Hey Hawk fans I'm back with another blog this one on the Hawkeyes hard fought loss against the Buckeyes last Saturday. This was a game where the Hawks were right where they wanted to be tied with the number 4 team in the nation heading into 4th Quarter. During that quarter Ohio State was the team that made the plays, it was a game of two halves Iowa dominated the first half taking a 17 to 10 lead to the locker room. The second Half was all Buckeyes as they outscored Iowa 24 to 7 including outscoring Iowa 10 to 0 in the 4th quarter. This was the second game this season where Iowa had a good chance to win but just couldn't make enough plays to win the football game. Even though the Hawks came up short they still went toe to toe with one of the best teams in the nation, which has to give the team confidence for the next couple of weeks. Now is the game as simple as Ohio State just had too many athletes maybe but I think Iowa executed a perfect game plan on offense. So what was different about the Hawks offense on Saturday against Ohio State.
Iowa's offense looked a little different Saturday afternoon as the Hawks came out with a lot of 3 tight end sets. This was very effective all day long and the most impressive thing of the game was Iowa's opening drive it really set the tone going 80 yards in 12 plays to score a touchdown in the Horseshoe was huge. Iowa ran the ball 27 times for 130 yards averaging 4.8 yards per carry the Hawks leading rusher was Damon Bullock who had 10 carries for 56 yards. Weisman also had 10 carries for 52 yards and Leshun Daniels had 4 carries for 14 yards. I really thought this was Damon Bullocks best game he really ran the ball well reading the hole and cutting. I also thought Iowa should of ran the ball more in the second half they were having success but they just kind of went away from what was working. We have been saying for a long time that the tight end position may be the strength for the Hawkeyes passing game, well we finally got to see them become a big part of the offense. Throwing to the tight ends was a major part of the game plan on Saturday with Jake Duzey having his coming out party hauling in 6 passes for 138 yards and a TD, CJ Fiedorowicz also had a good game with 4 receptions for 29 yards and a TD. Jake Rudock played another good game on the road this was the 3rd hostile environment he lead us into and once again he performed hitting 19 of 34 passes for 245 yards 3 touchdowns and 1 interception. On the day Jake hit 8 different receivers including completing 11 passes to the tight ends in the ball game. The only receivers with multiple catches Tevaun Smith, Damond Powell and Don Shumpert each caught two passes each. I think this 3 tight end formation is something we will see the rest of the season it was very effective vs Ohio State who has a pretty good defense.
Iowa really controlled the time of possession in the first half with long drives 12 plays 80 yards in the opening TD drive 5:37, 9 plays 67 yards for a field goal 3:53 and the final TD drive in the second quarter which was 15 plays 69 yards taking up 6:37 seconds. The encouraging thing about each of these drives is not only did they end in points but 2 of the 3 ended in touchdowns which is big as Iowa has had some problems scoring TD's when they get into the redzone. In the second half Iowa punted twice and threw an interception, they had a chance to win the game just couldn't make the plays. I thought after Jake Duzey's long touchdown reception Iowa was going to win this game but things just didn't go the Hawks way in the 4th quarter. The running game should be there in almost all of the Hawks remaining games but vs Ohio State Iowa showed a wrinkle with the tight ends that could completely change the Hawks offense. The good thing about tight ends is they are normally lined up on a safety or linebacker and with the guys we have at that position I like our chances to take advantage of most safeties or linebackers in the passing game. Now the Hawkeyes offense struggled in the second half but I was still encouraged by the way they passed the football scoring 24 points should be enough to win a lot of games with the defense we normally play.
Defensively Iowa wasn't nearly as bad as the stats make them look, not being able to force Ohio State to punt really doesn't say a lot of good things about them. Ohio State is a very explosive offense and I felt the Iowa defense did a pretty good job for the most part of limiting big plays they just couldn't make a big play to push the Hawks to a victory. Iowa played a little bit conservative on defense allowing Braxton Miller to just throw short passes all game and he really took advantage of the Iowa defense. Braxton Miller went 22 of 27 showing why he was a Heisman candidate early on this season throwing for 202 yards two TD's, and rushing 18 times for 102 yards. Iowa's defense was good all day long but they couldn't get Braxton Miller corralled on 3rd down he had two huge scrambles on 3rd down which were really devastating for the defense. One particular scramble it was 3rd and 7 Iowa had him dead to rights in the backfield Miller went all the way to his right than ran all the way back to the left twice without one holding penalty. Carlos Hyde had a big game too rushing 24 times for 149 yards and scoring the first 2 rushing TD's against the Iowa defense although to be honest it didn't look like he got in on his first TD. Ohio State has a lot of talent and for Iowa to win this game we needed the defense to force a turnover which just didn't happen. When the Buckeyes started to find a rhythm I knew were were in big trouble because with that offense they can score very quickly. One thing that was disappointing was that Iowa did give up another big play a long touchdown, on the play it looked like Tanner Miller bit on the play fake with left a wide open Corey Brown for the touchdown. Now the defense couldn't make the play to change the game they did play pretty well the problem was the offense just couldn't keep up the pace they had in the first half allowing Ohio State to control the time of possession and tire out the defense. I still think this defense is very good they just ran into the best offense in the Big Ten.
In a big game like this sometimes special teams can turn a game in one teams favor but that wasn't the case Saturday. Jordan Cotton had 6 opportunities to return kicks averaging 19.7 yards per return including a long of 31. Iowa's kickoff coverage was better this week as Ohio State had 2 chances to return kicks averaging 24.5 yards per return I would like to see that knocked down to under 20 yard average but they still improved from where they have been. Field Goals Mike Meyer made one kick 28 yards out while Ohio State's kicker Drew Basil made 2 field goals with a long of 27. Punting was an advantage for the Buckeyes as they didn't punt at all. Connor Kornbraith punted 3 times averaging 38.3 yards I would like to see this raised by at least 5 yards if he could average 45 yards per punt I would be happy with that. Overall special teams didn't make a huge difference in this game on Saturday the good news is Iowa's coverage teams were a lot better than they have been so far this season.
As Iowa fell 34 to 24 a lot of people were very pleased with the way they played and I'm one of those, I thought if they had a chance to win it in the 4th quarter they had a shot. Now Iowa has proved they can play with a lot of teams, now the Hawks have to take the next step to finish off some of these games with victories. Now there are no moral victories but the effort the Hawks put up on Saturday should give them confidence going into the last 5 games of the season. Everything is in front of the Hawks it all starts this Saturday these games are winnable now all the Hawks have to do is win. They have been close to beating some good teams Northern Illinois, Michigan State, Ohio State the time is now to win a close game. Iowa plays Northwestern on Saturday which starts a stretch of 2 critical home games with the Wildcats and the Badgers if the Hawks can get out of this 2-0 I truly believe we could finish this season strong. The Hawks fell to 4-3 1-2 in the Conference. If you remember last season Iowa started 2-0 in the Big ten before losing 6 in a row to end the season which makes this game vs the Wildcats this weekend extremely important. Iowa needs this win so the players don't have the here we go again feeling to what happened last season. I feel there is a huge difference between this years team and last which is this team has an identity they know what they want to do on offense. I will have a preview of the Northwestern game for you in the next day so make sure you check back as always thanks for reading.
Go Hawks.
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