Iowa football: Five observations in blowout win vs Middle Tennessee State
By Andrew Wade
Blitz protection was great
Coming into this game, one of the guys I said we should be watching out for was Khalil Brooks as the Blue Raiders love to blitz. Moreover, in a game against a team that has significantly more talent, it was likely that we would see even more blitzes as they tried to disrupt the Iowa football team’s offense.
And to an extent, they did a solid job. There was the near-safety that Nate Stanley managed to get out of, and they managed to bring down Iowa’s starting quarterback for sacks twice, but considering how often they were blitzing, I was impressed by how well the Hawkeye offensive line and backfield did at picking up the blitz.
The offense line did a great job of managing the incoming defenders, and as we’ve been saying for a while, Mekhi Sargent did an excellent job in pass protection, and in my opinion, won this key battle against Khalil Brooks and the rest of the Blue Raiders defense.
Although Stanley was sacked twice, I just have to give credit to the Blue Raiders on well-timed blitzes on play-action passes. They were bound to get to Stanley once or twice.