Previously: Iowa Defense 

On Wednesday we covered the watchable part of Iowa football, the defense. Now we have to discuss the offense, which has been horrendous this season. The Hawkeyes are gaining under 300 yards of total offense per game this season, ranking 123rd out of 130 FBS schools in that metric. Their scoring is significantly better, but it's spiked by defensive/special teams points. Take those out and it's ugly. 110th in passing offense, 106th in rushing offense, 103rd in 3rd down conversion rate. SP+ ranks them 92nd in offensive efficiency, only marginally better than previous foes Indiana and Northwestern. It's very ugly. What's gone wrong, and do the Hawkeyes stand a chance against the Michigan defense? Let's see: 

 

The Film: We're still using Iowa vs. Wisconsin for this. The two defenses Iowa has seen that are in Michigan's tier are Wisconsin and Penn State, and I felt that the Wisconsin game was a better match schematically, in addition to a few other factors. For one, the PSU game was thrown off kilter after Clifford's injury and the Hawkeyes continually got better and better field position, not to mention you had the (sorta) Night Game at Kinnick factor making things weird, which isn't comparable to a neutral site game that figures to be 70% Michigan fans. Whereas the Wisconsin game was played in Madison. Secondly, the Wisconsin game featured both Iowa QBs, as opposed to just Petras against PSU, so I thought Wisconsin would be more helpful to give us a window into both, even if Petras has been named the starter by Ferentz. 

Personnel: Seth's chart. 

That's right, DJ Turner and Mazi Smith finally gets their stars. 

Iowa's offensive struggles start with the QB position, where they are slated to start Spencer Petras, even though that's a decision few people have any confidence in. Petras has 9 TD to 6 INT this season on <60% completion, and though the team has dabbled with Alex Padilla, it says a lot about how bad Iowa's QB situation is that Petras is significantly better than Padilla. The RB is Tyler Goodson, a fine player who has rushed for 1,101 yards on 4.6 YPC and could definitely be better if not for the team-wide passing game meltdown which allows good defenses to key in on the run. He's been held to ≤3.5 YPC six times this season as a result. Ivory Kelly-Martin had been his backup, but injury struck and that left Gavin Williams as the reserve back, but Goodson gets the vast majority of the team's carries. Goodson is a versatile player and his ability as a receiver gave him his star. 

Predictably, Iowa does carry a fullback, Monte Pottebaum, which is one hell of a name. They don't use him that often, but in short yardage situations, expect to see him out there. The TE position isn't as loaded as it was a few years back when Iowa had Noah Fant and TJ Hockenson and proclaimed themselves Tight End U. Instead, the Hawkeyes have a primary TE in Sam LaPorta, who is decent, and then Luke Lachey comes on in two TE sets, and he's not great. LaPorta is Petras' favorite target and the team leader in receiving yards, but is still a far cry from a ready-made, NFL product like this team has had in the past. 

The WR position is also lacking, despite having some of the same names from the last time Michigan saw Iowa. Keagan Johnson and Nico Ragaini start at the outside positions and both are alright. I wasn't impressed by either in my watch of this game, but they have had better performances at other times in the year. Tyrone Tracy Jr., whose season has fallen far short of expectations, starts in the slot. The reserve receivers include Charlie Jones, who is more memorable for his role as the team's kick and punt returner, and then the impeccably named Arland Bruce IV out of the slot, who is Iowa's short yardage receiving option. 

All of the problems on the offense start with the offensive line, a strange statement for a school that has produced some very good NFL linemen over the years. They do have C Tyler Linderbaum, who is absolutely the same caliber of player as great Iowa linemen past, from Brandon Scherff to Tristan Wirfs. Linderbaum is the likely 1st Team All-American center and will be the first center off the board in this coming April's NFL Draft. The only question for Linderbaum and the draft is how high in the 1st round will a team be willing to draft a center.

