Iowa football: Mekhi Sargent looks like the real deal vs Miami

It’s just one game, and I hate to overreact, but Iowa football running back Mekhi Sargent looked really good in his 2019 debut against Miami.

It’s just one game for the Iowa football team, and it was against an average Group of 5 opponent, but Mekhi Sargent really stood out to me and not just because of how well he did filling up the stat sheet, although that was impressive too.

After coming on strong towards the end of last year, Sargent picked up right where he left off in last night’s season-opener for the Iowa football team.

He carried the ball 14 times for 91 yards (a 6.5 yard per carry average) and 1 touchdown while adding 4 catches for 65 yards in the passing game. His receiving yards were inflated by one big gain, but for the most part, in the ground game, he was just consistently getting 5-7 yards a pop.

Outside of the stats though, what impressed me most is his patience and vision. Sargent isn’t the fasted running back on the team (hello Ivory Kelly-Martin) or the most powerful (what’s going on Toren Young) or even the most explosive (I would probably give that nod to Tyler Goodson), but he’s incredibly effective running the ball for the Iowa football team. It’s because of his vision and is great, and he knows how to be as efficient as possible running the ball.

There was a play last night where a linebacker was coming through the line to tackle Sargent, and he did a little shuffle towards the line, drew the linebacker in, and then cut to the left to avoid him. It was just one play, but boy did it impress me and to give you more proof of how impressive it is, my buddy (who is a big Nebraska fan and loves to hate Iowa) even said that it was one of the best runs he had seen.

After the game, head coach Kirk Ferentz had some nice things to say about his lead backs’ performance.

"He’s more decisive, more confident out there. And he made some really big plays.There was a run he converted in front of our bench; it wasn’t really clean. And somehow he got through there. It looked like a four-yard gain, but it was a heck of a run to make those four yards. And he’s a great young guy, just works really hard and found his rhythm."

What he said couldn’t be truer. As I said above, Sargent isn’t exactly elite in any given category, but he finds a way to get it done every time.

And for an Iowa football team looking to re-establish an identity as a running team, Sargent showed (again) last night that he is up for the task. If he keeps it up, he could be in for a big year.