Previously: Iowa Offense 

Now that we got the dystopian portion of the program out of the way, let's turn our attention to the Iowa defense. They roll into Indianapolis having wrestled the #1 SP+ ranking away from Michigan and Ohio State, who were too good at offense last week to hang onto the pole position defensively. Should've tried playing six games against the B1G West this season. 

 

The Film: Like the offense piece, there are significant injuries to factor in when analyzing the Iowa defense. Though not as severe in volume, the loss of star corner (and punt return extraordinaire) Cooper DeJean was a tough blow for the Hawkeyes as DeJean almost certainly would've been given the Dangerman designation in this piece. DeJean's injury was sustained in November, so it limited me to only a few options. That said, I don't think Iowa has faced a single good offense all season, so this was slim pickings regardless. Factoring in time considerations, I decided to go with Illinois, a recent game against a team whose offense has been surprisingly productive in November (they scored 48 on Indiana and 43 on Northwestern). 

Personnel: Click for big. 

The least flashy part of the Iowa defense has been the defensive line for a few years running and that remains the same this season. Not bad, just not as impeccable as the rest of the defense. They lost flash-and-dash pass rusher Lukas Van Ness to the NFL Draft's first round, leaving their pass rush talent good but not great, starting with Joe Evans, the stand-up EDGE who sometimes drops into coverage. He starts opposite Deontae Craig, but Ethan Hurkett is close to functional starter status. All three of those names have logged at least 450 snaps this season, so on a defense without a ton of rotation, the EDGE position is the only one that resembles Michigan in its rotation of virtually indistinguishable co-starters. There is a fourth name at this position, Max Llewellyn, but he is firmly a backup with 111 snaps this year.

Tackle was the position of relative weakness that Michigan was able to take advantage of in last year's meeting in Iowa City. I do think this year's tackle group is better than last year's but still not a strength per se. I like Logan Lee, who showed good burst/explosion to swim in the backfield and gum up the run. He gets a star, but the other players are merely solid to good. Yahya Black might be the weakest starter on the defense, while Ethan Hurkett rotates in. I like Hurkett more as a pass rusher but had some vulnerabilities against the run, while Black profiles on PFF as the reverse. Jeremiah Pittman is the fourth name but like Llewellyn, he's sparingly used and a major downgrade from the main characters. 

The LB level lost first round pick Jack Campbell off last year's team but continues to fire at an extremely high level thanks to elevated starters Nick Jackson and Jay Higgins. Both are playing tremendous football this season, both ranking among the top 15 highest graded LBs in the country who have played at least 50% of team snaps, per PFF. They haven't merely played 50% of team snaps, Higgins/Jackson play nearly every snap for the Iowa defense while the game is competitive. Kyler Fisher comes on in 4-3-4 situations against two TEs and seems fine (I didn't see much of him because Illinois was playing out of 11). 

It's the secondary position that's deadly, even without DeJean. The loss of the star corner means the outside corners are not stars, but they are still fine players. That would be Deshaun Lee, who rose up the depth chart with DeJean's injury, and the veteran Jermari Harris. Harris, along with the aforementioned Logan Lee, are the only starters from the 2021 unit that faced Michigan in Indy left on this Iowa defense. Both Lee and Harris are good and had strong games against Illinois, but a notch below "CASH" (nickel/HSP) Sebastian Castro, who has been incredible. With a 90.6 PFF grade, he is tied for the 4th highest graded defender anywhere in the FBS, which garnered him the Dangerman designation. The safeties feature one returning starter, the excellent Quinn Schulte, with one talented ingénue, former 5* Xavier Nwankpa. Schulte has taken a step forward from last year and Nwankpa is looking like what you'd imagine "5* safety coached by Phil Parker" to look like. Damn good!

[AFTER THE JUMP: elite but ain't played nobody]

Base set: Iowa is a base 4-2-5 with their CASH position, as always: 

They did flash the 4-3-4 look with Kyler Fisher out as the LEO linebacker briefly against Illinois: 

I expect that to appear quite a bit against Michigan's two TE sets. 

