Iowa coach refused to shake hands with North Dakota coaches after win

Published Dec. 21, 2016 7:12 a.m. ET

Nate Scott

The final buzzer sounded, and Iowa men's basketball coach Fran McCaffery waved at his team to get off the court. They were leaving.

McCaffery was upset at the behavior by opponent North Dakota in the closing seconds of an 84-73 Iowa win, and wasn't going to stick around to talk it out.

The entire second half of the game, which Iowa led nearly start to finish -- at times by as much as 19 points, had been physical, but it came to a head on the final play. After North Dakota's Corey Baldwin turned the ball over with a few seconds remaining, Iowa forward Nicholas Baer held it, happy to let the clock run out. Both teams appeared to accept that the game was over.

... Except for Baldwin, who ran up and forcibly ripped the ball out of Baer's hands, then tossed it to a teammate for a layup. The basket didn't count, and McCaffery, angry at the behavior, led his team off and refused to shake hands with anyone on the North Dakota staff.

https://twitter.com/BigTenNetwork/status/811425097781100544

After the game, McCaffrey had thoughts, via ESPN:

"I wasn't pleased with how the game ended and the things that happened," McCaffery told reporters after the game. "I'll say this, I have a lot of respect for [North Dakota head coach] Brian [Jones] and [assistant] Jeff Horner. I don't think they teach that stuff. But I was not having it. That's not the way to play.

... I told my players I was proud of them. You can't get caught up in that. The game was over."