IOWA CITY — After talking with Iowa women’s basketball captain Taylor Stremlow recently, my mind immediately flashed back and downloaded a memorable interview from May 2022.
It was a hot spring morning four years ago in West Des Moines, and I was invited to observe a private workout with Caitlin Clark, who was preparing for her junior season at the University of Iowa with Kevin O’Hare, her trainer at Dowling Catholic High School. Clark’s fire always has burned deep, but it was really burning during this feverish shooting and conditioning session. She shared that her older brother Blake had been continuing to text her visual reminders of Iowa’s second-round NCAA Tournament loss to Creighton a few months earlier. He knew how to get under her skin, in a good way.
“It gets you going on the inside a little bit,” Clark said in May 2022, about 10 months before her fame truly exploded. “It just makes you want to work even harder and prove everybody wrong.”
Clark’s sophomore year was a breakthrough on many levels. She led the Hawkeyes to a share of the Big Ten Conference regular season title, then the conference-tournament championship, the first sellout of Carver-Hawkeye Arena for a women’s game since 1988 and a No. 2 seed in the NCAA Tournament. But the ending, a 64-62 home loss to a No. 10 seed in which she shot 4-for-19, put an abrupt bow on that excitement.
Clark added, “I think that’s the fire we might need going into next year.”
We know how this story turned out. Clark and the Hawkeyes reached the next two national-championship games. They captivated a fan base and a women’s basketball-watching nation. An average of 18.9 million TV viewers (with peak viewership of 24.1 million) watched Clark’s final college game, an 87-75 Iowa loss to South Carolina.
Flash forward four years and one month from Clark’s May 2022 interview, and it’s déjà vu. Stremlow, the fiery leader of the Hawkeyes, is still steaming about Iowa’s NCAA Tournament home loss to No. 10-seeded Virginia in double overtime that stunningly ended the No. 2 seed’s season at 27-7.
“Hate to lose. Hate to lose in Carver,” Stremlow said during a June 25 media session. She shot a regretful 2-for-13 vs. Virginia. “Hate to lose when we should have won, in my opinion. Just knowing that I can and I will do better — and that we as a program can and will do better… I know that returning group feels that fire, and the coaches definitely do.”
That quote sounds familiar, doesn’t it?
Now we’ll see what vibe comes from it. The 2025-26 Hawkeyes were young and overachieved their preseason expectations. The 2026-27 Hawkeyes, despite bringing in four players from the transfer portal, plus two freshmen, have a veteran feel with a high ceiling and expectations to match. A Sweet 16 appearance feels like the minimum bar for head coach Jan Jensen’s third squad.
The 2022-23 Iowa Hawkeyes in Clark’s junior year took time to calibrate, losing at Kansas State, at home to North Carolina State and at Illinois in the season’s first two months. But once they got humming, they were nearly unstoppable.
No player will compare to Clark again, ever. She’s one of one. But the Creighton burn and her junior-year Hawkeyes are an apt, potentially parallel history lesson to tuck away as the dog days of summer practice unfold for the 2026-27 Iowa women’s basketball team.
Ava Heiden determined to expand her game
In addition to breaking some major news in saying she plans to stay at Iowa for the next three seasons (thanks to new NCAA eligibility guidance), Ava Heiden offered encouraging updates on her development.
Heiden became a relentless producer during her sophomore season, finishing at 18.0 points per game and earning first-team All-Big Ten status. Her athleticism and ability to finish near the rim were too much for most opponents to handle. She gradually got better at avoiding foul trouble. By the end of the year, about the only thing she lacked was supporting-cast help.
The 6-foot-4 center is known as a relentless worker and certainly hasn’t rested on her breakthrough season.
“I don’t want to stay stagnant, as to where my skill level was last year,” Heiden said. “This summer I’ve been implementing some new stuff.”
Her summer focus has been heavy reps in three areas:
“She really wants to focus on adding some different weapons to her bag,” Jensen said.
With McKenna Woliczko, Iowa has more size … and speed
As previously reported, Iowa is returning to a “four-out, one-in” offense that features four wings and one post, as compared to the “three-out” offense run last year with Hannah Stuelke at the 4 (power forward) and Heiden at the 5 (center).
Yet the Hawkeyes clearly look like a much longer team than they were last year.
Two new additions are a big reason for that. Jocelyn Faison, a 6-foot-1 Georgia transfer, brings a lanky, left-handed wing who was brought in to help create offense and be a lockdown defender. McKenna Woliczko, the prized 6-2 freshman forward, glided down the floor like a gazelle during Iowa’s transition drills, almost going too fast on the fast break. That’s a good problem to have.