Man or zone coverage: [**copy and paste from 2022 and 2021**] Hello, this is Iowa. This is a Cover 2 team, placing them into the zone category. They are masters of Cover 2, running what we called in this space "Graduate Level Cover 2" before the last B1G Championship Game, running with that as the base and then tossing in Man 2 from time to time, as well as a few other coverages they can use from within that shell. But two safeties high and corners waiting to pop up in the zone to siphon interceptions is the hallmark of the Iowa system

Pressure: Another reliable expectation of Iowa defense charting is they will never rush three. They didn't in this game, they didn't once against Rutgers in 2022, and they didn't in 2021 against Wisconsin. The pressure metric has varied quite a bit, however. They were very un-blitzy against Rutgers in '22 while decently so (32%) against Wisconsin in '21. This year the Hawkeyes clock in at 40%, much more in-line with their 2021 approach. They brought pressure often against Illinois QB John Paddock, having some decent success in disrupting his rhythm and forcing quick throws that their fearsome secondary were easily able to PBU. 

Dangerman: With Cooper DeJean injured, we're going with one of his fellow DBs in "CASH"/HSP Sebastian Castro. His awe-inducing PFF grade was the primary reason for selection, given how many above average players this Iowa defense has, but I also felt Castro had a strong game against the Fighting Illini, so I have plenty of tape to go with too. Castro has been at Iowa since 2019, a classic Hawkeye who hits it big at the end of his career with the team. He started on last year's Iowa defense but I didn't have much to say when I wrote them up last September. This time I've got a lot of good coverage clips: 

He should've had an interception against Illinois but didn't come up with it: 

Castro's coverage was very strong when targeted, and there were several times that the throwaway was in his vicinity, giving us a glimpse of an Illini receiver being given no separation at all by the defensive back. As a HSP sort of player, Castro has more responsibilities than just coverage, as he's the most likely Iowa DB to be blitzing. Here's one example: 

DB #29 blitzing to the bottom 

Castro also combined to make one of the plays of the game. Illinois went for it on 3rd & 1 in the red zone, attempting a QB sneak. The interior DL stood tall and stuffed the initial push, but Paddock tried to cut off tackle and run for it. If he surges forward, he easily gets the first down, but makes a bizarre attempt to cut it outside and Castro punishes Paddock for that error: 

A smart, versatile piece, Sebastian Castro has a lot of uses in this Iowa defense and he performs well at all of them. He covers, defends the run, and can rush the passer, with no real weaknesses to his game. He may not have the NFL hype of a Cooper DeJean, but Castro is effective just the same. 

 

Overview

The most difficult task in charting the Iowa defense this season is evaluating it against the schedule it faced. This season in 12 games Iowa saw the following offenses by ranking in SP+: 49, 70, 111, 26, 120, 87, 89, 106, 105, 98, 88, 121. The lone offense to crack the top 45 that Iowa played was Penn State, an offense that, you may recall, was comatose against Michigan and Ohio State and fired their offensive coordinator as a result of the unit's impotence. The Hawkeyes defense has teed off against garbage offense after garbage offense with a litany of incompetent QBs running the show. 

This is not to denigrate the quality of Iowa's defense. It is a good unit; you can't post the results they did even against that caliber of competition without being good. But in terms of results, the results you post are inextricably linked with the caliber of offense you face and we have not seen a proper measuring stick for the Iowa defense this season. The closest thing to it was Penn State in September. Iowa avoiding OSU, Michigan, and Maryland out of the B1G East has really left us in the dark. 

Against Illinois, an offense that perked up at the tail-end of the season with a new QB, the Hawkeyes were mostly quite stout but I did my best to try and glean what I could. Illinois put up 280 yards on 70 plays, a neat 4.0 YPP. Not good, but they did stitch a few drives together. Cross-referenced with the Penn State tape and box score, which saw the Nittanys gain 397 yards on a whopping 97 plays(!!) at a similar 4.1 YPP clip, the most success I have seen offenses put on this Iowa defense is by dinking-and-dunking in the passing game and grinding out modest gains on the ground. That is the best template I can put forth for you and will do my best to illustrate it. 

