Iowa

Iowa Football: An early look at El Assico

Published

7 months ago

June 9, 2025

Iowa Football: An early look at El Assico

In a scant 11 weeks your Iowa Hawkeyes will make the 136-mile trek west on I-80 to retrieve the Cy-Hawk series trophy after its year-long ~~vacation~~ captivity somewhere deep in the bowels of Iowa State’s football facility. For Iowa fans last year’s edition of El Assico definitely lived up to its name, as Iowa pissed one down it’s leg and allowed Matt Campbell’s squad to carry the trophy off our field, onto their bus, and drive it back to their little cow-town out west. It was a bad day, and an absolute harbinger for the 2024 season, as the loss all but ended any hopes for a CFP birth (which were pretty remote to begin with).

But that was last year, it’s a whole new world in Iowa City with a new QB (4 new QBs to be precise), another offseason under Tim Lester’s belt and a new optimism for a season that, we hope, will lead to resurgence of Iowa Football under Kirk 4.5(???). Let’s take a look at what Little Brother has in store for us this year.

Series History

El Assico is my least favorite game every season for a variety of reasons. Sure, Iowa owns the all-time series (47-23) and generally owns little brother (especially when they wear one of their horrific alternate uniform combos – seriously, what’s the deal with the black and whites?), but it never feels good, even when we win. It’s a game that, generally, Iowa is expected to win, so when they do it means nothing and if they don’t it means everything, it’s a lose lose proposition for the Hawks. This time around Iowa State is coming off the best season in their history (finally getting over the 10-win hump) and they’re not looking to fall off. Matt Campbell has the Cyclones feeling good and has stolen 2 of his last 4 tilts against the Hawkeyes (though the Clones can’t seem to figure out how to beat us in their building), so I don’t expect that this year’s edition will feel good either, even when we win. The only real difference this year is that, right now, I don’t think many people would pick Iowa to win this game.

2024 Results

Overall: 11-3
Conference: 7-2

The Cyclones enjoyed a historic 2024 season, finishing 11-3 (achieving the schools first-ever 10+ win regular season), culminating with Iowa State earning a spot in their first ever conference title game. They finished the season ranked #15 in the final AP poll, and capped everything off with a bowl win over Miami that earned them the privilege of consuming an anthropomorphized Pop-Tart.

Coaching Staff

Head Coach: Matt Campbell (10th season at Iowa State)
Offensive Coordinator: Taylor Mouser (promoted from Assistant Head Coach/Tight Ends Coach, 1st season as OC)
Defensive Coordinator: Jon Heacock (9th season at Iowa State)

Matt Campbell arrived in Ames 10 years ago (which is hard to believe) and recently agreed to a Ferentz-like eight-year contract that will keep him in Ames through the 2032 season (provided that he doesn’t get poached by a P4 team, with a lot more money, between now and then). Taylor Mouser was promoted to offensive coordinator after Nate Scheelhaase left for the pros, though he’s no stranger to Ames, having been with Campbell since his arrival. Jon Heacock is Campbell’s Phil Parker and he isn’t going anywhere or getting any worse at putting a solid, though not always exceptional, unit on the field.

Key Departures

WR Jayden Higgins (Selected 34th overall by the Texans) – Higgins notched one of the best seasons an ISU receiver has ever had last year with 87 catches (second all-time), 1,183 yards (third all-time) and 9 touchdowns (tied for second all-time)

CB Darien Porter (Selected 68th overall by the Raiders) – Porter didn’t put up crazy numbers: 51 (18) tackles, 3 INT, 2 PDs, but he was a solid corner and a big body that could cover pretty much every team’s #1 WR.

WR Jaylin Noel (Selected 79th overall by the Texans. Noel may not have had the season that Higgins had, but he caught seven passes of 50+ yards (including a 75 yarder that sucked all the wind out of my sails in Iowa City last year).

OT Jalen Travis (Selected 127th overall by the Colts) – Travis was the first Cyclone OL drafted since the 49’ers took Carter Bykowski with the 246th pick in the 2013 draft.

Transfer Loss:

DT Tyler Onyedim (Sr.) – transferred to Texas A&M – 75 tackles and ten tackles for loss over the last two years.

Key Returners

QB Rocco Becht (Jr.) – Rocco has come a long way since he was thrust into the starting role after Hunter Dekkers ousting over gambling two years ago, throwing for over 3,000 yards each of the last two seasons and recording 48 passing touchdowns (sidenote – Iowa QB’s have thrown 19, no that is not a typo, in that same timeframe).

