two during the first spring training at the Ballpark of the Palm Beaches, the new facility shared by the Houston Astros and Washington Nationals. That includes the sprinkler system.

With the St. Louis Cardinals one out from winning the first night game in the history of the ballpark Monday, the sprinklers along the right-field line came on prematurely, delaying the team’s game against Houston for a couple of minutes.

“First year,” Cardinals manager Mike Matheny said afterward with a smile. Once the sprinklers turned off, Miguel Socolovich induced a groundout to end St. Louis’ 12-6 victory over the Astros.

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IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) — Alex Robinson and Vladimir Brodziansky each scored 19 points and TCU survived 94-92 in overtime against No. 1 seeded Iowa on Sunday to advance to the NIT quarterfinals. TCU was playing without starting guard Jaylen Fisher, who broke his wrist and is out for the season.

The Horned Frogs (21-15) led 84-82 in the final seconds when Iowa’s Tyler Cook finished a layup to tie it and send the game to overtime.

TCU never trailed in the extra period, and a Kenrich Williams dunk with 3:02 left gave the Horned Frogs an 88-86 lead they held the rest of the way. TCU built a six-point lead with 24 seconds left. A Jordan Bohannon 3 for Iowa trimmed the lead to two (94-92), but the Hawkeyes ran out of time.

The Horned Frogs (21-15) will host the Oakland-Richmond winner Tuesday for a spot in the NIT final four. Bohannon had a career-high 25 points for Iowa (19-15) and hit seven 3-pointers. Peter Jok added 22 in his final game as a Hawkeye. The win is TCU’s first ever against Iowa and the first meeting between the schools since 1948.

MILWAUKEE (AP) — Caleb Swanigan had 20 points, 12 rebounds and seven assists, and Purdue reached the Sweet 16 for the first time in seven years with a wild 80-76 victory over Iowa State on Saturday night.

The Cyclones erased a 19-point deficit in the second half, taking their first lead of the game on Deonte Burton’s two free throws with 3:11 left. But P.J. Thompson responded with a critical 3-pointer for the Boilermakers, and Swanigan made several huge plays in the final minutes.

After Dakota Mathias missed the front end of a 1-and-1 with 11 seconds left and Purdue clinging to a 78-76 lead, Swanigan tracked down the rebound to set up Thompson’s free throws with 7 seconds remaining. Monte Morris missed a 3 on the other end, and time ran out for Iowa State.

Vince Edwards had 21 points and 10 rebounds for Purdue (27-7), and Isaac Haas finished with 14 points.

The Iowa Hawkeyes men’s basketball team earned its first-ever No. 1 seed in the National Invitation Tournament and will host fourth-seeded TCU Horned Frogs on Sunday in the second round. Tipoff is scheduled for 4:01 p.m. (CT) on Mediacom Court at Carver-Hawkeye Arena. The winning team will face the winner of No. 7 seed Oakland and sixth-seeded Richmond in the quarterfinals.

You can hear the action on KJAN, which is part of the Hawkeye Radio Network, beginning at 3-p.m. with the pre-game show. Gary Dolphin handles the play-by-play, while Bob Hansen provides expert analysis.

IOWA CITY, Iowa –The Iowa Hawkeye women’s basketball team bounced defending champion South Dakota 78-73 Saturday afternoon in a second-round WNIT game at Carver-Hawkeye Arena. 6-foot 3 Sophomore Center Megan Gustafson finished 15-of-16 from the floor and scored a career-high 33 points. Gustafson also had 13 rebounds to tally her 17th double-double of the season, as Iowa improved to 19-13.

The University of Iowa women’s basketball team will host Colorado (17-15) in Round Three of the WNIT on Thursday, March 23 at 7 p.m. (CT). Colorado defeated UNLV, 66-52, on March 16 in Boulder, Colorado, before downing South Dakota State, 81-75, in overtime on Sunday in Brookings, South Dakota.

Gustafson set both a school and arena record for field-goal accuracy (minimum 15 made field goals), and the Hawkeyes needed every one of them Saturday. Most of Kathleen Doyle’s seven assists went to Gustafson or Hannah Stewart, who added 11 points on 5-of-6 shooting from the floor. Doyle now has 138 assists, a school freshman record. She broke Samantha Logic’s mark of 136 established in 2011-12. Doyle also set a freshman steals record earlier in the season.

Senior Ally Disterhoft, who became the Hawkeyes’ career scoring leader in Thursday’s first-round WNIT victory against Missouri State, added 10 points to help keep her college career alive.

(HawkeyeSport.com)

MANHATTAN, Kan. (AP) – Breanna Lewis had 23 points and 11 rebounds, Kindred Wesemann added 16 points and seventh-seeded Kansas State beat No. 10 seed Drake 67-54 on Saturday in the opening round of the NCAA Tournament.

The Wildcats (23-10) took the lead in the game’s opening minutes and never relinquished it, even though the Bulldogs (28-5) never made things easy. That allowed Kansas State to ease into a matchup with No. 2 seed Stanford on Monday night for a spot in the Sweet 16.

Like they had against Drake, the Wildcats will again have the benefit of playing at home. The NCAA selection committee awarded them the right to host the opening rounds when Stanford had a conflict at Maples Pavilion, a testament to the crowd support Kansas State has enjoyed over the years.

Lizzy Wendell scored 17 for Drake, which carried the nation’s second-longest winning streak at 22 games into the tournament. Becca Hittner added 13 points and Sammie Bachrodt had 10.