ISU Notes, Expectations, and Predictions

When Iowa State has the ball-


They run one of those quircky semi no huddle offenses where they come to the line look at the defense and then get the call from the sideline. Normally this is a different type of offense for the Iowa defense to face, but they faced a similar offense last week in Tennessee Tech and didn’t seem to have much problem with it. The Iowa State offense starts and ends with quarterback Steele Jantz. He single handedly brought them back from the jaws of defeat last week but you could also argue that his poor decision making in the first half put them in a hole. He leads the team in rushing with 80 yards on 20 carries, something that I am sure the ISU coaches don’t want to see is their quarterback taking 20 carries. Besides Jantz the Cyclones will deploy a three headed attack out of the backfield. Jeff Woody is a Southeast Polk alum and is used more in short yardage situations. Shontrelle Johnson is a shifty back that Iowa State wasn’t able to get the ball much to last week, but he is the home run threat out of the backfield. James White is the third member of their backfied and like Johnson, he is a small shifty back that they love to get out into the open field against defenders. In the passing attack Jantz looks for Aaron Horne a lot, who was a junior college teammate of Steele’s. Horne had 7 catches last week and will operate primarily out of the slot. Josh Lenz is their big play reciever averaging 19 yards per catch this season after averaging 12 last year. A player who has had all the hype since he arrived on campus is Darius Reynolds, who in his senior year has yet to deliver on the hype. He has grabbed 41 balls over his four year career and was involved last week in some costly personal foul penalties. Iowa actually matches up pretty well against the Cyclones defensively as they have upgraded their athletecism in the back seven from last season.

When Iowa has the ball-
Iowa State hasn’t had a quality defense in years and this year could be their best in recent memory. That being said, this defense still isn’t very good. Their defensive line still has problems creating pressure on opposing quarterbacks and that causes the defensive backs to have to cover even longer. The ISU defense gave up close to 400 yards of offense to an offense that doesn’t have near the weapons that Iowa will have on the field on Saturday. The Cyclone linebackers are very good and it would be intersting to see what they could do if they had a quality defensive line so that they could be free to run and make plays. Iowa’s offensive line should be able to dominate the line of scrimmage and if they do that, the game won’t be close.

Notes-
Iowa is 6-2 in the last 8 games of this series
Iowa State only has 1 TD against Iowa in the last 18 quarters and that was against the 2nd string last year
Marvin McNutt only needs three receiving TD’s to tie the Iowa all time record
Iowa hasn’t allowed a punt return TD in 8 years
The Hawkeyes haven’t allowed a 200 yard individual rusher in 11 years

Tale of the Tape:

                                   Iowa            ISU
Record                      1-0, 0-0      1-0, 0-0
Scoring                          34                20
Scoring Defense              7                 19
Rushing                         148              141
Passing                         246               187
Total Offense                396               328
Rushing Defense           140                204
Passing Defense            156               181
Total Defense               296               385
Punt Returns                   0                 3.7
Kick Returns                30.5             19.6
Turnovers                      +1                 -3

Hawkstop’s Predictions:

Score
Iowa – 31
ISU – 10

Iowa continues their dominance in the turnover category, forcing 3
Vandenberg finishes with 250+ yards and three scores
Coker has a nice rebound game with 70+ and 1 TD
McNutt has a great game with 125+ 2 TD
Davis catches 5 balls for 60+ yards
Martin Manley has a catch for 50+ yards
James Morris has 10+ tackles
Steele Jantz doesn’t finish the game
Iowa defense has 4 sacks
Jordan Bernstein records a forced fumble and 5 tackles