The Morning After: Nearly Perfect
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I woke up Saturday morning and just – this is blasphemy, I know – wasn’t ready for football. NFL preseason did nothing for me. I watched Rutgers-UMass and while that got me football-curious again, I still wasn’t feeling it. I didn’t watch anything on Friday. Just wasn’t ready.
Then I got up, watched other sports Saturday morning, immediately turned on football Saturday when games started and I WAS READY! LET’S GO! FOOTBALL!
The morning slate ended and honestly, I wished the Hawks had an early game yesterday. Despite some of that lethargy going into the season, I was ready to go for the Hawks and the wait until the mid-afternoon kickoff was slightly excruciating.
But was it worth it? Oh yes. Yes it was. Because the first half – Iowa 33, Northern Illinois 0 – was about the perfect half of football. Did Iowa miss an extra point, then a long field goal? Yes. Were a few of the throws out wide off the mark? Also yes. Nearly every pass to the east sideline had receivers looking back into the Sun that were either dropped or off the mark slightly.
That doesn’t matter to me. That was about as good a half of football as Iowa can play. And my GOD do they have some dudes on offense. Tony Diaz – where have you been all my life? He looks like different gravy entirely. Kamari Moulton secured a career high in yardage after just six carries. The tight ends are dangerous (great to see Addison Ostrenga back out there after his Achilles injury a year ago.) The offensive line had some line porn for all of the sickos out there.
And then the defense came out and allowed no first downs and secured a turnover.
Nearly perfect. Things to work on. Of course. But this looks like a dangerous, dangerous team after Week 1.
Other thoughts:
- We’re well into this and there’s been no discussion of quarterbacks. That’s GREAT. And honestly, Hank Brown is owed a huge apology. He had a few of those “wide that were off the mark” throws, but overall, he was the better quarterback. Perhaps his worst practice was the worst possible practice to under-perform? Literally every report from the open practice indicated that Jeremy Hecklinski was excellent and should be the starter. Today was a different story. Hecklinski wasn’t bad, but the interception he threw in the end zone was, and that tilts the scales to Brown for now. Brown has to start next week.
- Tony Diaz is the best Iowa receiver I’ve seen since Marvin McNutt. The reception he had in the flat early the game, stuck his foot in the ground and sped ahead for a first down? /drools
The near-touchdown he caught but was unfortunately out of bounds? Man – the guy just has it. He’s going to have a monster season in this offense. - Speaking of the offense – they had guys running open all over the field.
- Also now really deep into this and I’ve barely mentioned Kamari Moulton. Guy hit a career high in 6 carries. Not that it matters but if he’s healthy for last year’s game in Ames, Iowa wins that. No one will ever convince me otherwise.
- The defense was all over Northern Illinois. 6 sacks, they didn’t have a first down for 40-ish minutes, an average of 0.2 yards per carry…these guys had no chance at all.
- At one point, Northern Illinois had as many total yards as Iowa had first downs (19.)
- We have slight worries about special teams. Especially the field goal unit. Missing a 52-yarder is no big deal. Long kick. Fine, whatever. Missing an extra point? Yeesh. Iowa also had a 45-yarder and a shorter 34-yarder that Caden Buhr banged through with ease, though. Good to get some confidence. That will be something to watch all year. Of course, Evan James had an awesome 77-yard punt return so not all was lost in the special teams realm.
- This team? They’re dangerous.
- Next week better be a beat’em down. We owe them one.
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