RB Carson Hansen (Jr.) – With 750 rushing yards and 13 touchdowns on the ground as a sophomore, Hansen proved that he wasn’t playing second fiddle to anyone. He may not have Abu Sama’s flash, but this kid has a nose for the endzone.

RB Abu Sama III (Jr.) – Sama may not have been able to repeat the success of his Freshman campaign, but he’s a legitimate threat with the ball in his hands. Combined with Hansen, this is a dangerous backfield.

S Jeremiah Cooper (Sr.) – 48 total tackles, two interceptions, and eight pass deflections in 2024

CB Jontez Williams (Jr.) – Williams tied for 5th on the team in tackles last season with 46, had 4 picks and 5 PDs, he’s taking over for Cooper and will be heavily relied on to lock down his side of the field.

New Additions

WR Chase Sowell (Sr.) – A big pickup for Campbell, Sowell started out his career at Colorado, left after Deion Sanders came in, and grabbed 81 catches for 1,300 yards and four scores in two years at East Carolina. He’s a shoe-in for the #1 at WR.

EDGE Vontroy Malone (Jr.) – Malone had 49 tackles with 3.5 sacks and 8.5 tackles for loss over the last two seasons in Tulsa, they’re hoping Malone can help beef up the pass rush (which managed just 16 sacks last season)

2025 Expectations

Wins: 7.5
Big 12 Championship Game: +1200

The Big 12 isn’t the conference it used to be (it’s not even the Big 8 anymore tbh) and there’s not a single game on the Clones’ schedule that they can’t win, but EVERY game is a toss-up, even the “easy” matchups. The Big 12 is expected to be stronger in 2025 with most predicting that Oklahoma State and Arizona will return to form. The road schedule (KSU in Dublin, Cincinnati, Colorado, TCU, and OKST) isn’t exactly murderer’s row, but there’s not an easy win in the bunch.

The Cyclones might be even better this year, but the Big 12 is stronger than it was in 2024. While they avoid Texas Tech, Utah, and Baylor, they are also missing games against teams in rebuild mode (UCF, WVU). The season opener against Kansas State in Dublin, will be crucial (and not just because they’ve decided to export Farmageddon to the Emerald Isle), as a loss in Week Zero could bring a hangover that carries into their date at South Dakota (predicted to go 12-0 and challenge for the FCS National Championship) and, fingers crossed, the Hawkeye’s visit to Ames.

Game Details

Date: September 6, 2025
Time: 11:00 AM CT
Location: Jack Trice Stadium, Ames, Iowa
TV Network: FOX

Fun Fact: Every year I manage to burn the caloric equivalent of walking ~10 miles while sitting on my couch watching this stupid game.

Only 11 weeks until kickoff!

Source link

Related Topics:an at black early Featured Football front page gold hawkeye Heart Iowa look pants state

Click to comment

Iowa

Iowa Great Lakes businessman Butch Parks dies at 81

Published

51 minutes ago

January 9, 2026

Press Room

Iowa Great Lakes businessman Butch Parks dies at 81

SPIRIT LAKE, Iowa (KTIV) – The Iowa Great Lakes community is remembering Leo “Butch” Parks, a longtime lakes-area businessman and founder of Parks Marina.

He died Tuesday, Jan. 6, at the age of 81.

Parks established the marina on East Lake Okoboji in 1983, growing it from a small fishing boat operation into a business with marinas, sales, service, rentals, storage, and popular destinations like the Barefoot Bar.

Parks and his wife, Debbie, also owned Okoboji Boat Works for 23 years.

Funeral services are set for Friday, Jan. 16, at St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Spirit Lake. It will be followed by a celebration of life at Snapper’s restaurant in Okoboji that evening.

Want to get the latest news and weather from Siouxland’s News Source? Follow these links to download our KTIV News app and our First Alert Weather app.

Source link

Iowa

Iowa woman accused of pandering for prostitution and harassment after incidents at Casey’s and a daycare

Published

13 hours ago

January 8, 2026

Press Room

Iowa woman accused of pandering for prostitution and harassment after incidents at Casey’s and a daycare

AURELIA, Iowa (KTIV) – A Northwest Iowa woman is facing charges of harassment and pandering for prostitution after two incidents took place in December 2025.

Forty-seven-year-old Kristal Miller of Odebolt was taken into custody on an arrest warrant and faces three charges: one count of pandering for prostitution and two counts of first-degree harassment, according to court documents.

Kristal Miller(Cherokee County Jail)

The charges stem from two separate incidents that took place on Thursday, Dec. 18. 2025.

According to court documents, at 6:15 a.m., Miller reportedly went to the Casey’s General Store, located at 100 Pearl St. in Aurelia. Documents state Miller approached an employee and customers, requesting money from them.

