Iowa football: Hawks likely without three starters against Wisconsin

The Iowa football team has battled injuries all season and their upcoming game vs Wisconsin is no different as they are likely without two starters.

Last week after the Iowa football knocked off Northwestern, I wrote about how this bye week was perfectly timed, once again. The Hawks had a key Big Ten West showdown against Wisconsin on the horizon and they had some injured guys that could hopefully heal up by game time.

Unfortunately, there wasn’t a significant amount of positive news on the injury front after Kirk Ferentz’s press conference yesterday.

The Iowa football team is expected to be without three starters, and possibly a fourth depending on the status of Kyler Schott heading into Saturday.

Although the initial prognosis said stud wide receiver Brandon Smith could be out 3-5 weeks, it’s looking much gloomier on that front. Smith is undoubtedly out against Wisconsin, and Kirk Ferentz didn’t exactly give me the warm fuzzies about his return.

He said Smith was dealing with an ankle injury and followed it up with this:

"Brandon Smith is going to be out for a while."

Alright, Kirk. I don’t know you personally, but when you say it like that it makes me think Smith won’t be returning until a bowl game.

In addition to Smith, tight end Nate Wieting is also out on the offensive side of the ball with Shaun Beyer, Sam LaPorta, and Drew Cook filling in during his absence.

Defensively, the Iowa football team’s starting middle linebacker and Wisconsin native Kristian Welch is out again as he seems to be dealing with lingering effects of a stinger/concussion. Last game the Hawks planned to alternate Dillon Doyle and Jack Campbell, but mostly stuck with Doyle during the game. It will be a handful for the young player, but I expect we see much of the same versus Wisconsin.

The only real positive news was that guard Kyler Schott could be ready to go Saturday. He’s been practicing this week according to Kirk and it sounds like if things continue to progress without any setbacks, we will have Schott back in the lineup, which could be a huge boost given the poor play of the interior offensive line in the last four games.

With an opportunity to keep the dream alive of winning a Big Ten West title, it will be all hands on deck for the Iowa football team as they work through injuries to three of their opening game starters.