College GameDay in Iowa City, Caitlin Clark picking games and launching shoes, a 28th straight Kinnick sellout, and a top-15 Hawkeye team riding the high of the Big House miracle. The stage was set for a generational win. Then the Buckeyes showed up and reminded everyone of their $60M NIL budget. OSU 31-14. They outgained us 484 to 238 and held the ball for 38 minutes to Iowa's 22. That's not a close game that slipped away. That's a small budget team playing college football's highest paid roster in history.
Moulton Was Never a Legit RB1. IowaLaw has surprisingly taken heat on this board throughout the season for noting the obvious: Kamari Moulton is serviceable, but he isn't a Big 10 RB1. Today was more of the same. 11 carries, 27 yards (2.5 ypc). Through three Power 4 games, the Hawks are averaging 2.6 yards per carry. Sure, the O-line got manhandled and nobody is running through 8 Buckeyes in the box. But why did 2,000 yard rusher LJ Phillips only get 4 carries for 16 yards (4.0 per carry)? Future star Jackson got just 1 carry.
Hank Brown Had His Chance...Heck Can Do Better. Brown started the season rated the 18th best starting QB in the Big 10. Kirk opted against spending a dime of NIL money to bring in a QB instead of a game manager. As a result, Brown went just 12 of 27 on mostly check down passes. That's an awful completion percentage but we've come to expect that and the check downs at Iowa. But what's unacceptable is the randying around. Brown threw an awful interception, several near ints, took horrible sacks holding the ball too long, and a lost fumble inside his own 15 yard line. When he wasn't overthrowing a wide-open Tony Diaz near midfield, he was completing check downs thrown to the wrong shoulder so the receivers couldn't catch in stride. Watching Hecklinski come in cold and go 5 for 5 for 67 yards makes me wonder if he's the guy he was at the spring scrimmage. Surely he deserves a shot against Washington.
Zero Push. Zero Holes, Zero Brains. Watch the replays and the story is the same on almost every run: the line of scrimmage moves backward, not forward. Ohio State consistently won the battle up front, and the backs were getting hit at or near the line. The outside zone scheme depends on the line getting movement and creating cutback lanes. Of the few cutback lanes I actually saw out there, Moulton was either too slow to hit them or was arm tackled by the first guy who touched him. Aside from the blocking, how many uncharacteristic penalties can this OL continue to rack up each game?
Hawthorn Leads a Stout Run Defense and Pass Rush. Ohio State and their 2 future NFL running backs ran it 47 times yet averaged just 3.4 yards per carry. The defense sacked Sayin 4 times and got a huge stop on 4th down. Hawthorn, Iowa's only full-sized DL, had 2.5 tackles for a loss and seems to be the lone bright spot on Iowa's DL. Lutmer too was all over the place, tallying 11 tackles in the first half before getting hurt early in the 3rd quarter. Let's hope it was just a cramp and nothing serious.
Moulton Was Never a Legit RB1. IowaLaw has surprisingly taken heat on this board throughout the season for noting the obvious: Kamari Moulton is serviceable, but he isn't a Big 10 RB1. Today was more of the same. 11 carries, 27 yards (2.5 ypc). Through three Power 4 games, the Hawks are averaging 2.6 yards per carry. Sure, the O-line got manhandled and nobody is running through 8 Buckeyes in the box. But why did 2,000 yard rusher LJ Phillips only get 4 carries for 16 yards (4.0 per carry)? Future star Jackson got just 1 carry.
Hank Brown Had His Chance...Heck Can Do Better. Brown started the season rated the 18th best starting QB in the Big 10. Kirk opted against spending a dime of NIL money to bring in a QB instead of a game manager. As a result, Brown went just 12 of 27 on mostly check down passes. That's an awful completion percentage but we've come to expect that and the check downs at Iowa. But what's unacceptable is the randying around. Brown threw an awful interception, several near ints, took horrible sacks holding the ball too long, and a lost fumble inside his own 15 yard line. When he wasn't overthrowing a wide-open Tony Diaz near midfield, he was completing check downs thrown to the wrong shoulder so the receivers couldn't catch in stride. Watching Hecklinski come in cold and go 5 for 5 for 67 yards makes me wonder if he's the guy he was at the spring scrimmage. Surely he deserves a shot against Washington.
Zero Push. Zero Holes, Zero Brains. Watch the replays and the story is the same on almost every run: the line of scrimmage moves backward, not forward. Ohio State consistently won the battle up front, and the backs were getting hit at or near the line. The outside zone scheme depends on the line getting movement and creating cutback lanes. Of the few cutback lanes I actually saw out there, Moulton was either too slow to hit them or was arm tackled by the first guy who touched him. Aside from the blocking, how many uncharacteristic penalties can this OL continue to rack up each game?
Hawthorn Leads a Stout Run Defense and Pass Rush. Ohio State and their 2 future NFL running backs ran it 47 times yet averaged just 3.4 yards per carry. The defense sacked Sayin 4 times and got a huge stop on 4th down. Hawthorn, Iowa's only full-sized DL, had 2.5 tackles for a loss and seems to be the lone bright spot on Iowa's DL. Lutmer too was all over the place, tallying 11 tackles in the first half before getting hurt early in the 3rd quarter. Let's hope it was just a cramp and nothing serious.