As you've likely ascertained by now, even without Cooper DeJean, the secondary is the teeth of this Iowa defense. Sebastian Castro has gotten his spotlight, but both safeties are really good. The one long passing play Nebraska got against Iowa came with both safeties rolled down, which feels decently notable. In the game I charted against Illinois, there was nothing given up over the top and when called upon, the safeties were right where they needed to be. Xavier Nwankpa didn't show up much in that tape but Quinn Schulte was all over the place. Look at this PBU: 

His timing in this game was exquisite, realizing which receiver he needed to pick up and getting to the spot right on time to make a PBU or wrap up the receiver for a prompt tackle. They blitzed Schulte once and he got hit with a borderline roughing the passer, but like Castro, he flashed a bit of everything in this game. PFF raves about the contributions of both Nwankpa and Schulte, so definitely beware. 

The outside corners are not as good as the HSP/safeties, but they aren't bums. Jermari Harris has battled injuries and been around the block, but the wily veteran was still making plays like this: 

Iowa racked up a staggering 11 PBUs against Illinois(!!), with Harris accounting for four of them. Illinois' passing game was certainly too predictable in throwing the same kinds of routes over and over again, but you have to give credit to Iowa's defense for recognizing the pattern and more importantly, having the technique to bat the balls away. Like usual, Phil Parker's defense is impeccably coached, master technicians at the art of arriving on time and positioning your body to break up passes without committing penalties. 

Here's Deshaun Lee, DeJean's replacement, with his turn to show off his PBU skills: 

Coverage was pretty tight all game long, creating the environment for this PBU clinic, but there were some moments that Illinois was able to get separation to move the ball through the air. When Iowa lined up the corners off the line of scrimmage with 5-8 yards of depth, Illinois was content to take what the defense gave them: 

Penn State had some similar clips: 

Quick stop routes and slants vs. soft coverage was Illinois' best way of targeting the corners, but the most efficient means of moving the ball through the air in hunting matchups against linebackers. In particular, Illinois looked for any way they could to get star slot WR Isaiah Williams matched up on Iowa's LBs. As good as Iowa's LBs are, this is not an ideal matchup for them, putting 235 lbs. of meat in space on a shifty and quick 185 pounder: 

Illinois fed the ball to Williams early and often in this game, finishing with 8 catches on 15 targets for 105 yards. His best play was the above clip, but the general theme of his successes were that they came over the middle of the field. Iowa's LBs, Nick Jackson and Jay Higgins, are good players who I do like, but they are going to have their limitations, as all players do. When they get a more fair matchup, I did like their coverage abilities, especially Higgins. Here's a nice PBU from him: 

I don't have a firm take on how these LBs will do against the TEs Michigan has, but based on the Illinois tape, I wouldn't mind seeing Donovan Edwards or Semaj Morgan get their crack at running routes with the LBs in coverage. If it's anyone more their size/shape/speed, those LBs will probably be pretty good at covering. 

As for the pass rush, it was solid from Iowa against Illinois. I established in the pressure section that they were pretty blitzy and the focal points of those blitz packages was the LB level. Like I said, Schulte and Castro do rush occasionally, but it's much more common to see the LB level bring the heat. Sometimes that includes EDGE Joe Evans dropping to complement the rush, while sometimes it's a straight 6 man pressure.

I'm not sure how good Iowa's DL is at generating organic pressure. They certainly had their moments against Illinois, like this rush from Evans and Yahya Black forcing a safety early in the game: 

There were also some good clips of EDGE Ethan Hurkett dipping his shoulder around a tackle and getting after the QB, but it wasn't a constant siege. As a team over the full season, Iowa ranks 46th in team pass rush grade to PFF, which is solid but nothing special, and notable in the context of an otherwise-special Iowa defense. They grade out as elite in coverage, tackling, and run defense, but it's the pass rush where they sag some. That stood out the most to me in my viewings of the PSU tape. Penn State didn't have tremendous success offensively against Iowa but Drew Allar did have a strong outing, getting Gary Danielson rambling about Allar's NFL future, something that 100% did not happen when PSU faced Michigan or OSU. What was different? Seemed to me to be a lack of pressure, as Allar had a lot of clean pockets to set his feet, which I noted was oh-so-important to Allar's overall success back when I charted the Nittany Lion offense. 

