Iowa football: Hawkeye’s unfortunate history of playing Northwestern
By Andrew Wade
The Iowa football team is hoping to rebound against the first place Northwestern Wildcats Saturday. Here’s Iowa’s unfortunate history versus the Wildcats.
If you ask an Iowa football fan who do they hate the most in the Big Ten, you may get answers like Wisconsin, Ohio State, Michigan, or even Penn State. One answer that you may get on occasion (and certainly from me) that may surprise you is the Northwestern Wildcats.
How, exactly, could an Iowa football fan hate Northwestern considering Iowa has a very strong lead in their series history?
How, exactly, could an Iowa football fan hate Northwestern considering they have won ten games in their program history just five times. Ten wins just five times since their program creation in 1892. For reference, Kirk has won ten games five times since taking over the program in the late 90’s.
The answer is simple. In recent history, Northwestern has been Iowa’s kryptonite. Northwestern is the team, regardless of their record, they find a way to beat Iowa. More importantly, they were the team that hurt Iowa’s title run in 2009. Northwestern beat the #8 ranked 9-0 Iowa Hawkeyes 17-10 and they knocked out starting quarterback Ricky Stanzi. Iowa would go on to lose the next week’s game against Ohio State with backup quarterback James Vandenberg playing before winning their remaining games.
It was still a great season by Iowa standards, but it could have been so much more.
Additionally, while Iowa holds a 50-26-3 lead in 79 games against Northwestern, they are just 8-9 versus the Wildcats in the Kirk Ferentz era including losing the last two matches. These two programs couldn’t be more different and more similar at the same time.
Iowa’s storied history is so much more than Northwestern’s. Iowa literally leads Northwestern in ever major historical category such as Weeks in the AP Poll (317 to 176), NFL draft picks (253 to 180), bowl game appearances (31 to 14), and conference championships (13 to 8).
Were these two teams are similar though is how they play week in and week out. You can never sleep on each team regardless of where they are ranked. Just look at this season, for example. Northwestern is arguably fielding one of their least talented rosters in the last decade but have scrapped and scraped their way to five conference wins and sole possession of first place in the Big Ten West.
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While Northwestern has been the spoiler to Iowa’s season, I would love to see the sweet twist of fate where Iowa can ensure Northwestern’s season really isn’t special by securing a win Saturday at Kinnick. With last week’s title-ruining loss to Purdue, Iowa can’t play for a Big Ten West title, but they can still make a big impact on the race and their season, and it starts by beating Northwestern.