The bad news is every other part of the line outside of Linderbaum is a tire fire. Iowa rotates a lot of guys in and out at the other four spots but has struggled to find the consistency they're looking for. The line, particularly the interior, is pretty good at run blocking. It's just that the entire line, save for Linderbaum, is a pass blocking catastrophe. I like LG Kyler Schott and I didn't mind RG Connor Colby, but Colby in particular has some major pass blocking issues. The rotational guards are Justin Britt and Cody Ince, with the former being particularly weak in pass blocking. It's the tackles, though, where things really break open. Iowa is slated to start Jack Plumb at LT and Nick DeJong at RT and both received at least a half-cyan for pass blocking, and both were abused in the clips I'm about to show you. The same could be said for OT Mason Richman, who got the full cyan and has since been demoted from the job of starter that he held during the Wisconsin game. None of the tackles can block anybody for more than two seconds in pass protection and there are no answers for Kirk Ferentz's crew. It's grim. 

[AFTER THE JUMP: Clips that will make you recoil]

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Spread, pro-style, or hybrid: Iowa does some pretty interesting things with their formations, and so I'd classify them more in the hybrid category. On some occasions, they can be immensely Bo-ball, and then on the very next play are lining up with four and five wide. The under center vs. gun table is maybe our most evenly split this season: 

Formation	Run	PA	Pass	Total
Shotgun	2	2	29	59%
Under Center	19	1	3	41%

Unfortunately, what probably stands out to you the most from that chart is how even though Iowa uses both formations often, they are used in such extremely predictable ways that the utility you may get from using both is very low. Put another way, it isn't tricky to operate out of both the gun and under center if by going to those formations, you're telegraphing to your opponent what kind of play you're about to run. OSU ran into this problem last week, something that @colintj on Twitter picked up on in their review of the game, running the ball every time they lined up in the pistol. Michigan seemed to have done their homework on that, and something as obvious as "we pass nearly every time we go to the gun and we run nearly every time we go under center" should not be hard to key in on. 

Their play distribution by down can be found here: 

Down	Run	Pass
1st	11	12
2nd	9	8
3rd	1	12
4th	1	2

Iowa's inability to get into short yardage situations in this game (mostly due to their inability to protect the QB and prevent sacks) forced them to pass the ball on 3rd down far too often for a team with this bad of a QB situation. Their play style on 1st and 2nd down shows a team that is very balanced, but also one that is quite predictable in this phase too: if they ran it on first down, it was very likely to be a pass on second down and vice versa. 

In totality, I stick to my hybrid answer. They can get decently spread at some points in the gun, and then line up in full on MANBALL the very next play. Speaking of which... 

Basketball on Grass or MANBALL: Iowa can throw a lot of different looking formations at you, and so it's difficult to classify them as either, but given the way they offense moves, and the athletic limitations of the QB, they're still closer to MANBALL. I honestly don't have a formation that I would classify as their "base set" because Iowa is constantly shape-shifting, but I'll show you some looks now. Here's the Hawkeyes at their most MANBALL: 

I-Formation, two TEs, you know how this goes. Good, tough, B1G football. But then they can come out like this: 

Goodson's ability as a receiver and your ability to line up both TEs as receivers allow you to flip flop between a jumbo package and an Air Raid looking formation in the blink of an eye. If only either were effective.... 

Iowa is somewhere in between these two, trying to get tricky and versatile, but the playcalling is too predictable and the pieces are all mostly ineffective. They don't do much Speed in Space stuff, so it's probably more correct to put them on the MANBALL side of the spectrum, but to describe them in the same way as Wisconsin, which is only capable of throwing beef at you, is incorrect. 

Hurry it up, or Grind it out: The other component that makes Iowa on the MANBALL side of the spectrum is that they are a grind it out offense. They still huddle up a decent amount of the time, and were regularly running plays with under 15 or 10 seconds on the playclock. I saw no notable examples of tempo, and even moving at a brisk pace was rare. This is an offense that will remind you of the early Harbaugh days, and given that Iowa will want to make this into a nasty, defensive affair, I would assume that they will move at the pace of a snail tomorrow if they can ever stitch a coherent, long drive together. 

Quarterback Dilithium Level (Scale: 1 [Navarre] to 10 [Denard]): Neither Spencer Petras nor Alex Padilla are much of a threat to run the football, and the QB run has never been much of an element in Iowa's offenses under Ferentz, now over two decades into his tenure. Padilla and Petras have combined for 63 carries on the season, half of which are sacks. Take those out and you're looking at roughly three non-sack carries per game, nearly all of which are scrambles. There were no designed QB runs in this game and neither guy looked particularly fleet of foot running the ball. Padilla has seemed more eager to run but that's more a Shea Patterson bugging out of the pocket syndrome thing in my opinion. For these two, I'd give them both a 2. 

