Week 1 overreactions are in.
The Colorado Buffaloes are going bowling. Clemson isn’t a serious threat to Florida State in the ACC and the Tigers can kiss any College Football Playoff dreams goodbye. All of that or none of that may be true. It’s the beauty of college football.
We overreact accordingly. And in the Big Ten, there’s plenty from Week 1 to react to as well. Thanks to Alex Hickey of Saturday Tradition, there’s a list of Week 1 Big Ten takeaways to dissect.
What did we learn about each Big Ten team? How about for the Iowa Hawkeyes?
Brian Ferentz is in trouble.
Everyone knows Iowa needs to average 25 points per game for Brian Ferentz to stay employed as offensive coordinator. Which makes a 24-point showing against Utah State the sickest of all jokes. Especially when Iowa scored 14 of those points in the first 8 minutes.
This won’t end well. – Hickey, Saturday Tradition.
Even if Hickey’s prediction comes to fruition, we’ll always have those opening two drives of the 2023 season and the excitement it brought in the moment, right?
In all sincerity, Iowa’s recent track record and Brian Ferentz’s recent failings with the Hawkeyes’ offense might be clouding everyone’s judgment a bit here. Was it a frustrating, uninspiring middle portion of the game against a Utah State defense that ranked No. 82 in total defense and 104th in scoring defense a season ago?
Absolutely it was. Iowa had a turnover on downs and four punts to go with a 20-yard Drew Stevens field goal over the course of its next six drives following the two opening touchdowns.
Still, I’ll exist a little bit in the land of optimism alongside quarterback Cade McNamara’s postgame assessment until proven horribly wrong. If Iowa can iron its run game out, McNamara and the Hawkeyes showed there’s finally weapons in the passing game.
Those weapons can’t continue with several of the key drops that killed a couple Hawkeye drives, but, even in those drops, McNamara demonstrated an accuracy that was lacking from this offense each of the past two seasons.
The offense is improved. Is it improved enough to average more than 25 points per game? I think so.
Time will tell on that front. The jokes write themselves, but I’d categorize what we learned about Iowa’s offense in Week 1 like this: Iowa’s offense is indeed improved, but, thinking it’s improved to the degree the first two drives initially indicated, that’s still a mirage for now.
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