Iowa Football: Where Iowa stands after Week 2 in the B1G standings
By Cole Gross
The second week of Big Ten football is behind. After week two, here is where the Iowa football team stands compared to its’ conference foes.
After a few hiccups last week within the conference, this week was much better. There were certainly a few scares, but only two Big Ten teams lost this week, and one of those was Rutgers to the Iowa football team. Here’s a rundown of east and west standings, and what is on tap going into week 3.
East Standings
Indiana: 2-0 (0-0) vs. Ohio State
Maryland: 2-0 (0-0) @ Temple
Michigan: 2-0 (0-0) Bye
Michigan State: 2-0 (0-0) vs. Arizona State
Ohio State: 2-0 (0-0) @ Indiana
Penn State: 2-0 (0-0) vs. Pittsburgh
Rutgers: 1-1 (0-1) Bye
It was a crazy Saturday for teams in the East. Probably the biggest surprise in the Big Ten so far is the Maryland Terrapins who put on another scoring frenzy by beating 22nd ranked Syracuse 63-20.
Indiana has also shown they can score in bunches as they blasted Eastern Illinois 52-0 in their home opener. I believe they can put up a fight when Ohio State goes to Bloomington this week.
Michigan State looked much better than there arch-rival Michigan as they hosted in-state foe Western Michigan and won easily 52-17.
Michigan, on the other hand, got quite a scare at home. The Wolverines survived a double-overtime battle with Army by getting a stop in the second overtime to win 24-21.
Penn State struggled initially trailing 10-7 at half vs. Buffalo but came out and put it on the Bulls in the second half winning 45-13. Ohio State was Ohio State as they rolled Cincinnatti 42-0.
After putting on a clinic in week one, Rutgers was a different football team when they walked into Kinnick. Both their offense and defense struggled and the Iowa football team shut them out.
West Standings
Illinois: 2-0 (0-0) vs. Eastern Michigan
Iowa: 2-0 (1-0) @ Iowa State
Minnesota: 2-0 (0-0) vs. Georgia Southern
Nebraska: 1-1 (0-0) vs. Northern Illinois
Northwestern: 0-1 (0-0) vs. UNLV
Purdue: 1-1 (0-0) vs. TCU
Wisconsin: 2-0 (0-0)
Nebraska had its first road test of the season facing old rivals, Colorado Buffalos. The Cornhuskers had a 17-7 lead heading into the 4th quarter and the wheels came completely off as they ended up losing 34-31 in overtime. Illinois also went on the road to UConn but had a different outcome as they won a very competitive game 31-23. Along with Nebraska and Illinois, Minnesota was the final team on the road as they headed out west and faced Fresno State in a back and forth game which they won in double overtime 38-35.
Purdue, after losing a heartbreaker on the road last week, came home and did not have a problem with SEC opponent Vanderbilt as Boilermaker stud Rondale Moore put on a show helping the boilers win 42-24. Wisconsin picked up right where they left off from last week not having any problems in their home opener shutting out Central Michigan 61-0, and the Iowa football stepped into conference play hosting Rutgers whom they thoroughly dominated from start to finish.
Week 2 sure was interesting, even though you can’t tell a whole a lot about teams within this conference after 2 weeks but it does look like the big ten conference is going to be tough throughout the league.