The Hawkeyes remained unbeaten Saturday afternoon vs a very tough Illinois team. Iowa had to fight tooth and nail to get out of Kinnick Stadium with a victory Saturday. The Hawks beat the Illini 29 to 20. This was a nice win but Iowa did get some bad news in this game as all reports are saying Drew Ott suffered a torn ACL in the 3rd quarter and will be out for the season. So how did the Hawks find a way to get the job done when both offensive tackles were injured, even Jordan Walsh missed some time in this game?
This was really a very interesting game to watch because it felt like Iowa should have been up more yet when you looked at the scoreboard it was a one score game with just over 3 minutes left. In the first half Iowa struggled to get the running game going. Illinois was stacking the box to try to take away the run and in the first half they did a good job. The first half was all about CJ Beathard passing. Beathard finished 15 for 31 200 yards and two touchdowns with 0 interceptions. The Hawkeyes got the offense going on their second drive of the game. On second and 8 the one thing everyone was looking for happened. Jerminic Smith the true Freshman Receiver caught his first pass a 14 yard slant pattern. Later in the drive on another second and 8 Beathard showed his ability to scramble running for 9 yards for a first down at the Illinois 21. The next play the Hawks ran a well designed playaction pass with Beathard hitting George Kittle for a TD. This was George's third straight game with a touchdown reception. Illinois quickly responded for their only big plays in the first half. Wes Lunt hit Malik Turner for 34 yards on a pass against Red Shirt Freshman Corner Josh Jackson. Turner made a tremendous one handed catch with Jackson having pretty good coverage. The next play Illinois ran a quick flea flicker where Lunt hit Geronimo Allison who broke Jordan Lomax's tackle attempt and took the ball down to the 4 yard line. On second and goal Iowa gave up their first rushing touchdown of the season giving the Illini a 7 to 6 lead due to a missed PAT by Marshall Koehn.
Iowa and Illinois traded punts before the Hawkeyes put together another nice drive moving the ball all the way down to the Illinois one. The big play of the drive came on a 3rd and 27, Beathard hit Jerminic Smith for 46 yards on a bullet down the right sideline setting the hawks up at the Illini 15. The Hawkeyes had been excellent in the redzone in the Non Conference portion of the schedule, they've had a little tougher time in conference play. The Hawkeyes went for it on 4th and 1 picking up the first down at the Illini 4. The first play Iowa tried a play action pass that Beathard had to throw away. On second down Canzeri took the ball to the two yard line and on 3rd down Jordan was stopped at the one. Iowa chose to go for it on 4th down running a rub route with Smith running a Slant and Vandeberg a corner. Beathard was pressured forcing him to throw the ball quicker then he wanted and Vandeberg just had the ball go off his fingertips.
The Iowa defense only allowed one first down before forcing a punt setting Iowa up at the 42. The Hawks once again faced a long 3rd and 13. Out of Shotgun Beathard took the snap rolled to his right away from pressure before launching a 49 yard pass to Jerminic Smith down to the Illini 11. On 2nd and 15 Iowa ran a halfback screen that Jordan Canzeri took 15 yards to put Iowa back in front 13 to 7.
Iowa put together a 13 play drive to end the first half. Beathard hit his tight end Henry Krieger Coble for a 1st down on 2nd and 9. Iowa moved the ball down to the Illinois one yard line with just 19 seconds left in the first half. Iowa was out of timeouts so their options were limited on what they could do. They ran a perfectly designed play with Jerminic Smith coming open on a crossing pattern but CJ threw it a little behind him and Smith couldn't come up with the catch. Koehn made a field goal to extend Iowa's lead to 16-7 at halftime. This is now two weeks in a row where Iowa has struggled a little bit in the redzone. I would personally like to see more rollouts for Beathard giving him the run or pass option. He has proved he can run and protect the football.
Things changed very quickly to start the second half as Illinois finally decided to abandon the run and pass almost every play. The Illini really started to pick on Greg Maybin as Geronimo Allison was getting open at will for most of the second half. Illinois started the second half with a 10 play 57 yard drive to make the score 16 to 10. Drew Ott came up big on 3rd and goal from the 9 sacking Wes Lunt to force a field goal. This is where the Iowa rushing attack started to gain some traction but Illinois forced a punt. Their next drive they went 7 plays in 41 yards before Iowa finally stood up again to get a stop. The big play was a sack by Nathan Bazata causing a 6 yard loss. On 4th down everyone in the stadium went from excited to very quiet as Drew Ott was rushing the punter his right knee buckled. Ott did return to the sidelines but he was on crutches and wasn't able to walk hardly at all. All the reports are stating Drew Ott has a torn ACL.
