IOWA CITY -- Iowa picked up a 103-74 victory over Northern Illinois on Friday night in Carver Hawkeye Arena.

Here are three takeaways from the final non-conference game of the season for the Hawkeyes.

As one can tell by the final score, the Hawkeyes and Huskies put up a ridiculous amount of shots on Friday night -- 84 for Iowa and 58 for NIU, a total of 142.

"We want to run the entire 40 minutes of the game and keep attacking," Ben Krikke said postgame. "I think teams wear out defensively, because we're just trying to be relentless and get easy layups. We work on that every day in practice."

The Hawkeyes knew NIU wanted to get out and run, too. The amount of shots taken wasn't something that caught them by surprise.

"Coach kind of explained to us before [the game], that they like to get up and down," Owen Freeman said. "It was kind of like we were playing against ourselves a little bit."

You know that guy in pickup basketball games that chucks up a bunch of threes, attempts acrobatic layups around the rim and refuses to play defense? That's NIU in a nutshell.

With a bunch of athletes in varying sizes who are willing to launch a shot from anywhere, the Huskies took full advantage of Iowa's lackluster defense.

"I think our ball-screen defense -- we were too far back," Krikke said. "And then closing out the guys -- we were just a little bit short. The last couple days we wanted to close out a little bit higher to contest shooters and not give them a thought of shooting. We just a little short, so they got those shots off [in the first half].

In the first half, it was beneficial for NIU, as the Huskies shot 66.7 percent from the floor and 72.7 percent from three.

"It's not the first time they've had a performance like that," Fran McCaffery said. "They went on a 27-2 run at Monmouth, they were beating Northwestern at halftime and they were up 20 against DePaul on the road. They do this all the time -- they're a very explosive team.

"We did not get up into their space like we had prepared for -- whether it's a ball screen or not, you've got to get up in their space."

It didn't pay off in the second half.

NIU shot just 29.4 percent from the field in the second half, and Iowa outscored them handily, 49-26.

"In the second half, we took care of business in that area -- we got up in their space and created some misses," McCaffery said. "Then we got our running game going. Our halfcourt defense led to transition buckets."

And boy, did they get their running game going. Iowa scored 38 points in transition, and six different players scored in double figures.

"We have so many weapons on this team that can [score]," Freeman said following the game. "Coach addressed that in the locker room. We have so many different guys we can beat teams with. Everyone has started to click, and once we get in transition it's a free-for-all."

"I think it's indicative of who this team is," McCaffery added. "We have a lot of different ways we can go. For example struggled a little bit offensively in the first half and then Pryce came in and hit two threes. Dasonte Bowen was terrific -- he had 15. Josh Dix was great in the second half. When we go to the bench, we're not losing a lot."

The assist-to-turnover ratio of Iowa put up of 23:7 was just another indication of how the Hawks were able to put up points in bunches.

"These past two games, we've shared the ball extremely well," Freeman said. "I think we had 33 assists against UMBC. That just comes with learning each others' games, and everyone is starting to click more. That run in the second half, we were on pace for even more than what we scored."

McCaffery says that number is a strong foundation of how he wants his team to play.

"I'm not surprised," he said. "We need to be there every night. I thought we would've had more assists on 42 baskets. We had the six guys in double-figures, one guy with nine and another guy with eight. So it easily could've been eight guys. That's what makes us hard to guard."