IOWA CITY – The full circle moment caught up to Callie Levin during the post-game press conference Thursday night at Carver-Hawkeye Arena.
The third-year guard who transferred from Iowa to the University of Northern Iowa last spring fought back tears while talking about her fresh start at UNI after the 10th-ranked Hawkeyes’ 78-40 win over the Panthers.
“First of all, all glory to God above. I just get choked up being here right now at this press conference. I’m just really grateful to be here,” she told reporters. “I lost a lot of confidence along the way, and Coach T [Tanya Warren] has instilled a lot of confidence into me. So, yeah, just just to be here, it’s all glory to God. I can’t even put it into words. He’s just done so much for me.”
“That’s why I have this tattoo, ‘Count It All Joy’ [James 1:2]. I look at it all game long, and it means so much to me to just be here. I have so much confidence now in myself and in my teammates, and it took a lot to get there, but I’m really proud of myself to be here today and to have that kind of confidence.”
Although she was on the Iowa team for two years, Levin had several firsts at Carver-Hawkeye Arena on Thursday with UNI.
It was the first time she was introduced in the starting lineup on the Hawkeyes’ home court, and after a slow start, she hit her first 3-pointer during a game there. She hit another shortly after to tally 6 points in 21 minutes.
She sat much of the first half after committing two fouls within the first four minutes of the game, something coach Warren wasn’t too surprised about given the emotions leading into Levin’s return to Iowa City.
“Slow down. Let the game come to you,” Warren said she told Levin after her second early foul. “I figured we were probably going to be in that situation – there’s a lot of emotions. It would be for anybody, but this young lady handles it extremely well, and she plays extremely hard. So to have that extra emotion and play as hard as she does, I wasn’t surprised she picked up that second one quickly.”
Levin admits she had mixed emotions coming back to play against her former team.
“Obviously it’s different. I’m not going to say it’s not. It was a little weird, but like I said, I have teammates and I have coaches who have my back, and they had my back all week,” she said. “Obviously, we didn’t get the outcome we wanted, but it was great. It was great being back.
And although she remains friends with her former teammates, it’s strictly business when they face each other on the court. She explained a sequence in the third quarter when she hit a 3-pointer shortly after Iowa guard Taylor Stremlow blocked her shot.
“I actually saw Taylor last night, and we’re buddy-buddy,” Levin said. “Obviously on the court you’re not going to be buddy-buddy. She blocked me, and I said ‘uh uh.’ So, I came down and hit that three in her face. And I mean we’re just competitive. I love her so much.”
“I had a great experience. I had great relationships here. I love people, so it was fun being able to battle against them and stuff,” she added. “It was fun to see Layla [Hays] out there too. I remember I got down there on the block and I was just talking smack to her.”
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Iowa head coach Jan Jensen was pleased with the rousing reception the Carver crowd gave Levin when she was introduced in UNI’s starting lineup. She is also glad her former player is now thriving.
“It’s just part of the landscape of college sports and kids, they just sometimes change their thought processes when they go to a university. Sometimes they go, they want to be part of it, then they realize, ‘hey, I want to actually play a little more’ and so forth,” Jensen told reporters. “But I was happy that Callie got that [ovation]. She and I have a really good relationship, and I do think the world of her. I think that’s just who Iowa Hawkeye fans are. You know we want our team to win, but not at any expense of certainly a kid like Callie.”
Tough transition
Growing up in Solon – about 12 miles north of Iowa City – Levin was always a Hawkeye fan. And when then-Iowa coach Lisa Bluder, who also lives in Solon, came calling her freshman year in high school, she didn’t have to look any further in the recruiting process. She was a Hawkeye.
“I didn’t get my Iowa offer until later on in my freshman summer. My first offer was Arkansas, and then after that, they just kind of started coming in. I was kind of considering other places, but after getting my Iowa offer, it took me like two weeks, and then I ended up committing,” Levin told The IX Sports during UNI’s Media Day on Oct. 27.
She ended her career at Solon in 2024 with a Class 3A State Championship, leading the Spartans with 27 points in the title game. She was named Miss Iowa Basketball 2024 by the Iowa Print Sports Writers Association, a distinction also held by Kiah Stokes (Linn-Mar 2011), Caitlin Clark (Dowling High School 2020) and Audi Crooks (Bishop Garrigan 2023).