After this play it almost felt like all the air came out of the Stadium. It started to feel like maybe Illinois was going to be the team leaving with a victory. After a 17 yard run by Jordan Canzeri, Ike Boettger went down with an ankle injury. Left Tackle Boone Myers was already sitting out this game so now Iowa was down both of their starting offensive tackles. James Daniels came into the game under very difficult circumstances. He gave up a sack on third down so Illinois once again had all the momentum and the ball. They took 6 plays to go 57 yards before the Iowa defense came up big again forcing a field goal to cut the lead to just 3. At this point in time it felt like Iowa needed something big to swing the momentum. They got just that when Jordan Canzeri ran a Counter play starting out left before cutting back to the right side where he went 75 yards for the score. The play was sprung on a great pulling block by Jordan Walsh and Austin Blythe completely turned his guy. Jame Daniels also made a nice block on the outside.
Illinois then drove right back down the field facing a 3rd and 1, they tried a reverse pass that Greg Maybin intercepted. Iowa punted 5 plays later. Illinois capitalized as Lunt hooked up with Geronimo Allison for a 53 yard touchdown pass. The Illini were back within 3 with still 10:10 to go in the 4th quarter. This is when Jordan Canzeri was given the ball on 11 straight plays as Iowa took almost 7 minutes off the clock. On 3rd and 5 Beathard tried to hit Smith on a slant pattern but Jerminic couldn't come up with it so Iowa settled for a field goal. So with Iowa leading 26 to 20 the Illini had one last chance to try to win the game. They had just executed a game winning drive last week vs Nebraska. The very first play of the drive Parker Hesse who replaced Drew Ott knocked the ball out of KeShawn Vaughns hands which was recovered by Josey Jewell. 3 Plays later Iowa kicked a field goal to put the game out of reach.
This was a very physical game both defenses made multiple big hits. I love this Iowa secondary they are making huge hits and that continued Saturday. Jordan Lomax had a huge hit on the sideline just how your taught with the shoulder. Josey Jewell had a great game at linebacker leading the team in tackles and recovering the fumble that won the game. The Iowa run defense was excellent again only allowing 46 yards on 24 carries. They did however get beat through the air for 317 yards. Greg Maybin had a tough day and with the way King has played this year teams are going to be targeting him. He did come up with the big interception at the end of the 3rd quarter.
On offense I can't say enough about the performance of Jordan Canzeri. He had 43 carries for 256 yards and a touchdown. He was the key in this victory for Iowa. Without Leshun Daniels, Canzeri had to basically get every single carry. Also it was nice to see Beathard and Jerminic Smith get on the same page. Jerminic caught 4 passes for 118 yards. Now if Iowa can get Tevaun Smith back this offense is starting to look pretty dangerous. Both Jerminic and Tevaun can beat man to man coverage deep which should open up holes for Matt Vandeberg. CJ did miss one touchdown pass but for the most part when he had time to throw he made plays.
Special teams was also big. I thought Dillon Kidd was one of the reasons Iowa was able to get the victory, he had a great day punting. He averaged 46.6 yards per punt including a 55 yard punt and a 50 yard punt to keep Illinois backed up. He had 3 punts inside the 20 including one downed at the 4. Marshall Koehn did miss a PAT but he came up big late in the game making 2 pressure kicks to ice the game. Desmond King didn't get a lot of opportunities in the return game as Illinois kept the ball away from him most of the time.
This was a nice win for Iowa it didn't go exactly how I expected. I thought Iowa would have been up by more which they very easily could have if they would have scored touchdowns on those two drives in the first half. Illinios was an impressive team I think Iowa caught them at the right time because this Illini team will be very dangerous as we move forward. The Hawks are banged up as they head to Evanston so hopefully a lot of the injuries won't keep guys out this week. This is a huge game for the Hawks as they can deal Northwestern their second loss in the conference and really take control of the western division. I'll have a preview of that Game in the next couple of days.
Thanks For Reading
Go Hawks.
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