Hawks’ Eye: Experts predict Iowa vs. Michigan in Big Ten championship game

Each week during the season the Hawkeye Headquarters staff will predict the outcome of the Iowa football game.

HawkeyeHQ.com
Blake Hornstein (7-5): Myself and others have been critical (and, subtlety entertained) of the Iowa players and coaches “gaslighting” the media from time to time. Kirk Ferentz makes us read between the lines, sometimes the players sound like Navy SEALs moreso than student-athletes.

I’m not going to get into specifics, and perhaps I shouldn’t be breaking the fourth wall, but when it comes to this game I believe every last word we heard from the Hawks.

The question: How does Iowa beat Michigan?

The answer, according to Kirk Ferentz: “The challenge this week is going to be to get it into that fourth quarter where it is competitive.”

Wide receiver Nico Ragaini echoed the same sentiment, telling me: “Make it a dogfight and make it a close game to the end and then take our chances with that.”

It’s true.

There is no secret formula. Nothing is guaranteed. The only way Iowa has a chance to win this game is with another Phil Parker defensive masterclass.

Yes, Iowa beat Michigan 14-13 in 2016 as three-score underdogs. But the game was at Kinnick — the spread would’ve been 30 if it was at a neutral site. The last time Iowa beat a top-five opponent away from Kinnick was the 2009 Penn State win. The closest they’ve gotten was the gut-punch of the 2015 Big Ten title game.

Look, the last time we saw the Hawkeyes compete with a great team was the 31-0 Penn State disaster where the defense played 100 snaps and gave up 397 yards.

I love the heart, passion and late-game heroics just as much as the fanbase. I don’t hate Iowa. They’ve got great colors, it’s easy to spell and Kinnick Stadium is a place unlike any other.

But, this isn’t going to go well. I’m sorry.

Prediction: Michigan 35, Iowa 7

Ryan Jaster (10-2): This week must be tough for the Wolverines, knowing no one believes in Michigan.

“Our backs are against the wall and people think you can’t do it.”

Yes, all week, my social media timelines and sports websites have been filled with people expecting the Hawkeyes to win in Indianapolis. Or not.

So who are these people that don’t believe the hype when it comes to the Wolverines?

It’s me. I’m no one. But not in 2023. In 2019.

And apparently it became a villain origin story for Connor Stalions.

Way back in 2019, Stalions was spotted at the Notre Dame game, just three weeks after I wrote my “Never underestimate how overrated Michigan can be” column and made a compelling case that “Iowa > Michigan” – or at least that the Hawkeyes weren’t as far behind these blue bloods as everyone made them out to be. It’s stat-driven and objective — everything college football is often not. If that column were any better, it’d write a book – a book that would make Ulysses look like it was written in crayon — then read it to you. It was my Eiffel Tower. My Rachmaninoff’s Third. My Piéta.

Then the Hawkeyes went out and lost by a score that seems almost normal now: 10-3. 

Speaking of guys on the sidelines with cell phones, look at this hold I captured during an “uncatchable” throw that would have tied the game before half.

The intended receiver? Oliver Martin. The same ex-Michigan, ex-Iowa receiver that ended up elsewhere. If you haven’t started drawing lines between photos on an evidence board like Charlie Day, I commend you. We’re tangled in strings here.

2019 Michigan went on to do nothing of note, then canceled three games in a 2-4 2020 campaign. Then all of a sudden, the Wolverines figure it out and win two Big Ten titles in a row.

It’s almost as if they flipped a switch. Or pushed record on a phone. I wonder what changed.

But enough conspiracies.

Ever move away from your hometown, then eventually move back? The years start to merge together and the gaps of time you spent in Chicago, Fort Lauderdale and Los Angeles get overrun by Rock Island memories, as if you never left.

That’s Michigan in college football. There was a very large stretch where they were less relevant than the PS2 prognostication below, but we were all supposed to act as if Blue was still B1G elite.

Rich Rodriguez, Brady Hoke, the first seven seasons of Jim Harbaugh — it didn’t matter. Michigan wasn’t the Michigan everyone kept saying they were. You can’t chalk it up to Ohio State’s 15-1 record in The Game from 2004-2019. Penn State surpassed them. Wisconsin did. Michigan State. (Really. Look at 2008-2015.) They heard Northwestern’s footsteps. And a valid argument could be made for Iowa. For a few years? Absolutely. But maybe even a decade. These aren’t flukes. It’s a sustained lack of success.  

Seven of the Big Ten’s teams – even Nebraska – made a championship game before Michigan. It didn’t matter if it was the contrived Legends and Leaders or geographically-sound East and West. For the first 10 years of the #B1GFCG – no Wolverines.