When Levin joined the Hawkeyes that fall, it was a far cry from her glory days in high school. She saw action in just 10 games and scored her first points as a Hawkeye against Murray State in the first round of the 2025 NCAA Tournament.
She garnered a little more playing time her sophomore year, appearing in 19 games in which she recorded 23 points and 11 rebounds.
While her energy never disappeared – she was known as the hype woman on the bench and loved by Iowa fans for it – she realized her dream school was not the right fit for her as a player.
“It was definitely tough at first. I mean, obviously at Iowa, I didn’t really play my freshman year, and then I got some not super consistent minutes my sophomore year,” she said. “But definitely mentally challenging just to continue to grind and work when the reward isn’t there. I think that’s one of the hardest things I’ve had to walk through. And then just making the decision that Iowa is not the place for me.”
“Obviously it was a tough decision, but I did decide to transfer. The transfer portal was interesting because a bunch of coaches are trying to get your attention and talk to you and stuff. So you kind of have to narrow it down,” she added. “But from the beginning, I was interested in UNI. I honestly wanted to stay in state and stuff. But there were a couple other schools that I was talking to as well, and so then I ended up setting my visits, and I decided to put UNI as my first visit. And then after visiting UNI, I canceled the other ones. I was just blown away by the culture that they preach.”
Other top contenders included MVC powerhouse Murray State in Kentucky and Wisconsin, where two of her Iowa teammates, Addie Deal and Teagan Mallegni, transferred. At the end of last season, the three talked to each other about their similar situations and desire to transfer.
“I think you cultivate a friendship when you are going through some of the same things, and so just being able to talk to them at the end of the season and get their kind of word on it and what they were thinking,” Levin said. “We were able to bond through that a lot and are friends till this day. We had a scrimmage against them, and then we just keep in touch weekly, which is fun.”
Second chance
Coach Warren ensured Levin during her visit that she would be a key piece to the Panther program.
“She is amazing. She’s top notch. She’s one of the best coaches I’ve ever had, and I think just the biggest reason why is because she believes in me and she knows what I can bring to the table, and I just think that’s super important,” Levin said of Warren. “And then also the culture she’s been able to cultivate here over the last 20 years. It takes a lot of hard work, and she fights for us day in and day out. And I just respect that so much.”
After missing out on her in the high school recruiting process, Warren immediately reached out to Levin once she hit the portal.
“Let’s get her. I mean, you love everything about her. She plays the game the right way. She plays extremely hard,” Warren told reporters Thursday night. “She’s a high-character young lady. As good as a basketball player is, she’s a better person. She genuinely loves her teammates. She loves her coaches, and she just loves people. And the energy that she brings, you can’t help but get attached to that.”
Over the summer, Levin’s UNI teammates voted her as a captain before she even put on a purple Panther uniform.
“From the time she stepped on campus, she’s made a difference. I think there’s something to be said for that,” Warren said. “First of all, it took a lot of courage for her to do what she did. Being an Iowa kid, growing up here, wanting to come here, it took a lot of courage for her to first of all be able to do that and says a lot about her. But then you come into a new program, a new environment, a new team, and for her teammates to name her as a captain – enough said.”
UNI senior guard Jenna Twedt played against Levin and Solon in the WaMaC Conference for Benton Community High School. Once on-court foes, the two became fast friends.
“I like her on my team a lot more than against her,” Twedt told The IX. “She just brings another level of energy that is just great, and I love playing with her.”
Levin has set personal and team goals for this season.
“I think some of our biggest goals as a team is to win a conference championship and to get to the NCAA tournament. I think that’s the biggest one, and we’re all just grinding day in and day out to get there,” she said. “But for me individually, I think it would be super fun to get newcomer of the year. That’s a big goal that I’ve been thinking about.”
She holds no hard feelings for the Iowa program and its coaches and players, and cherishes her time there.
“It was great. I think it’s not an experience I take for granted. Obviously, it taught me a lot, and it pushed me in my faith as well, which is huge,” she said. “But yeah, I kind of always had the dream to play at Iowa, and then as I matured in my basketball career, I realized that my dream is to play basketball. And so, just being able to come to UNI and play basketball has been awesome.”
