Hawkeyes Excited for Crossover at Kinnick

Iowa Hosting DePaul in Basketball Exhibition Sunday at Football Stadium

A look at the south end zone before Iowa Football's final spring practice on April 23, 2022 at Kinnick Stadium in Iowa City, Iowa. (Rob Howe/HawkeyeNation.com)

Caitlin Clark takes pride in her shooting, but she’s already issued a warning about Sunday’s “Crossover at Kinnick” exhibition game at Kinnick Stadium.

Iowa’s women’s basketball game against DePaul will be outside, with temperatures expected to be in the 50s. Combine that with shooting a ball outside in a football stadium, and well…

“There will be a couple of airballs there,” said Clark, the reigning national player of the year who is preparing for her senior season with the Hawkeyes. “So just expect it.”

The style and quality of play isn’t the most important thing. Approximately 48,000 tickets have been sold for the event, with the proceeds going to the university’s Stead Children’s Hospital that overlooks Kinnick Stadium.

It’s going to have everything a football Saturday would have at Kinnick — the Hawkeyes are going to come out of the tunnel, and at the end of the first quarter everyone will participate in “The Wave” to honor the children and the families watching from the hospital.

“We get to run out of the tunnel, do the ‘Wave,’ just like football does, the things you watch every weekend at a football game,” guard Gabbie Marshall said at Monday’s Big Ten women’s basketball media day in Minneapolis. “I think it’s going to be awesome to be a part of, and being down there doing it.”

“It means a lot having so much impact on these kids’ lives,” said forward Hannah Stuelke, who teared up as she spoke. “Now they get to watch us in person.”

“I think, myself, I’m looking forward to soaking it all in,” Clark said. “We want to go out there and play great basketball. But it’s a historic moment for our program, historic moment for women’s basketball in general.”

The event, which will be televised on BTN, will break the NCAA women’s basketball single-game attendance record. It comes just a couple of months after 97,000 fans packed Nebraska’s Memorial Stadium for a women’s volleyball event.

“I obviously watched the match at Lincoln. It was amazing,” said Iowa coach Lisa Bluder, who came up with the idea for the “Crossover” after seeing the size of the crowd that showed up for an on-campus celebration to celebrate the Hawkeyes going to the Final Four and the national championship game. “ Probably one of the best women's sporting events we've ever had, and elevated all women's sports. That was thrilling.

“We had planned this before we knew that they were going to be doing that at Nebraska, and I'm just thrilled that we had a staff, administration, that backed us in this, because as you may know, there's a lot of extra work that goes into putting a basketball court in a football field, and I'm just so proud of our administration that they've been behind us 100 percent with this.”

Bluder had already scheduled a scrimmage with DePaul for the second consecutive season.

(DePaul coach) Doug Bruno, he’s been around a long time, he’s a great guy,” Bluder said. “And he was fully on board. It was an easy ask.”

The key will be getting the weather to cooperate. Iowa had an outdoor wrestling event at Kinnick against Oklahoma State in November, 2015, on a warm, sunny afternoon.

“We would love to have that kind of weather,” Bluder said.

The forecast is for a partly sunny day with temperatures in the 50s. The key, Clark said, is for no moisture on the court, so a completely sunny day would be better.

“It looks like we’re going to be OK,” said Clark, who said she has been watching the weather forecast daily. “ I’ve never heard the word “dew point” so many times in my life. We’re just worried about moisture. Sounds like it’s going to be a good day.”

The Hawkeyes and Blue Demons will get a morning shootaround on Sunday.

“It will be nice to get a feel,” Clark said. “Obviously the depth perception is going to be a big deal in a football stadium. But we’ve played in big environments, big arenas before. So it’s not something you think about getting into the flow of the game.”

Clark said the last time she shot at an outdoor basket was in 2000, during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Gabbie and (former teammate) Megan Meyer and I went to a park,” she said, laughing. “I don’t think there’s any way to prepare to be outside, unless you want to go shoot outside. But I haven’t done that in some time.”