With balance and depth, Iowa men’s basketball team filled European baskets

Hawkeyes averaged 116 points over three wins in France and Spain, with Payton Sandfort and Tony Perkins playing like the veterans they are

Dwelling on statistics from a college basketball team’s overseas tour is useful only to a degree given the nature of the games and the opponents.

However, there are always things that jump out and can be seen as possible harbingers for the season ahead. Such as:

1. Payton Sandfort is ready for his close-up.

The junior wing not only averaged 19 points over Iowa’s three games in France and Spain, but 11 rebounds. He made 12 of 27 3-point tries.

This likely will be the first season in the last five in which Iowa doesn’t have a player average 20 points. It’s not a common thing to have one any year in the college game, but the Hawkeyes have had one in each of the last four seasons.

This year, the points will be more of a community thing. A whopping seven averaged double-figures in Europe as the team averaged 116 points. The opponents weren’t Michigan State, Maryland and Purdue, but 116 is 116.

Sandfort can be expected to take a jump upward from his 10.3 ppg and 4.1 rebounds of last season. The guy’s a player, not just a scorer.

2. Freshmen Owen Freeman and Brock Harding of Moline, Ill., aren’t going to do much waiting to be part of the mix.

Freeman had double-digit rebounds in each of the three games. Do it once, and maybe a big part of it is the ball coming to a player. Do it three straight times, and it’s the player going to the ball.

Freeman averaged 12.3 boards to go with 10.3 points. The Hawkeyes may not need a lot of offense from him in his first season, but they could sure use the rebounding.

Harding averaged 11.3 points, with a consistent 10, 12 and 12. He also averaged five assists over the first two games.

3. Tony Perkins is serious.

At the end of last season, Perkins said he wanted to become Iowa’s all-time best guard as a senior. It’s more than a high goal, it’s almost unattainable.

But he means it. He averaged 16.3 points on the trip. Though one might expect point guard minutes to be carved up among…