It was expected to be a blowout and it turned out to be a dominating effort on both sides of the ball as Iowa shut out Northern Illinois 40-0 behind balanced offense, a smothering defense and a special teams touchdown. The offense was outstanding in Iowa football’s opener, totaling 507 yards, the most in a game since September 2019.
The defense did it’s part pitching a shutout and limiting Northern Illinois to 120 yards, tied for the sixth-fewest allowed in the 342-game Kirk Ferentz era.
Kamari Moulton along with the offensive line was the star of the day as he ran for two scores and 183 yards.
Iowa’s quarterback play was spotty. Not great but not bad either. Hank Brown, who made the first start of his Hawkeye career, outplayed Jeremy Hecklinski, but not by a wide margin. The two quarterbacks combined to go 19-for-36 (53%) passing for 205 yards, two touchdowns and one interception. both threw touchdowns. For the first time in recent memory, the Hawkeye offense showed can stretch the field with speed while unleashing a punishing offensive line in the run game. Tony Diaz showed early why fans and coaches are excited about what he brings to the offense. He caught a touchdown pass from Hank Brown to start the scoring and totaled seven catches for 84 yards on the day.
What can we takeaway from this opening win? Northern Illinois didn’t offer much in the way of resistance but Iowa did show progress on offense and the defense dictated tempo all afternoon long holding the Huskies to no first downs in the first half and 112 yards of total offense. Moulton set a new career high in rushing yards, before the first quarter ended. He rushed for two touchdowns on Iowa’s first three offensive drives of the game, including one for 50 yards and another for 37 yards. Head coach Kirk Ferentz said “That’s the best we’ve seen him.”
The quarterback decision wasn’t decided today nor will it be next week in all likely hood. But if the running game dominates again, either QB can run the offense. And the young defense can take it’s time growing into another Phil Parker dominating unit. The flip side is that we only learned that Iowa can dominate an inferior opponent and we still don’t know how they will fare against teams in the Big Ten. Time will tell but today was a refreshing step in the right direction.