Authorities state Miller claimed she was wanted by the FBI and told people, if anyone called the police, “she would kill them.”

During this encounter, she also allegedly asked an employee to remove the string from her hooded sweatshirt. Documents state when the employee refused this request, she threatened to strangle them.

That same day at 7 a.m., Miller reportedly approached a female employee outside an Aurelia daycare and asked them for money.

Court documents stated Miller suggested the unnamed employee leave her boyfriend. Miller reportedly told the employee, if she did, then she and Miller would both be paid.

Authorities say when she was told no by the employee, Miller became upset and started yelling at them.

Miller also allegedly threatened to “steal her car” and ”take her away to her guys to start a new life.”

She was booked into the Cherokee County Jail on a cash-only bond of $5,000. A preliminary hearing has been scheduled in Cherokee for Friday, Jan. 9, at 10 a.m.

Want to get the latest news and weather from Siouxland’s News Source? Follow these links to download our KTIV News app and our First Alert Weather app.

Source link

Iowa

Iowa law on police appeals ‘constitutionally vacuous,’ prosecutor says

Published

1 day ago

January 8, 2026

Press Room

Iowa law on police appeals ‘constitutionally vacuous,’ prosecutor says

The Iowa Supreme Court is reviewing a 2024 law that allows law enforcement officers to appeal their placement on a Brady-Giglio list.
A dispute between Jefferson County’s attorney and sheriff led to the sheriff being placed on the list, which identifies officers with credibility issues.
The county attorney argues the law is unconstitutional because it lets judges interfere with a prosecutor’s duty to disclose evidence to defendants.

A feud between two Jefferson County officials has landed before the Iowa Supreme Court, which must decide if a 2024 addition to Iowa’s Rights of Peace Officers law is unconstitutional.

Jefferson County Attorney Chauncey Moulding is asking the state’s high court to overturn what he calls the “constitutionally vacuous” law, which allows officers to petition the courts to be removed from their county’s Brady-Giglio list.

Named for two U.S. Supreme Court decisions, the lists compiled by prosecutors identify law enforcement officers and others whose credibility is in question, and it can provide grounds for questioning their testimony in court.

After a dispute over a case involving a sheriff’s deputy’s use of force, Moulding in 2024 notified Jefferson County Sheriff Bart Richmond he was placing him on the Brady-Giglio list. Richmond petitioned a court to reverse Moulding’s decision, and a district judge did, finding Richmond’s actions in connection with the case, while unprofessional, did not bring his honesty or credibility into question.

In his appeal, Moulding argues that’s not up to the court to decide, and that the law lets judges improperly intrude on prosecutors’ professional judgment and, ultimately, defendants’ rights.

“The practical real application of (the 2024 law) is to create a Kafkaesque scenario where a criminal defendant could face the prospect of criminal charges involving a State witness who is so lacking in credibility that the State’s attorney has qualms about even calling him to testify, but is prevented from disclosure,” Moulding wrote. “Such a situation is unconscionable, and underlines the constitutional vacuousness of the statute itself.”

The court has not yet scheduled arguments for the case, which could have impacts far beyond Jefferson County. Attorney Charles Gribble, representing Richmond, said this is just one of three Iowa Brady-Giglio appeals he personally is involved in.

What is a Brady-Giglio list?

Under the Fifth Amendment, criminal defendants are entitled to due process of law. In Brady v. Maryland in 1963 and in subsequent cases the U.S. Supreme Court held that due process requires a prosecutor to disclose any known exculpatory evidence to the defense. That includes anything giving rise to doubts about the credibility of the prosecution’s witnesses, including law enforcement officers.

In 2022, Iowa formalized that process by mandating prosecuting agencies maintain a Brady-Giglio list of officers whose credibility can be questioned due to past dishonesty or other misconduct. The law requires agencies to notify officers when they are being put on a list and allows them to seek reconsideration.

Being placed on a list can damage or destroy an officer’s career, as prosecutors generally will decline to call them as witnesses or to bring charges that would depend on their testimony.

2024 law gives courts a role in Brady-Giglio lists

Iowa’s 2024 law went beyond requiring officers be notified of their placement on a Brady-Giglio list by giving them the right to appeal to a district court if their prosecuting agency refuses to take them off a list. The law requires judges to confidentially review evidence and allows them to affirm, modify or reverse an officer’s Brady-Giglio listing “as justice may require.”

In less than two years, courts have reversed local prosecutors on several Brady-Giglio placements, including a messy Henry County dispute in which prosecutors accused a sheriff’s deputy of making misleading statements on a search warrant application.

