Iowa quarterback Nate Stanley received hype this offseason after a great sophomore season. After struggling initially, he is on the verge of breaking out.
We at Dear Old Gold have not been the biggest fans of the young Iowa football quarterbacks performance through four games this season. In fact, he just made our list of opportunities for improvement after the Wisconsin game. As we said there though, this is a result of high expectations for Nate Stanley.
Until last week’s game against Northern Iowa though, Stanley appeared to be following a familiar progression that we have seen too often over the years with Iowa quarterbacks. It looked like Nate Stanley was pressing and attempting to do too much. He also just didn’t appear comfortable in the pocket and was struggling to progress through his reads.
Against Northern Iowa, Nate Stanley was able to get himself back on track for the most part, but Iowa football fans had to temper expectations as Northern Iowa is just a FCS program.
Heading into the arguably one of the bigger games of his career against #18 Wisconsin Saturday night, we noted that in order to beat Wisconsin, Stanley would need to be efficient and effective. It was also an opportunity for him to rebound after a disastrous performance in Madison last season.
Through three quarters, Stanley looked the part. I even noted in my game-time notes that this was a breakout game for him. I was truly impressed with how the Iowa football quarterback was performing against a typically tough Wisconsin defense. It didn’t hurt that Iowa was running the ball well, but there were numerous times that you could see Stanley going through every single one of his progressions before finding the open receiver.
He was even redirecting receivers while moving outside of the pocket ultimately resulting in a big play for Iowa.
Nate Stanley scrambling all around, improvises, throws deep ball to .... a tight end. T.J. Hockenson hauls it in for 46 yards to convert third-and-9.
— Chad Leistikow🆑 (@ChadLeistikow) September 23, 2018
Nate Stanley was not just a game manager for the Hawkeyes, he was a star quarterback. He turned his game up a notch and had the Hawks in a position to upset the visiting Badgers.
Wisconsin really didn’t have an answer for him. That is, until the fourth quarter where Wisconsin dialed up the pressure a bit and with the game on the line, Nate Stanley begin showing signs of being human again. He missed a few throws and got a little excited with his throws putting too much on a few, but I still walked away excited about the overall progression of his game.
The difference between Saturday night and the season opener against Northern Illinois where Nate Stanley only threw for 108 yards was night and day. He would go on to throw for 256 yards on 23 attempts while throwing two touchdowns (both to Fant) and one interception (off a deflected pass).
There is still a lot of season left and after Saturday’s loss, Iowa now has to play lights out for the remainder of the season to have a shot at the Big Ten West title, but if Stanley continues to build off his performance against Wisconsin, it is possible for the Hawks to make a run.