After what seemed like an eternity, college football is back! Week 1 is in the books and the Hawks are a perfect 1-0 following a 24-14 win against one of the worst defenses in the country.
1. Is Cade Elite or a Game Manager? Cade was benched then suffered a serious injury. Despite that, Hawk fans hope he's the guy to heal the wounds suffered as a result of 3 years of the worst QB play in all of college football. Cade turned in a 17/29 for 191 and 2 tds performance. That's a solid, steady stat line, especially when you account for all of the terrible drops. One concern to monitor is he seemed to check down quite a bit. He relied heavily on short passes to the TEs and RBs (though, unlike Petras, he hit them in stride so they could gain yards after catch). It's too soon to tell whether Cade's Drew Tate like confidence will allow him to take chances down the field or if Brian and Kirk will instill their patented fear of mistakes that led to pattern of QB regression at Iowa.
2. Is the Defense Still Elite? Last year's defense ranked #1 in the nation and boasted two first round draft picks. Still, most just assume the D will always be elite because of Phil Parker Up until the 4th quarter, the D showed potential. However, when you look at the post-game stats, the D allowed a below avg QB to complete 32/48 for 213 yards and their RBs averaged nearly 6 yards per carry. Will Iowa once again lead the nation this year in yards per play? Highly unlikely, unless Big 10 OLs and RBs are inferior to Utah State's.
3. Is Higgins the Most Underrated Player on the Team? Going into the season, most media hype centered around Cade, DeJean, Taylor, Jackson, and the tight ends. Higgins was more of an after thought. All he did was go out there today and have a Big 10 player of the week caliber game! He notched 15 tackles (mostly solo), batted down a pass, and made plays when it mattered. This guy paid his dues over the years, waited his turn, and looks to be Iowa's next great defensive player.
4. Are the OL & WRs "Much Improved" Like Kirk Said? Iowa's underperforming OL & WR coaches kept their jobs after last year's abysmal job, were given raises, and were the beneficiaries of the Swarm Collective going out and bringing in some OL & WR grad transfer talent. Sadly, I saw very little improvement out there. Once again, the OL couldn't open holes for the running game (Iowa's "top tier" RBs averaged just 2.6 yards per carry against a defense that finished 121st in the country last year in rushing D). The much touted upgraded WR group caught just 3 passes from a playoff caliber QB (1 of the 3 catches involved the defender falling down and Seth Anderson being left wide open in the end zone). Those are Petras caliber numbers. Perhaps most disappointing, highly touted 4 star OSU transfer Kaleb Brown had zero catches and no involvement in special teams or the run game.
5. Wetjen? The 5'10, 175 lb walk on transfer from Iowa Western showed glimpses of Charlie Jones out there. Underutilized, like Charlie, as he wasn't targeted in the pass game, but he's lightening quick and rushed for more yards on just 3 carries than Williams and Patterson combined. I don't know who this guy is, but I'd like to see him (or Brown) get more involved in the offense and special teams.
6. Big Time Grad Transfer Jackson? The addition of 3 time all-ACC LB Nick Jackson was expected to help us forget all that Iowa lost on defense last year. Unfortunately, Jackson was invisible out there today. He may have led the ACC in tackles last year, but today he finished with just 1 solo tackle and 4 assisted, mostly jumping on the pile when a guy was already almost down. On the bright side, looking over at Oregon's box score, former Hawk LB Jestin Jacobs had ZERO stats (maybe he's still hurt?). Let's hope Jackson turns out to be an upgrade over what we lost to the portal.