Dangerman: In the most Iowa/B1G West thing imaginable, I'm naming the center as the Dangerman for Iowa, Tyler Linderbaum. When Iowa came to Ann Arbor in 2019, Linderbaum was not a star and Seth found his tape "disappointing" in that year's FFFF, amidst a line that featured high draft picks at both tackle spots. This year there is not that kind of talent around him, but Linderbaum has become that level of player, a center that NFL scouts are salivating over. If Iowa did anything good on the ground in this game, they normally had Linderbaum to thank for it: 

Center #65

In this game, I found Linderbaum to be at his best when he was working with his guards to open a hole. In this clip, he's working with RG Connor Colby on an initial double team that creates space: 

Center #65

Here's one more clip, where Linderbaum and Cody Ince go to work, as well as a good effort from tackle Jack Plumb, which creates a rare chunk gain on the ground: 

Pass protection was a bit shakier, but Linderbaum was still the best pass protecting component of the line, just sometimes struggling with stunts when he's not getting help from his guards. On a dysfunctional offense that could not move the ball against a great Wisconsin defense, Linderbaum was a beacon of hope in a very dark game and he could cause some problems for Michigan's defensive tackles in this game, earning him the Dangerman designation. 

HenneChart: Oh boy, here we go: 

Iowa vs. Wisc.	Good				Neutral			Bad					Ovr
Quarterback	DO	CA	SCR		PR	MA		BA	TA	IN	BR		DSR	PFF
Spencer Petras	-	7 (+2 screens)	-		2	3		-	-	6	-		54%	-

This is.... less bad than I was expecting? Let me get this straight, Spencer Petras is not good. But he's also been dealt a terrible hand, with receivers who struggle to get separation against good DBs if not provided an RPS win, and an offensive line who can't block anybody, making Petras constantly live in fear. I mean....

Free rushers came at Petras often, some from around the edge and others, like in that clip, came straight up the gut unblocked. If given more time, it was essentially a coin flip on whether Petras could deliver a catchable ball or not. Sometimes, it was heads: 

But other times, it was tails: 

Marginal balls were pretty common for Petras, and this one sums up much of Iowa's passing game problems: 

The ball is thrown behind Goodson, though there is still a chance that it can be caught, but it's dropped. A mediocre to bad QB throwing to mediocre to bad receivers, all behind a line that can't pass protect at all. Fun! I have some sympathy for Petras' situation, even if he is a step down from the Nate Stanleys and Ricky Stanzis to come through Iowa City in years past. And as mentioned earlier, Petras is still a step up from Padilla in my opinion, despite the latter getting a higher DSR in this game....

 

Iowa vs. Wisc.	Good				Neutral			Bad					Ovr
Quarterback	DO	CA	SCR		PR	MA		BA	TA	IN	BR		DSR	PFF
Alex Padilla	-	4	-		-	1		-	-	-	2		67%	-

Padilla got the last two drives of this game, when Wisconsin had mostly backed off with a 20 point lead and only a few minutes to go against a castrated offense. Padilla delivered a few catchable balls to much more open receivers than Petras ever got, but his decision making was what stood out to me in a negative way that it didn't for Petras. For example: 

Padilla has options open underneath, ignores them, tries to scramble, runs directly into a sack. He also tried to force a ball in at another juncture, and in case you're wondering if he's all that much more accurate than Petras, let me show you this: 

Again a QB throws a marginal ball behind a receiver, and again it's dropped. 

Both of these Iowa QBs are liabilities, but Petras is the better one, because he's more equipped to handle the inevitable pressure that comes on every play without looking like a deer in the headlights. It also helps that he's, you know, above 50% completion on the season (Padilla sits at a ghastly 46.4% completion). Petras gets the start, but considering it will be open season on Iowa QBs in this game, it wouldn't shock me to see Padilla come in, either due to injury or Petras simply getting eaten alive by the Michigan defense. 