And yet, the Washington Post declared in 2017 “they have risen” — but only in the polls. On the field? Nah.

No conference championships from 2004-2021, and we were supposed to believe they were in a “Big Three” of the Big Ten?

Here’s how Michigan’s wins stacked up from 2014-2018:  

62 — Ohio State

53 — Wisconsin

45 — Penn State

44 — Iowa

43 — Michigan and Michigan State

41 — Northwestern 

When the Hawkeyes passed the Wolverines to finish No. 8 in 2002, they traded places in the polls before the next season, then repeated the process in 2003 and 2004. Three years of less respect, three years of ending the season above them in 8th.

In those seasons, Iowa was 2-1 against Michigan. I hear you: “That was 20 years ago.” Extend that out to 2016, and it is still 7-4 Hawkeyes. I’ll do the math: .667 vs. .636.

If we cherry-pick a bit and add years they never played, we could post that Iowa only lost to Michigan once from 2007-2018.

But we’d never do that. (The Hawkeyes were 5-1 in that span – the decade of dominance. Too much?)

Now just because Michigan has won two titles in a row – under potentially dubious circumstances yet to be vacated – we’re supposed to pretend the void between 2004-2021 didn’t happen?

Wait, I know exactly where those years don’t exist: NCAA Football 2004. Let’s turn to the ultimate objective source:

In a stunner, the Totally Irrelevant Prediction says the Hawkeyes win 17-14. A scoreless tie with the half winding down is broken up when Iowa throws a 39-yard touchdown with 32 seconds left. Seven seconds later, the Hawks return a fumble 16 yards for a touchdown. Iowa adds a field goal to its lead and the defense doesn’t yield until late as the Hawks hold on for an improbable victory.

Kirk Ferentz doesn’t care about what this — likely the lone Hawkeyes pick locally or nationally — or any other prediction says.

“The great thing about sports is you just never know what’s going to happen,” Ferentz says in the video at the top of this page. “That’s why all the prognosticants, they get a little frustrated because you just can’t predict even over a regular season what’s going to happen 100% because people are people and there’s a lot of things that can happen.” 

What’s ironic about what Ferentz said is that the whole concept of the Totally Irrelevant Prediction is that a PS2 playing NCAA Football 2004 in 2015 (and now concluding Year 9 in 2023) can do as well as the experts picking scores. Because it’s a crapshoot. It’s not just in the game, it’s in the name. And sometimes it’s true: The TIP is 10-2 this year.

Will it be 10-3 or 11-2 after this Iowa pick to win the B1G? We’ll see. We don’t know. No one really does. But you can’t win if you aren’t in this game. Wouldn’t you rather have a shot? 

I get it, nine times out of 10 we’d pick the Big Ten East over the West in this game and, sure enough, the East is 9-0. Wait. A. Second. That means, yes, only this game can be that 10th time. The one the West wins.

Despite that optimistic outlook and the feel-good simulation above, the Hawkologist’s prognosis is still a solid 6 on the 6-point pain index. Even a win wouldn’t be spotless.

If it ends poorly, rest easy. Take solace in the knowledge that it’s only a matter of time until this game and 2021’s is vacated. That said: Why not Iowa?

Here’s a look at what others from near and far expect, starting with the weather from former Our Quad Cities Weather meteorologist and current CBS 4 Indianapolis meteorologist Tyler Ryan:

“The rain has cleared out of the area but the clouds will still stick around. Highs will be in the low 50s and there is a slim chance for an isolated shower as fans head home.”

Thanks to Tyler for his contributions the past two seasons and good luck in Indy!

HawkeyeInsider.com
David Eickholt: Michigan 30, Iowa 10. Click here to read more.

CBS Sports
Dennis Dodd: Michigan
Tom Fornelli: Michigan
Chip Patterson: Michigan
Barrett Sallee: Michigan
Shehan Jeyarajah: Michigan
David Cobb: Michigan
Jerry Palm: Michigan

ESPN
Bill Connelly: Michigan 29, Iowa 6

Athlon Sports
Steven Lassan: Michigan
Joe Vitale: Michigan
Luke Easterling: Michigan

Bleacher Report
David Kenyon: Michigan 27, Iowa 7

USA Today
Scooby Axson: Michigan
Jace Evans: Michigan
Paul Myerberg: Michigan
Erick Smith: Michigan
Eddie Timanus: Michigan
Dan Wolken: Michigan
Kevin Erickson: Michigan 25, Iowa 9

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