The Morning After: What Do We Have?

What do we have with this team, exactly? Does anyone know?

This is an Iowa team that, rightly, can hammer teams on the ground. They are indisputably better in that arena than what we’ve seen at Iowa in four years. We’ve seen Iowa struggle on the ground against teams at Troy’s level in the past. Not this year. Iowa has a good line when it comes to the ground game. They have a great stable of backs, highlighted by Kaleb Johnson (man crush levels are HIGH with that guy).

They can get after the quarterback in pass situations. They’re good up the middle. They can stop the run.

Iowa has what looks like a kicker that has returned to form. They have a punter with a big leg. He’s not Tory Taylor (yet), but he’s got the ability. They have a top-level return man.

But the quarterback play has been…shaky. Pass protection has broken down more than once. The defense gives up big plays. That’s consecutive weeks they’ve been burned. It’s made worse by the fact that they give up those plays right after Iowa scores. The special teams had a blow up. This was a 3-point game in the 4th quarter against Troy.

We’ve seen Iowa show their superiority for maybe 4 quarters of play scattered over three games. Their best stretch of play offensively was a game in which Kirk Ferentz was at home with a grandson making eggs. He gets back and the governor is re-inserted. That should rightly be a huge caution flag for everyone.

What is this team?

Whatever they are, they better figure it out quickly. The numbers look good overall. They had nearly 300 yards rushing Saturday. The offense still has struggles, but they’re better than they’ve been since about 2020. They have a professional play caller now, a guy that seems to start slow in the scripted portion of the game but that’s by design to feel an opponent out and set things up later in the game (Brian Ferentz, by contrast, would nail the script then still have 9 or 10 drives to figure out and he had no idea how to do that). They’ve shown they can get it done on the ground. But they are shaky in areas, and some of them are uncharacteristic of recent Iowa vintage.

League play starts next week. Do you feel comfortable about any of that through 3 games? I know I don’t.

Other Thoughts:

– My viewing experience for this game was again a bit choppy. I had another kid’s birthday party to attend – the dad has booze on hand at all times; a good friend indeed – so I got my first experience with Gary Dolphin and Pat Angerer on radio on the way there. I have to say – better than I thought it would be! Angerer’s still feeling his way through this so there’s some dead time that Ed Podolak would’ve filled, but without Ed it’s made Dolphin have to step up more to support a new guy in Pat. It might be the best thing that’s happened to Gary. It felt a little sharper from Dolph than I remember. He’s always struggled with basketball, but football? He’s ok. Angerer brings some younger fan energy to this – at one point on Kaden Wetjen’s kick return to start the second half, Angerer kept yelling “COME ON WETJEN!” It was great. Better than I thought it’d be.

– Cade. I don’t know. I just don’t know on him. There’s a new package for Brendan Sullivan inside the 20. That’s good for the team…but it’s not exactly a ringing endorsement of Cade and where he is right now. And to get the ball after Devonte Ross’s punt return with 1:00 left in the half and one timeout and sit on the ball…that won’t cut it, guys. It just won’t cut it. It’s poor clock management, and it’s made worse by the message it sends. You can’t get it done against Troy, with a 6th-year player under center? If you don’t trust him in that situation, when will you trust him?

– Special Teams breakdown on the punt. Everyone got sucked into the middle. That was as easy a return as I can remember.

– The big TDs allowed – is some of that inexperience for a player like TJ Hall? He hasn’t played a ton despite being a third-year player. Iowa gave up 253 yards of offense to Troy, and 125 of that came on two long plays. 128 yards allowed on everything else. The defense was good overall, but the two long plays make it look worse than it was.

– Kaleb Johnson will be on the list of finalists for the Doak Walker award. He’ll be in the final 3. 479 yards and 6 touchdowns through three games (really 2 1/2) will do that. Enjoy this season with Kaleb while you can – a year from now, he’ll be in the National Football League. I honestly can’t wait to see what he does up there.

– Good to see Jaz Patterson and Kaleb Brown back in the army. Cade’s best throw may have been the 18-yarder to Brown to keep the drive that ended in Patterson’s touchdown alive.

Also – did we know Cade is a laces out guy? I didn’t! I’d never noticed this before!

– The offense is more fun to watch. Truly, it is! I like having a professional play caller in the chair. As painful as some of it’s been, I actually want the defense getting off the field so I can see what this offense will call. It’s variety we haven’t seen in years. They are using a second quarterback, and in one instance, they called stuff out of pistol for him! I find that side interesting again.

– That said – Kirk’s back. The interest in that side can evaporate immediately with him back.