What happened in Jefferson County?

The lawsuit before the Iowa Supreme Court involves an April 2024 traffic stop by a Jefferson County deputy. As laid out in a subsequent memo by Moulding, video recordings show the deputy handling the driver roughly and, when the man complains, telling him “I can do whatever I want” and, “You’re not going to tell me what I can and can’t do. … You’re going to learn what respect is, young man.”

After learning about the incident, Moulding wrote, he repeatedly emailed Richmond, asking if the deputy’s actions had violated any county policies. Richmond did not respond. Concerned about possible litigation against the county, Moulding then asked another county to conduct an investigation. While the details are disputed, Moulding accuses Richmond of stonewalling both his office and the outside investigators and instructing his subordinates also not to cooperate.

“A county sheriff ordering deputies not to cooperate with an inquiry into a deputy’s use of force represents a fundamental lapse in judgment and raised serious concerns regarding the Sheriff’s honesty, candor and ethics as a law enforcement official,” Moulding wrote.

He scheduled a meeting that Richmond did not attend and then placed him on the county’s Brady-Giglio list. In an emailed statement, Moulding called the entire matter “unfortunate.”

“Frankly, I am shocked that instead of attempting to address this matter with my office cooperatively, the Sheriff instead decided to stonewall an investigation, stonewall the Brady-Giglio investigation, and then take this matter to court instead of sitting down and addressing the matter like an adult and an elected official,” he said.

In a letter, Moulding warned Richmond that he would no longer be called as a law enforcement witness and advised him to limit his involvement with criminal investigations, as “your engagement in such activities could likely negatively impact the outcomes in court.”

Judge disagrees with sheriff’s placement on list

After Moulding denied Richmond’s request for reconsideration, Richmond filed suit. In February 2025, Judge Jeffrey Farrell ruled Richmond should be removed from the list.

Farrell’s order criticized both parties, finding that Moulding had failed to comply with some procedural elements of the law but that Richmond could have avoided the whole situation with “basic and professional” responses to Moulding’s emails. Nonetheless, he found Richmond’s actions did not demonstrate dishonesty or deceit that would justify placement on a Brady list.

“This is not a case in which an officer lied to a court, was convicted of a crime, manufactured or destroyed evidence, or committed some other act that would serve as the basis for impeachment in any criminal case,” Farrell wrote. “Game-playing the county attorney is not the standard of professionalism that Iowans expect of our elected county sheriffs,” he added, but does not constitute grounds for a Brady-Giglio listing.

Prosecutor appeals, argues law is unconstitutional

In his appeal, Moulding does not address Farrell’s factual findings, instead asking the court only to decide whether the law is constitutional.

“The most glaring constitutional defect in (the 2024 law) is that it impedes a criminal Defendant’s substantive and procedural due processes of law, and right to a fair trial,” the appeal says. “These fundamental rights constitute the bedrock raisons d’être for the entire body of Brady-Giglio jurisprudence in the first place.”

Iowa appears to be the only state with a law allowing officers to sue to be removed from a Brad-Giglio list, but Moulding cites a recent federal lawsuit where a judge rejected a South Dakota officer’s attempt to get removed from a list, finding the request “in essence, asks this Court to require a State’s Attorney to violate the constitution.” He further argues that the law violates the constitutional separation of powers and is “so poorly drafted as to be unenforceable and void for vagueness.”

Sheriff’s attorney says single lapse of judgment is not grounds for listing

Gribble, Richmond’s attorney, argued in his Supreme Court brief that the law is constitutional and that the sheriff’s actions fall well short of Brady-Giglio standards.

“Under (the 2024 law), placement on the Brady-Giglio list results not from a single lapse of judgment but rather from repeated, sustained, intentional and egregious acts over a period of time,” he wrote. “Thus, while a singular act of bad judgement may undermine a police officer’s credibility in a particular case, placement on the Brady-Giglio list places a permanent and unreviewable scarlet letter on the officer that he/she is unlikely to be able to ever overcome.”

He also suggests that a court order removing an officer from a list “does not in any way alter the prosecuting attorney’s duty to provide exculpatory evidence in all cases.” In an interview, he argued there should be a legal distinction between prosecutors disclosing concerns about an officer’s conduct in the case in which it occurred, and doing so in every future case involving them.

“To me, that’s what Brady-Giglio is for, not for occasional or first-time wrongs, even if established of a police officer, but those that have a history of that sort of thing,” he said.

The Supreme Court has not yet set a date for arguments in the case.

William Morris covers courts for the Des Moines Register. He can be contacted at wrmorris2@registermedia.com or 715-573-8166.

Source link