 

Overall 

There's no other way to put it: this was bad. This is a bad offense. Iowa can't keep the QB upright, the QB is only occasionally delivering decent balls, and the WRs aren't getting much separation on their own, and dropping passes even when they are. And because Iowa can't pass the ball, their good run-blocking interior OL and experienced RB can only get a few yards before the hole is promptly filled by the opponent's back seven, who have been allowed to key in on the run. They have tried to expand with new formations, but the play calling is too predictable and the offense can't stitch long drives together. Put together in one image... 

And now a picture of me having to watch that... 

Grim. 

The central problem for the Iowa offense is the offensive tackles. Yes, every piece of the offense except for Goodson and Linderbaum are some degree of ineffective, but if you could just swap these two OTs for Alaric Jackson and Tristan Wirfs, things would be significantly better. Because this wouldn't be happening on a regular basis: 

Against a good front seven like Wisconisn, one that loves to weaponize their LBs as blitzers, Iowa was completely overmatched, and on a regular basis. In that above clip you saw RT Nick DeJong get taken advantage of. In this one it's LT Mason Richman's turn: 

It wasn't just one-on-one matchups that were being lost, rushes with any degree of deception or ones that included stunts were issues: 

Pass protection issues centered on the tackles, but the interior of the line were culprits here as well. Just a disastrously coached unit all around. 

As mentioned previously, the wide receivers also struggled to get separation in this game. Here you see Petras look for his favorite target, TE Sam LaPorta, but the Wisconsin receiver is right there, wearing him like a cheap suit: 

This next clip is another microcosm of Iowa's passing offense, where Petras throws a ball too high but to a receiver (Keagan Johnson) who isn't really open: 

Look around that clip though. How many receivers are there? Two. How many DBs in the area of those two receivers? Four or five. That's the issue with the pass offense. If they devote resources to keeping Petras upright, they can only send a couple receivers downfield, who will then be swarmed by a mosh pit of angry men ready to kill them as soon as the ball arrives. 

The rushing game is a bit different. They can move the offensive line on the ground, particularly with the three interior linemen, Linderbaum leading the way. And Tyler Goodson is a good running back. The problem in this game- as it has been consistently against good defenses- is that the IOL open a hole, and then the opposition fills it in a hurry because they don't have to worry about the pass, allowing the LBs to play tight to the line and a safety can be rolled down into the box. Here's an example: 

You get good work from Linderbaum and Richman, as well as from the FB Monte Potterbaum, but the rush only goes for three yards because there just isn't any room once you get to the second level. Look how many Badgers are ready to defend that run pre-snap. Five at the line of scrimmage and three, almost four, at the second level. Simply put, the predictability of the rushing game and the ineffectiveness of the passing game makes it so opponents can just sell out to stop the run any time you go under center: 

When Wisconsin sent the house, often times they were able to blow plays up like they do there. If Iowa could ever find a way to clear the box out a bit and get a sizable hole, it could be a big play because Goodson can accelerate like a sports car: 

There just haven't been nearly enough of those sorts of runs this season because of the aforementioned issues. To continue being fair to Iowa, there have been some moments this season where their offense has had success- just very little of it in this game. I mentioned earlier that receivers tend to be open when you get RPS wins. This is one of them: 

Nebraska banks on the predictability of Iowa lining up in the I on 3rd & short and totally loses the TE slipping out for a big gain. That sort of stuff has led to their most effective moments through the air. In other cases, you just have a defense that gets lost through some element of deception: 

This play happened after the (sorta) Night Game at Kinnick juices were already flowing, but it's a combination of both poor PSU defense and a neat play design. The receiver (Nico Ragaini) starts on what appears to the deep safety to be a crosser, slipping behind the row of oblivious LBs to cut in the direction that the QB is rolling (a pretty common route on a bootleg). But then he doubles back the opposite way and catches the safety off-guard, who is way too late to get over there, and wide open for a big gain. To me that play has more to do with play design and a defense that was tired from being out there the entire second half and was mentally reeling than it does with slick WR play. If Iowa is going to get you through the air, it's going to be on something like that. 