With Lukas Van Ness off to the NFL, there is no one I'm particularly worried about as a pass-rusher. PFF likes Evans the most, while he wasn't super noticeable beyond that one clip against Illinois. I thought Hurkett had the best game in that one, with Deontae Craig unmemorable. Logan Lee looked like their best interior rusher to me (Aaron Graves had some moments too) but I'm not being wowed by anyone in this phase of the game, which feels notable. I do anticipate Phil Parker to ramp up pressure on JJ McCarthy, but I'm not overly worried about the organic pass rush agains Michigan's OL. 

Being able to punish the Iowa run defense for 4-5 YPC on the ground was how Michigan was able to go into Iowa City and procure a rather painless victory last season. How do we feel this year? The Iowa run defense may be a bit better, but I'm not sure if it is dramatically so. Illinois didn't have a ton of success running the ball, but there were some glimpses here and there of things Michigan could go after. Perhaps the biggest was Illinois coming out in spread formations and trying to run off-tackle. Iowa was light in the box, the EDGEs were getting blocked down, and the Fighting Illini got some five yard chunks like this: 

Penn State had a few runs like that too: 

The defensive tackles did stand their ground a lot of the time, with Logan Lee being a Dude: 

DT #85

But there were also some pancakes here and there creating opportunities for Illinois to move the ball on the ground. Plays like this: 

One example from the PSU game: 

Again, plenty of run stuffs in between in both games! But these are still mostly the same DTs from last year and I just don't think Iowa has faced any quality rushing offenses to use as a proper measuring stick. We're left with these sorts of clips to parse through and try to piece together. I think the best way to sum it up is I don't foresee Michigan getting many explosives on the ground (at least on standard between the tackles runs), but I do think they will get some push on the interior and if they vary their run concepts well enough, they can probably churn out a modest clip on the ground, 4 YPC or something like that. Not great, but not awful and it can be enough to help string together scoring drives. 

 

What does this mean for Michigan?

Looking at Iowa as a whole, this is no doubt a very strong defense but I struggle to see a path for the Hawkeyes to win this game unless the defense produces multiple defensive touchdowns and plays the game of their lives on a down-to-down basis. The offense, covered yesterday, is a total non-factor and it will surprising if they touch double digit points. Or frankly, score a touchdown at all. The defense is asked to do everything and while they have largely done so this season, Iowa's combination of field position mastery and defensive excellence has worked to such perfection in part because of who they've played. Against a slew of decrepit offenses with worse punters and skill at this sort of slogfest, Iowa was able to wiggle their way to 10 wins. It was still dicey and the team went 4-1 in one-score games in the B1G. 

For Michigan's offense against this Iowa defense, the main objectives are to win the field position battle and be a bit creative. I get the directive of not wanting to put a ton on tape in a game you're heavily favored to win, but as we saw last time around in Indy against these Hawkeyes, throwing out a couple neat plays early to break off gobs of yards and establish an early lead is the best way to make this game a breeze. I'm not saying the Donovan Edwards pass 3.0, but maybe a flea flicker, maybe some more OrjiCat, a reverse, something of that nature. Looking at the tape from the past two meetings, Michigan has had success on the ground against Iowa by running reverses/end-arounds/misdirection and I'd like to see that feature again. 

Get yourself moving, and then alternate between quick passing (off of what Iowa's defense gives you) and a varied run game to grind out yardage. It'll probably be plodding drives over explosives, and the Michigan defense forcing turnovers to set up short fields would go a long way too. This is a very talented defense, but they haven't seen a unit with all the weapons Michigan can offer and there's likely too much firepower for Iowa's defense to support its disastrous offense this weekend.