Iowa Football Preview, Prediction: Retooled Wildcats Come to Kinnick

IOWA CITY, Iowa – There’s still a long way to go but Northwestern showed during its first test this fall that last season likely was an aberration. The Wildcats stumbled to a 1-8 record in the Big Ten.

With new quarterback Peyton Ramsey at the helm, they trounced Maryland, 43-3, last Saturday. Twenty nine points were the most they scored last season. They were held under 20 in six of nine conference contests.

“We know they’re well coached team and play hard-nosed football, just like us,” Iowa safety Jack Koerner said. “They’re certainly a team that every time they show up on our schedule we’ve got to respect them. They had a tough year last year, but that’s not something that we think is going to carry over this year. We definitely are not overlooking them by any means just because they had a rough year last year.”

Granted, the Terrapins have struggled since joining the Big Ten. Even with that context, Northwestern deserved credit for rolling up 537 yards of offense under new coordinator Mike Bajakian. The outburst included 325 yards on the ground.

Ramsey filled the team’s biggest void from a year ago. He arrived as a graduate transfer from Indiana, where he was a team captain in 2019. Against Maryland, he completed 23-of-30 passes for 212 yards and a touchdown, while rushing for 47 yards and a score.

The Wildcats boast a pair of running backs who complement each other well. Drake Anderson, the son of the program’s second all-time leading rusher, Damien Anderson, is a smaller, quick ball carrier at 5-foot-9, 195 pounds. Isaiah Bowser (6-1, 220) is a hammer. They operate behind a talented group of offensive linemen.

“Those guys are really big and they like to turn out people and position block a lot. So our goal pretty much is to make sure we’re not getting knocked back off the ball, great pad level, things like that, and just making sure we don’t get turned out and have a chance to make a play on the football,” Iowa defensive tackle Daviyon Nixon said.

Anderson ran for 103 yards and a touchdown on 10 carries against the Terrapins. Bowser carried 23 times for 73 yards and scored on the ground and through the air Saturday. He burned the Hawkeyes for 165 yards and a touchdown on 31 carries during his team’s 14-10 win at Kinnick Stadium in ’18 but managed just 36 on 14 attempts last fall.

Iowa stuffed Purdue’s run during the first half of last week’s 24-20 loss but couldn’t contain it after the intermission. Zander Horvath, pressed into more work with starting running back King Doerue out with a hamstring injury, rushed 21 times for 129 yards (6.1 YPC).

“We just have to be better at the basics, just better at communication, just better at giving out calls, just talking to each other, amongst each other on the field so that way we have great position to make tackles and make plays,” Nixon said.

As bad as the Wildcats were last year, they still featured a strong defense, a staple under veteran coach Pat Fitzgerald. They allowed only 23.6 points per game despite an offense that consistently put it in bad position.

That unit played lights out in Week 1 behind the talented senior linebacker duo of Paddy Fisher and Blake Gallagher. Maryland managed just 207 yards, including only 64 on the ground. Northwestern registered four takeaways, three of them being interceptions.

“They’re very well coached, a very disciplined team,” Iowa quarterback Spencer Petras said. “They have a lot of talent, really good linebackers, defensive backs. So we need to bring our A game on Saturday. They’re a good team.”

The Hawkeyes’ 20-0 victory last season ended a three-game skid in this series. Before that, they’d won three in a row. In the 19 meetings since Kirk Ferentz took over the Iowa program in ’99, he’s 9-10 against the Wildcats.

TV ANNOUNCERS: Bob Wischusen, Dan Orlovsky, Allison Williams on ESPN.

SERIES: Iowa holds a 51-27-3 advantage in the series that began with a 12-6 Iowa victory in 1897. The Hawkeyes are 26-11 all-time in games played in Iowa City.

Iowa won 21 consecutive games over Northwestern prior to a 31-20 Wildcat win in 1995 in Evanston. The Wildcats hold a 13-10 advantage since snapping that Hawkeye win streak. Iowa won the last meeting, 20-0, in Evanston last season.

BETTING LINES: Iowa opened as a 3.0-point favorite at VegasInsiders.com. It had dropped to 2.5 as of Tuesday morning at the Elite Sportsbook in Riverside. The total was at 48.

TRENDS

-Wildcats are 22-8 Against The Spread in their last 30 road games.

-Wildcats are 2-6 ATS in their last 8 games overall.

-Hawkeyes are 1-5 ATS in their last 6 games in October.

-Under is 11-4 in the last 15 meetings in this series.

NORTHWESTERN PLAYERS TO WATCH

-Peyton Ramsey, QB – The impact of the graduate transfer from Indiana was felt right away in Evanston. He found seven different receivers that accounted for 23 receptions in Saturday’s win over Maryland, with each receiver recording multiple receptions. He stresses a defense with his legs as well as evidenced by his 47 yards rushing and score on the ground last week. Ramsey fits the mold of Wildcat quarterbacks like Dan Persa who have hurt the Iowa defense in the past.

