Iowa's Ava Heiden Brings Home Another B1G Award

For the third time in her career, Iowa Hawkeyes center Ava Heiden has been named B1G Player of the Week.

Seeing as she was also the Naismith Player of the Week, which is awarded to the best player in the country, this award comes as no surprise. Heiden has won all three of her B1G weekly honors this season, a year where she's grown extremely comfortable with this program.

Second year head coach Jan Jensen knew she'd have an extremely young team this year, but that clearly hasn't been a detriment. Heiden is getting better each and every game and that's a scary sight for the B1G knowing she still has two more years of eligibility.

Heiden's Dominating B1G Week

She’s a beast. She’s a baller. 🤭💪@ava_heiden is the Big Ten Player of the Week! pic.twitter.com/CqIjx92OG7
— Iowa Women's Basketball (@IowaWBB) February 23, 2026

Not often do the Hawkeyes play three conference games in a one-week span, but that's exactly what happened this time around. Heiden led her team to victories over Nebraska, Purdue, and No. 6 Michigan.

Even though Michigan is still ranked higher than Iowa, Heiden continues to ride a huge wave of momentum. In each of those games she had a 20-point double-double, a statistic that doesn't seem humanly possible for a sophomore.

During those three games she averaged 24.0 points, 11.3 rebounds, 3.3 assists, 2.0 steals and 1.6 blocks. Heiden has truly been unstoppable as she's fourth in the country with her 64% field goal percentage. With just two games remaining, Heiden has one final chance to bring home another weekly conference award.

Efficiency at its Finest

Iowa C Ava Heide — Iowa center Ava Heiden (5) and Iowa guard Chit-Chat Wright (11) react during a game against the Michigan Wolverines Feb. 22, 2026 at Carver-Hawkeye Arena in Iowa City, Iowa. | Julia Hansen/Iowa City Press-Citizen / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

Heiden's field goal percentage is something to behold as she is one of the most efficient players in the entire country. It's brought up time and time again that she's only a sophomore, but that just makes things like this even more impressive.

Heiden was 33-44 from the field during this three-game stretch. There aren't many players in the nation who shoot 75% with that large of a sample size in a three-game sample size, but that goes to show how talented and poised Heiden is for her age.

Iowa's season continues to wind down and Heiden will have one final regular season game at home on February 26 against Illinois. The Fighting Illini are Iowa's most difficult game remaining as after that they'll head to Madison to play a Wisconsin team that hasn't won a game since January 21.

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