Bill Carmody couldn’t have drawn it up any better.

Tied at 49 with 14.7 seconds left against Iowa, Carmody wanted to set up Jitim Young off a screen for an open jumper.

But Young never broke free. Instead, as Hawkeyes defenders swarmed around Vedran Vukusic, the forward scrambled, pulled up and drained a long jumper with 0.7 seconds remaining to sink Iowa 51-49.

“I had a guy in my face, but when I released the shot I knew it was going in,” he said.

Vukusic scored five points in the final 1:10 and helped the Wildcats to their eighth Big Ten victory of the season Wednesday night at Welsh-Ryan before 5,038 fans.

The win propelled Northwestern into sole possession of fourth place in the Big Ten with one conference game remaining before the Big Ten tournament.

It wasn’t a bad shot for a player who really wasn’t supposed to take the game-winner. Carmody hoped to put the ball in Young’s hands, but the Cats’ leading scorer couldn’t shake Iowa center Erek Hanson.

“They figured out a way to win without much help from me,” Carmody.

With his game-winner, Vukusic found a way to break out of his shooting slump. On the night he made just 2 of his 11 shots, but he sunk the one that counted the most.

NU’s victory — coupled with losses Wednesday night by Purdue and Michigan — moved the Cats into a tie for fourth place in the Big Ten with the Hawkeyes (15-11, 8-7 Big Ten). But if NU (13-13, 8-7) ends the season locked with Iowa, the Cats will take the higher seed in the conference tournament as NU holds a tiebreaker thanks to a 2-0 record in head-to-head action versus Iowa.

Steve Alford, the first Iowa coach since 1958-59 to have his team be swept by NU, didn’t blame his players for the loss.

“The guys gave me everything they had,” Alford said. “As a coach that’s all I can ask. We just came up a basket short.”

The Hawkeyes had been looking to avenge their earlier loss this season to the Cats, a 77-68 defeat on Jan. 10 in Iowa City, Iowa.

But on Wednesday, Iowa lost its leading scorer, Pierre Pierce, to injury late in the first half. Pierce never returned after scratching his eye.

With Pierce leading the squad in the first half, the Hawkeyes raced to an early 9-3 lead. But the Cats answered with a 12-2 run of their own, taking a four-point advantage midway through the period.

From there, the teams traded baskets, with the game tied 25-25 at the intermission.

“I thought we were lucky to be close at half,” Carmody said.

Iowa used a pesky zone defense on the Cats, keeping NU out of its offensive flow. For the game, NU shot just 35.2 percent from the floor, making 7-of-23 attempts from beyond the arc.

Still, NU made up for its offensive struggles with its defense and rebounding. The Cats forced 14 Iowa turnovers, with Vukusic recording three steals.

The Cats did lose the battle of the boards 36-31, although they held their own on the glass. Junior forward Davor Duvancic paced the team with a career-high nine rebounds.

On the offensive side, T.J. Parker struggled against the zone in the game’s first 20 minutes but gave the Cats a much needed boost following the break, sinking three three-pointers.

Parker finished with 14 points, tied for the team lead with Young and Duvancic.

Despite his second-half shooting prowess, Parker was more than happy to play a back-up role on the final play of the game.

“It was unbelievable,” Parker said of Vukusic’s jumper. “It reminded me of my (game-winning) shot against Arizona State. I asked Vedran ‘Are you trying to be like me or something?'”

But Carmody, nervous until the very end, wasn’t sure the Cats would win in regulation.

“It looked short to me,” he said. “But it just got all net.”