 

What this means for Michigan, and how to beat Iowa 

Iowa is a bad offense, and Michigan has a good defense. That in and of itself is a clear mismatch and the last two truly bad offenses Michigan faced were held to 195 and 233 total yards (IU and Northwestern). Iowa is a tad bit more competent offensively than those teams (I think), but not much. Wisconsin and PSU, the two defenses most comparable to Michigan's in quality that Iowa has seen, held the Hawkeyes to 156 and 305 total yards, respectively. I think that Wisconsin's defense is a tad better than Michigan's, while PSU's was on the run for the aforementioned Kinnick reasons in the second half, so I'd predict Michigan to hold Iowa to somewhere in between those two numbers, if you placed a gun to my head. 

The reasons are pretty simple: Iowa can't protect the QB and Michigan has the best pass-rushing tandem in the NCAA. If the Wolverines just tore through Dawand Jones and Nicholas Petit-Frere, they should have no problem dealing with Jack Plumb and Nick DeJong. This is the fourth supposedly "good" team Michigan has faced this season that had glaring weaknesses at pass protection among the tackles (Nebraska, Wisconsin, PSU) and every time it was a shooting gallery with the QB as the target, just as we predicted. I don't see how this time is any different.

The area of difference between those three and Iowa is that Iowa doesn't have a running QB who can make things happen on his own like Nebraska, and they also don't have a veteran signal-caller who's willing to stand in there and get blasted to get a first down like PSU. I'd suspect Petras under fire to look a lot like Mertz/Chase Wolf under fire. A reminder of Wisconsin's team passing numbers that day: 11/23, 167 yards on 4.4 Y/A for 2 TD and 1 INT. Yeah. 

Iowa may be able to find some degree of success on the ground against Michigan, but if the Wolverines play their cards right, they should be able to bottle up any long runs the way Wisconsin and so many other teams have against Goodson. You may let Linderbaum beat you at the line, but you don't need to respect their receivers. They don't have an Ihmir Smith-Marsette type this time around. Play one safety high the whole day, and roll the other down. Make sure there's a tackler ready every time Goodson hits the second level, and you should be able to also hold him to ≤3.5 YPC. If you can do that, and Petras is under fire, I'm not really sure how Iowa moves the ball in this game. 

This should be a big day for Aidan Hutchinson [Patrick Barron]

They'll have at least one good drive that ends in points because that's how it goes (as IU and NW did), but consistent ball movement seems hard to picture the way these two teams match up. Especially because Iowa is not a big play offense, so a single sack on a given drive could end that series dead in its tracks. Sack Petras, set them behind the sticks, and keep the run game in check. Do those things, and Michigan should be able to lock this one down. SP+ and CFB Graphs both have Michigan holding Iowa to <17 points and I would concur with that. 

Unless things get funky, which is how I want to wrap this up. Iowa beats you when you beat yourself, through turnovers and special teams. They have an elite kicker (Caleb Shudak), which allows them to bank points without driving anywhere close to the Red Zone, a solid punter (Tory Taylor) who can flip the field, and a very good returner (Charlie Jones) who can help them pick up hidden yards. Iowa is #1 in FEI special teams efficiency in the entire FBS this season. They try and win the field position battle so that their crippled offense barely has to do anything to get points, and then love to score points off of turnovers. Look at these wins this season: 

• Nebraska: 7 point win. Iowa scored 7 points on special teams and 2 points on defense and won the TO battle 2-1
• Illinois: 10 point win. Iowa scored 7 points on special teams and 7 points on defense and won the TO battle 2-1. 
• PSU: 3 point win. Iowa didn't score on defense or special teams but won the TO battle 4-1. 
• ISU: 10 point win. Iowa scored 7 points on defense and won the TO battle 4-0. 

That's how they get you. 

In that way, it's a good matchup for Michigan. Iowa needs takeaways, Michigan hardly ever turns the ball over. Iowa can't pass protect, Michigan has elite pass rushers. Iowa has elite special teams and tries to win based on that advantage, but so does Michigan (#2 in FEI special teams efficiency). The Wolverines seem well positioned to win this game and neutralize Iowa's approach so long as they play their game that they've played all season. You don't need an OSU-level performance to get it done. Just playing as well as Michigan did against Maryland two weeks ago should be enough to bring home a ring, perhaps comfortably. You just can't be John O'Korn in the rain and expect to win this game. That's how Iowa beats you.