Iowa Football: ‘Season Review Part III’ Games Nine through Twelve
You could hardly find anyone who said that Iowa was going to win this game much less blow the Buckeyes out. But strange things tend to happen at Kinnick Stadium. This game would end up being strange and had an outcome that few predicted. It would leave fans in amazement and send the college football rankings into a reshuffle.
The game started out with a bang as Amani Hooker picked J.T. Barrett off on Ohio State’s first play and returned it for a touchdown. The teams would score ten points in the first quarter as Iowa hung tough with the Buckeyes. But the Hawks exploded for 21 points in the second quarter, while Ohio State could only score seven.
The blowout began.
Iowa Hawkeyes Football
In the second half, the Hawkeyes scored another 24 points while the Buckeyes could only muster an additional seven and Iowa ended up beating their foe 55 to 24. The fans stormed the field and soon the playing surface of Kinnick Stadium was a sea of students, parents, and fans. You could hardly see a speck of green among the thousands of fans down on the field.
It was truly a sight to see.
The offensive player of the game was Nate Stanley. Staley threw 31 passes, completing 20 of them for 226 yards. But the most important statistic he put up that day was the five touchdown passes he threw. That was a feat that seldom happens against Ohio State and Stanley was able to do it. It was easily his best game of the year.
Joshua Jackson earns the player of the game honors on defense. He had three interceptions including one where he went up high and, with one hand, caught the ball and brought it down to the ground with him. It was one of the biggest plays for Iowa in 2017. The defense did a great job of keeping the Buckeyes from scoring a lot of points and helped make this game a blowout for the Hawks.
The win was a big one and as soon as it was over the words “letdown” creeped out when it came to the next game against the Wisconsin Badgers. Would the Hawkeyes have a letdown in Madison the next week or would they upset another ranked team and prove that they were for real?