I admit I was wrong. I thought Iowa State would travel to Iowa City and put up a fight against their in state rival. They didn't bother and should have stayed home. No need to go into much detail. A 35-7 butt kickin' where Ricky Stanzi and Adam Robinson were near perfect and Jewel Hampton was back helping out. The defense was solid holding ISU to 3 yards in the 1st quarter and ISU only got their touchdown because the scrubs were in. No need to say anymore. Let's move on to Arizona.
It's hard for me to break down the Wildcats. I live in the Midwest and frankly I don't see much Pac-10 unless they are playing a Big 10 or Big 12 team. The matter isn't helped when Arizona has played Toledo and Citadel. What television station covered those games? Fox Sports Tucson or was I suppose to fork over 30 bucks to watch those crappy games on pay-per-view. Seriously, I started looking up Arizona's stats from those two games and I have no idea how to judge them. They've given up only 8 points total in two games. One score was literally given to Toledo with a safety. So yeah, the numbers feel a bit magnified.
The Wildcats traveled to Kinnick last year with close to the same squad on offense this year. Neither QB was good in their contest. Nick Foles ended up with 55 yards passing and a td while sharing time with the ineffective Scott. This year it's all on Foles and so far he's been impressive. Stanzi wasn't much better with 202 yards and a pick 6. The key last year is the same as this year, running backs.
Adam Robinson must duplicate the 100 yard performance to keep the ball away from the 2 Nicks, Grisby and Foles. Grisby averaged over 6 and a half yards a carry on this defense with Pat Angerer and if he gets double the load, only 11 against Iowa last year, he could control the entire game by himself. Even Ferentz said it was tough to control him last year. Now at home, Iowa will have to double the efforts. Meanwhile, Iowa will have to keep feeding it's two-headed monster of Robinson and Hampton. Iowa had 2 running backs last year with Robinson and Wegher gaining almost 150 yards on 35 carries. Now Hampton is seeing action that Wegher did before. The 3 running backs are important because these defenses are going to get tired.
If your looking for a shootout, forget it. Don't expect either team to come close to 40 points unless your talking total of both teams. Mike Stoops has helped put together a tough defense much like his days as Defensive Coordinator at Oklahoma. Arizona was the 21st defense overall until Nebraska put a beat down on them in their bowl game. With their weak schedule and 4 point average, the Wildcats are easily a top ten defense, actually 2nd in points against. Iowa hasn't had much competition either, opponents are averaging one touchdown against them in their first two games and 8th overall in the country. I expect a low scoring game because both defenses should feel very confident in their play so far.
After what I thought would be a real test with ISU, Iowa may finally have a good game on their hands. In that same breath, so will Arizona. The Wildcat fans are planning a "red out" by wearing all red to the game. Tucson stadium will look like a blood bath than a football arena. Stanzi threw that pick 6 in the 1st quarter in the game against Arizona last year. If he does that again and that ruckus crowd gets into it, an upset could brew. Stanzi has relied on that pivotal ground game and I think we see more the same here. Iowa won't make an early mistake, take the crowd out of it early and momentum will carry them to a close victory. Last year 27-17, this year 24-20.
J Call
No comments:
Post a Comment