Patrick McCaffery Focused on Consistency

Iowa Junior Motivated on Court, Rec Softball Diamond

Patrick McCaffery wants to become a more consistent player.

In basketball.

And … in slow-pitch softball.

The Iowa junior forward was more than happy to talk about his games during a media availability last week — his basketball, and his softball.

First, there was the softball.

“We’re struggling. My team’s really struggling,” McCaffery said. “I kind of feel like Mike Trout. I lead our team in home runs, I think I’m high in batting average, but we just lose.”

McCaffery is his team’s second baseman — at 6-foot-9, he’s a rather tall second baseman.

He’s not bad defensively.

“You know, they don’t really hit it there much,” McCaffery said. “I think I’ve made more plays than I’ve made errors. Which is more than I can say for some of my teammates.”

But basketball is clearly McCaffery’s best sport, and he wants to get even better this season.

The fourth-year junior is Iowa’s leading returning scorer at 10.5 points per game. He was a 42.2 percent shooter from the field last season, 33 percent in 3-pointers. Nice numbers, but he wants more.

“You could just pick my best statistical game and say, ‘Oh, that’s my standard,’” he said. “Well, I think it’s more about improving overall. It starts with consistency. I feel like there were games where I played well, games where I didn’t play well. I think it’s just (about) being more consistent, night in and night out. I think I was consistent in my scoring last year, but I want to take it another level up. Because that’s what separates everyone else — the consistency.”

McCaffery opened last season by scoring in double figures in six of Iowa’s first seven games, and he had a six-game stretch during Big Ten play in which he averaged 13.2 points. He scored a career-high 18 points in Iowa’s 71-59 win over Minnesota on January 16, and he matched that in the Hawkeyes’ season-ending loss to Richmond in the NCAA tournament.

Fran McCaffery, Iowa’s coach and Patrick’s father, knows his son can be better offensively.

“His shooting has really improved,” Fran McCaffery said. “He’s got to improve his rebounding, and he knows that. But I think you’ll see his shooting numbers improve.”

Patrick is at his best on the perimeter — he was a 33 percent shooter in 3-pointers last season — and that’s another place where he wants consistency.

“My coach, my dad, whatever you want to call him, wants me to take and make more threes,” Patrick said. “So that’s been something I’ve been working on.”

The Hawkeyes will have a deep team this season, with plenty of length, with Patrick and 6-8 forward Kris Murray being complementary frontcourt pieces.

“I think I’m probably more of a perimeter player, handling the ball more, whereas Kris is probably going to be more of an inside presence than I will be,” Patrick said. We’re the same size, but we play differently. And I think we compliment each other really well.

“We definitely have a lot of (length). That definitely fits our playing style — long, athletic guys who can do a lot of different things with the ball. There’s just a lot of ways we could go, a lot of different options we can throw out there.”