After last winter’s run to the Elite Eight, Iowa men’s basketball is walking into the 2026-27 season with a different kind of pressure on its shoulders. Ben McCollum’s group did something no Iowa coach or team had done in nearly 40 years, and now the bar has been raised.
The Hawkeyes already know who the headliners are supposed to be. Last season, Bennett Stirtz, Alvaro Folgueiras and Tavion Banks carried the scoring, rebounding and the biggest moments.
Tate Sage, Kael Combs and Cooper Koch also delivered when the NCAA Tournament tightened up, helping Iowa keep moving even when Stirtz wasn’t shooting it well. With Stirtz and the others gone, Sage, Combs and Koch are now expected to handle more of the scoring, distributing and playmaking load.
Add 7-foot-3 Andrew McKeever into the mix, and Iowa has its main rebounder and rim protector in place.
That still leaves the bigger question: who becomes the difference-maker when the game gets messy? Who is the player who swings a night one way or the other? Four names stand out.
Ty’Reek Coleman is the portal pickup who should help steady the backcourt. Iowa brought him in from Illinois State and the Missouri Valley Conference to ease some of the burden on Combs after Stirtz’s departure.
He still looks like a player adjusting to Big Ten speed and physicality, but the traits are obvious. Coleman has a tight handle, can fly in transition, defends with edge and shot the three well last season for the Redbirds.
McCollum and his staffs have a strong track record with guards, and Coleman is only in his second year of college basketball, with the new five-for-five rule also working in his favor. He doesn’t need to be the lead guard - Combs appears to have that job - but if Coleman can give Iowa a three-and-D option off the bench, that’s a real win.
Isaia Howard brings a different kind of value. His athleticism and defense jump off the page, and McCollum can use him in a lot of ways because of his length, toughness and ability to switch.
Howard can put the ball on the floor, run the floor as a lob threat and take the occasional three. The issue last season was consistency from deep.
There was no middle ground with his shot - it was either a miss or a make, with little in between. On a team that already struggled with shooting and spacing, that forced Stirtz into too many difficult offensive possessions.
Without Stirtz around to cover for those rough stretches, Howard’s shooting has to improve if Iowa wants to be more reliable in the half court. The defense and effort are there.
The next step has to come on offense.
Trevin Jirak looked like the standout at Iowa’s practice open to the media on Wednesday, and the picture around him is intriguing. He appears to have changed his body in the offseason while keeping the kind of offensive skill set that makes him unusual for a Big Ten big man.
A 6-foot-11 center who used to play guard before a big growth spurt in high school, Jirak still sees the floor like someone who grew up on the perimeter. He’s a strong passer for his position and showed more confidence in his jumper on Wednesday, willingly firing from outside and knocking down several shots.
The question is what happens on the other end. Can he handle smaller, quicker forwards or guards if he has to?
If he shares the floor with McKeever or Cam Manyawu, one of those two may have to take on perimeter defensive duties. If Iowa can make that work, a two-big lineup with Jirak and McKeever or Manyawu could be very interesting.
Then there’s Trey Thompson, one of the more intriguing long-term pieces in the program. The four-star forward reclassified and picked Iowa in the class of 2025, but the old eligibility rules forced him to redshirt last season, so he never got on the floor.
That changes now. At 6-foot-8, Thompson fits the mold McCollum has often worked with: those hybrid players between 6-foot-7 and 6-foot-9 who can dribble, pass, shoot and defend multiple spots.
There hasn’t been much buzz around him this offseason or last, and he didn’t exactly jump off the page at Wednesday’s practice, though there were a couple brief flashes of encouraging playmaking. With Sage or Koch off the court, Thompson is expected to come in off the bench and help replace some of what they bring in shooting and defense against similar-sized players.
He arrived as one of McCollum’s first major recruiting wins at Iowa, and if the Hawkeyes are going to keep climbing, Thompson will need to be more than just present. He’ll need to look like the four-star prospect he was billed to be.
In Other News...
Iowa Names Are Starting To Stand Out In NBA Summer League
Iowas footprint in NBA Summer League was hard to miss in July, with a cluster of former Hawkeyes and Iowa natives turning up across rosters and events. The group included Hason Ward, Josh Dix, Keshon Gilbert, Brendan Hausen, Payton Sandfort, Bennett Stirtz, Joshua Jefferson, Curtis Jones, Tamin Lipsey, Mitch Mascari and Trey Campbell, and several of them found ways to contribute with points, rebounds and assists while wearing colors from teams such as the Warriors, Thunder and Hawks.
What made the run notable was not just the number of names, but how many of them looked comfortable in the setting. Gilbert had one of the sharper stretches, Sandfort showed he could score in bunches, and Stirtz emerged as one of the more productive Iowa-connected players in Las Vegas. For a program that has long sold itself on development and pro readiness, that kind of summer visibility is the sort of thing that gets noticed well beyond Iowa City. [Read more 🡒]
Iowa May Have Its Next Tight End Star Sooner Than Expected
DJ Vonnahmes rise has been one of the more encouraging developments for Iowas offense, especially at a position where the Hawkeyes have long expected tight ends to do more than just catch passes. Since last season, Vonnahme has grown noticeably in confidence, blocking and receiving, and coaches and teammates have taken note of the work ethic, route running and football intelligence that helped him become a bigger part of the attack.
He also gave Iowa something it badly needed in the passing game, finishing 2025 with team highs in receptions, receiving yards and touchdowns. Now the challenge shifts from breakout to follow-up, because Vonnahme knows defenses are going to spend more time trying to take away what he does best, and how he handles that attention could say plenty about just how quickly his ceiling keeps rising. [Read more 🡒]
Trevin Jirak Is Suddenly Back In Iowas Frontcourt Conversation
Trevin Jirak entered Iowas offseason as a big man with a limited freshman rsum and a long runway ahead of him, and the new five-for-five eligibility rule only widened that window. What has changed is the conversation around him. After spending the year mostly on the margins, Jirak has drawn more attention in practice thanks to a noticeable jump in conditioning, skill level and confidence, enough for the coaching staff to start talking about him as more than just depth in the frontcourt.
The appeal is not hard to see for Iowa. Jirak brings a different kind of look inside, and the staff has been willing to test how that fits with the rest of the roster. He has also shown enough versatility to make the staff think about where he can help most, whether that is stretching the floor or handling bigger matchups. For a team always searching for useful pieces in the frontcourt, Jirak has gone from afterthought to someone worth watching closely. [Read more 🡒]