Woliczko doesn’t need added pressure, but how quickly she assimilates to the Iowa system will impact how high the ceiling for this particular team can be. She has the potential to lock down the 4 spot for 25-plus minutes a game with high-level play (and get solid backup from Journey Houston, who Jensen said would alternate between the 3 and 4 spots) while allowing Iowa to play fast without sacrificing rebounds.
“She’s just able to do so many things, and she runs the floor, man,” Jensen said of her initial Woliczko impressions. “She’s just a pretty basketball player when she’s running. When she starts to understand the reads, she’s going to be a hard guard. Because she’s got a pretty quick first step. And she can finish beautifully. And she gets rebounds that you don’t think she’s going to get.”
Woliczko shot the 3-pointer very well during the one-hour session open to media, but that’s an area of development in the San Bruno, California, native’s game. She ideally needs to add some bulk this summer.
“She knows that she’s got a lot to learn, but she also knows that she’s got a lot of different weapons. She’s really versatile,” Jensen said. “Her 3 ball will get more and more consistent.”
Last year, Stuelke would slide to the 5 to back up Heiden. The plan this year is for 6-5 sophomore Layla Hays to take the next step in her development and serve as Heiden’s sole backup. Hays has had a strong spring and early summer, coaches said, and allows Iowa to bring waves of size into the middle of that four-out offense.
“I don’t want (Hays’ minutes) just to be for breathers or just because of (Heiden’s) foul trouble,” Jensen said. “I want it to be a decision that’s going to behoove us, and Layla can do that.”
Amari Whiting brings personality, defense to Iowa City
Point guard Chit-Chat Wright was scheduled to meet the media but had to jet out early for a class after practice ran long. But Jensen said Wright has gotten more assertive going into her junior year, a needed step in her development.
Newcomer Dani Carnegie, the marquee guard transfer from Georgia, is likely assisting Wright’s increased comfort level. The two are longtime friends and former AAU teammates. But Carnegie wasn’t present at the media viewing as she competes for Team USA’s 3-on-3 national team and won’t return until early July.
However, another prominent newcomer did greet the Iowa media on June 25: Oklahoma State transfer Amari Whiting, who seems like a breath of fresh air — especially in the departments of personality, leadership (she and Knox College transfer Bria Medina are the only seniors) and defense.
“She’s a sponge, she’s a quick learner,” Jensen said. “Coach’s kids are usually used to getting out of comfort zones, they’re used to trying new things and failing.”
Whiting’s early message to Hawkeye fans and coaches is basically, “whatever the team needs.” Whiting, who played her first two college seasons at BYU under her mother Amber, has a selfless and scrappy reputation as a defender.
“I want to guard the hardest guard every night,” Whiting, who has started all 97 games of her college career, said. “I think that’s something that takes heart, and I can show up for my team every night with that. Also, just get buckets.”
Though a 30.1% career shooter from long range, Whiting’s 3-point shot looked good in front of the media. The hope is that she can replace what Kylie Feuerbach brought as Iowa’s All-Big Ten defensive team stopper (Whiting is listed at 5-10 vs. Feuerbach’s 6-0) and add more offense. Whiting owns a career scoring average of 10.1 points per game.
Whiting beamed about her early impressions as a Hawkeye. It feels like a win-win transfer fit, and now she could stay for two years with the new NCAA rules. Also, it’s way too early to say whether Whiting or Stremlow will start at the 3 position for the Hawkeyes.
“Jan has been really pushing me offensively,” Whiting said. “When I’m out there, it’s not that I’m one-sided, it’s, ‘Hey, you’ve got to be a threat on the other end.’ … I’m excited she’s given me a lot of freedom. I feel like I’m able to relax here and just kind of turn off my brain and play.”
Hawkeyes columnist Chad Leistikow has served for 31 years with The Des Moines Register and USA TODAY Sports Network. Chad is the 2023 INA Iowa Sports Columnist of the Year and NSMA Co-Sportswriter of the Year in Iowa. Join Chad’s text-message group at HawkCentral.com/HawkeyesTexts. Follow @ChadLeistikow on X.
This article originally appeared on Hawk Central: 4 fresh thoughts from an Iowa women’s basketball practice | Leistikow
Reporting by Chad Leistikow, Des Moines Register / Hawk Central
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Chad Leistikow, Des Moines Register | USA TODAY Network
