Iowa Football: Is Kinnick Stadium Still One of the Toughest Places to Play?
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Kinnick Stadium at night is a national treasure in the American sports landscape.
The lights come on, the Iowa Hawkeyes take the field, and things get rowdy. The second half of games gets loud, and teams struggle to handle Iowa's homefield advantage at times.
Last year, despite two losses, the Kinnick Stadium crowd undeniably played a part in Iowa's upset bids of Oregon and Indiana, whom they lost to 18-16 and 20-15, respectively.
Without the crowd noise, those games may not be as close. The fans are on top of the field in Kinnick Stadium, adding to the long list of reasons it makes it one of the hardest places to play in college football.
EA Sports College Football 27 ranks Kinnick Stadium as one of the toughest places to play
On the heels of three Iowa stars cracking their positional top 10 rankings in this year's game, Kinnick Stadium joins the party.
EA Sports College Football 27 has rated Kinnick Stadium as the No. 19 toughest place to play in all of college football.
A handful of other Big Ten stadiums have made the cut as tough places to play, which include:
No. 2 – Ohio State, Ohio Stadium
No. 3 – Penn State, Beaver Stadium
No. 6 – Oregon, Autzen Stadium
No. 12 – Michigan, Michigan Stadium
No. 15 – Washington, Husky Stadium
No. 17 – Indiana, Memorial Stadium
Iowa gets the pleasure of making road trips to two of these stadiums during the 2026 season, as they take on Michigan and Washington as bookends of a three-game stretch.
The Hawkeyes do get to welcome the Ohio State Buckeyes to town, which will see them as underdogs searching for an upset over a team widely viewed as one of the top national title contenders.
Iowa's recent trend versus ranked teams
Despite logging at least eight wins annually, Iowa has struggled recently against ranked teams.
The 2025 season saw Iowa go 1-4, all of their losses against ranked teams. The Hawkeyes did pick up a quality bowl win over Vanderbilt to turn the tide.
The 2024 season saw Iowa go 0-2 against ranked opponents, while the 2023 and 2022 seasons also saw the Hawkeyes go 0-2 against ranked teams.
Iowa's 2021 season is the last one that saw the Hawkeyes really step up against ranked opponents, beating Indiana, Iowa State, and Penn State during the regular season, all of whom were ranked at the time of kickoff.
While rankings are yet to come out, it is realistic that Iowa could have at least three ranked opponents (Michigan, Ohio State, Washington) to pick up quality wins against, if not more, pending how Minnesota, Illinois, and Nebraska navigate their schedules.
This article was originally published on www.si.com/college/iowa as Iowa Football: Is Kinnick Stadium Still One of the Toughest Places to Play?.
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