-Paddy Fisher, LB – Senior Paddy Fisher has 322 career tackles, the most of any active Big Ten player and currently the third-most of any active FBS player, trailing only Texas Tech’s Colin Schooler (338) and West Virginia’s Tony Fields II. Since ’06, only two other Wildcats have tallied more career tackles (Chi Chi Ariguzo 335; Godwin Igwebuike 324).

-Blake Gallagher, LB – Fellow senior linebacker Blake Gallagher has been in the top two for the Wildcats in tackles in each of the last two seasons and currently has 252 career tackles, the second-most of any active Big Ten player behind Fisher. Gallagher tallied an interception in three consecutive games last season.

KEYS TO VICTORY

Northwestern: The Wildcats, like Iowa, rely on a balanced offense for success. That starts with the running game. A productive rushing attack is important Saturday.

Iowa: Iowa can’t keep shooting itself in the football with penalties and turnovers like it did against Purdue. Clean football is a must for the Hawkeyes.

GAME NOTES

-The Wildcats have won back-to-back games (2016, 2018) at Kinnick and a win on Saturday will match NU’s longest win streak in Iowa City (2006, 2008, 2009).

-Northwestern sophomore running back Drake Anderson had a breakout campaign in 2019 as a redshirt first year. Anderson rushed for 634 yards, which is the fourth most by an NU rookie. Drake’s father Damien Anderson, NU’s second all-time rusher (4,485), tallied 537 yards in his first college season.

-Northwestern had three graduate transfers join the program in the offseason. The Wildcats welcomed punter Derek Adams from Kent State, tight end John Raine from FAU and quarterback Peyton Ramsey from Indiana. All three made significant contributions in the opener.

-Northwestern’s 2020 recruiting class ranked 47th nationally according to 247Sports, tying the 2014 recruiting class as the highest in program history. The 2014 class featured current NFL players Clayton Thorson, Justin Jackson, and Blake Hance. The 2020 class is headlined by local four-star recruit Peter Skoronski (Park Ridge, Ill./Maine South), who is the fourth-highest ranked recruit in program history. Seven members of the 17-player class enrolled early in January of 2020.

-Last fall, Northwestern placed a Big Ten-best 57 players on the Academic All-Big Ten team. According to the NCAA’s Graduation Success Rate (GSR) released in the fall of 2019, Northwestern Football was one of five Division I programs to earn a 100 percent mark and became the first program from a Power Five Conference to achieve the accomplishment. The Wildcats have ranked in the Top-2 for GSR among FBS schools for nine consecutive years.

-Iowa running back Tyler Goodson made his fifth straight start in Week 1. He finished with team highs in carries (16) and rushing yards (77). He also tied for the team lead with five receptions, matching his career high.

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-Iowa had two interceptions in the season opener and has 55 interceptions since 2017, tied for the most in the country over the last three-plus years (Florida Atlantic 55, Louisiana Tech 55, Clemson 54, Alabama 53).

-Hawkeye junior defensive tackle Daviyon Nixon tied his career high with seven tackles and senior linebacker Barrington Wade set a career best with five tackles Week 1 at Purdue. Both players were making their second career starts. Wade added his first career sack (nine yards) and first career.

-Iowa has played 1,260 games since beginning football in 1889. Iowa’s overall record is 660-561-39 (.539). That includes a 411-222-16 (.646) record in home games, a 248-339-23 (.425) record in games away from Iowa City, a 335-382-25 (.468) mark in Big Ten games and a 295-187-15 (.609) record in Kinnick Stadium.

-Iowa has won six consecutive home openers.

NOTABLE ALUMNI

Northwestern – Ana Gasteyer

Iowa – Minnette Gersh Lenier

HOWE I SEE IT: The Hawkeyes’ backs are against the wall here. A second in-division loss this early in the season would be crippling.

Iowa dominated the Wildcats last season in Evanston with Northwestern fielding a listless offense. Ramsey changes the complexion there and the visitors will boast a much-improved attack.

The Hawkeyes must be better against the run than they were last week at Purdue. The Wildcats feature two dangerous backs and a quarterback who can also gash a defense.

Maybe it’s a locational bias but it’s hard to see Iowa starting the season 0-2 with losses against Purdue and Northwestern. But that’s not to say this is a cake-walk for the Hawkeyes. It’s a toss-up game.

Iowa lost a contest last week in which it was the better team but did itself in with a lack of fundamentals. It’s found a way to keep that from becoming a trend in the past when it’s happened.

We’ll assume that occurs again. With it, the Hawkeyes earn a hard-fought victory.

PREDICTION: IOWA 24, Northwestern 20

HawkeyeNation.com’s Rob Howe has covered Iowa Hawkeye sports for 24 years and began working at HawkeyeNation.com in 2003. Please follow @RobHoweHN and @HawkeyeNationHQ on Twitter.