I’m surprised they didn’t try something like the route the USSR (eventually) came up with which gave them more time on the Moon without stretching the technology too far.
The last Soviet plan was to use two N1s. The first would carry a braking stage; the second would carry a crew in a heavy L3M lander. They would dock in lunar orbit, descend, do some sciency stuff for a couple of weeks (not forgetting to put up a flag), then fire the L3M on a direct ascent for the Earth.
Unfortunately - and this is where the stretching the technology came back to bite them - it all relied on the N1 being upgraded to the N1M specification with hydrolox engines for all but the first stage. Even though the engines were test-fired, the entire programme was effectively cancelled in 1974.
