Iowa improved to 4-0 all-time against the RedHawks (0-1), who lost for the 23rd time in their last 24 road games.
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“Both guys really practiced well, our whole running back group has practiced well this preseason”, Iowa coach Kirk Ferentz said. The best field position that the Red and White had all day came in the third quarter when they got the ball on their own 26-yard line.
The first game of Josey Jewell’s junior season ended nearly before it started when he was called for targeting, an automatic ejection following a video review which confirmed the call on the field.
Jewell raced back to block for King after rushing the punter and lowered his helmet into the RedHawks’ Matt Merimee, who appeared to be losing his footing and was falling to the ground. After a video review, Jewell was disqualified from the game.
Junior linebackers Ben Niemann and Bo Bower led the Iowa defense with nine and eight tackles, respectively. “Hopefully Jay will be ready here next Monday, but it’s just kind of a touch and go thing until the end of the week”. Iowa defensive end Anthony Nelson forced two fumbles, and another was forced by linebacker Jack Hockaday – all of which were recovered by the Hawkeyes. Akrum Wadley scampered 11 yards to paydirt on a pitch left two snaps later.
“It’s one of those things that’s really tough to coach it and it’s tough to officiate”.
His absence provided Miami with an opportunity to get its rushing attack going, illustrative of how important Jewell’s role is in the whole scheme of things.
Parker Hesse and Matt Nelson I thought were both solid, but not great.
Anthony Nelson finished with 2.5 sacks for the Hawkeyes. He recorded six tackles, forced a fumble and broke up a pass. “He can turn a 3-yard run into a big play”. “He’s going to be a good asset”. They have depth, but he’s just too good to replace at this point in time.
“LeShun’s a beast”, said Wadley. “He took that to the crib”.
Bahl was 19 of 29 for 266 yards and two touchdowns, running backs Alonzo Smith and Maurice Thomas combined for 118 yards on 22 carries and a touchdown (a three-yarder from Smith), and receiver James Gardner caught two touchdown passes against Iowa corner Greg Mabin. “We have to try to do a little better job coaching it”, Ferentz said. Sure, the Hawkeyes are coming off a spot in the Big Ten title game and almost won that contest, but they were torched in the Rose Bowl by Stanford and now have had all summer to think about it. We ran the ball legitimately. “They know what they are doing and they did”.
Beathard finished the game connecting on 13 of his 20 pass attempts for 192 yards, while Wadley topped 100 yards for the fourth time in his career with a 121-yard performance and Daniels ran for 83. Gardner’s second score came with 9:43 remaining when Bahl found him again for an 8-yard score.
The Redhawks cut the lead to 14 early in the fourth, but Iowa scored the final 10 points to win 45-21. After some rough years on the ground, the RedHawks finally had some success on the ground on Saturday with 158 yards on a good Power 5 defense (180 yards when you take away Bahl’s sack yardage).
“It was a close game, should have been closer”, Chuck Martin said. Ferentz had mentioned that Toks would most likely play, but I figured special teams would be where we would see him. There are some things we have to work on.
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Iowa’s Keith Duncan tacked on a 22-yard field goal with just more than 6 minutes to play and Mitchell scored with just less than 2 minutes left to seal it for the Hawkeyes.
