Iowa football: Three areas that need improvement after win over ISU

The Iowa football team’s win over the Cyclones was anything but pretty. What areas do the Hawkeyes need to improve before facing the UNI Panthers?

Despite coming out victorious in Saturday’s afternoon game against Iowa State, the Iowa football program has plenty of things to improve. Similar to last week, most of the concerns lie on the offensive side of the ball as the Hawkeye offense just couldn’t get anything going. Thankfully the defense has been playing lights out football the last two weeks, but in order to beat a team like Wisconsin, the offense will need to improve quickly.

It’s important to note that Iowa’s offense has never been one to light the scoreboard on fire, but expectations were high heading into junior quarterback Nate Stanley’s second year as the full-time starter. Not only did his leading receiver return (Nick Easley), but he returns two Mackey Award Watch List players in Noah Fant and TJ Hockenson. The only key skill player missing from last year’s team is Akrum Wadley.

In place of Wadley is a trio of talented young running backs in Toren Young, Mekhi Sargent, and Ivory Kelly-Martin who can more than hold their own handling the rock.

So what gives?

To be honest, it’s been difficult to pinpoint, but the team just lacks gusto and consistency. Nearly every big play is followed by a big penalty killing any resemblance of momentum that the team may be gaining.

Luckily for the Iowa football program, they have a pretty easy game against a good FCS team in the UNI Panthers this week so they can work on the offensive fire power. It’s crucial that they do, in fact, improve against the Panthers before taking on the number five ranked Wisconsin Badgers at Kinnick in two weekends.

Here are the three people who we need to see improvement from last week’s victory to this weekend’s upcoming contest.