MINNEAPOLIS – The Floyd of Rosedale Trophy is back in familiar territory. After a heartbreaking loss last year at Kinnick Stadium, the Iowa football team claimed revenge against rival Minnesota, defeating the Gophers, 31-14, at Huntington Bank Stadium on Saturday night. The win marked Iowa’s ninth in the last ten years. 

After a turbulent first half that saw an anemic Iowa offense, several Hawkeye defensive breakdowns, and a 14-7 deficit, the Black and Gold faithful bore witness to four straight scoring drives and 24 unanswered points for the visiting team. The second-half explosion started with the run game, as the Hawkeyes totaled 181 yards on the ground and three rushing scores over the final two quarters. 

“Failure is part of learning, and luckily we didn’t have to touch a flame tonight,” Hawkeye head coach Kirk Ferentz told reporters in his postgame press conference. “I mentioned on Wednesday that there’s a hell of a difference between 3-1 and 2-2, and a hell of a difference between 1-0 and 0-1 in Big Ten play. I left it at that, but our guys are smart guys, they can figure it out.”

Hawkeye running back Kaleb Johnson led his squad with 206 rushing yards and a career-best three touchdowns. The third-year was followed by sophomore back Jaziun Patterson with 64 yards. The defense collected two turnovers and allowed 66 total yards in the second half. 

Receiving the opening second-half kickoff, Iowa drove 67 yards on five plays for a touchdown. Tight end Addison Ostrenga opened the drive with a 20-yard grab. 

“I just think we were itching to get back out there after halftime,” Iowa quarterback Cade McNamara said. “We were just so ready to go out there back out there … We just had such a bad taste in our mouth after the first half that we wanted to get out there, get it going, and let it rip.”

Ostrenga nearly had another diving catch that would have put Iowa within the five-yard line, but the play was ruled incomplete after further review. That put the Hawkeyes in a third-and-10 situation 15 yards out from the end zone. While not many teams would opt to keep the ball on the ground in that situation, the Hawkeyes went with the old-reliable – sticking the ball to Johnson and watching him make magic. And that he did, dashing between the tackles for his second touchdown of the day. 

“We didn’t change much going into halftime, we just changed our mental approach,” McNamara said. “If anything, we stuck with, really, the same plays as the first half, and we just went out there with a completely different mentality.”

Despite a fourth-down conversion on the ensuing drive, the Gophers were forced to punt, and Johnson had himself an encore. Following a first down conversion from running back Jaziun Patterson, the third-year took the reigns, breaking multiple tacklers en route to a 40-yard score to push Iowa ahead, 21-14. 

Iowa got the ball back following a Minnesota three-and-out and took only 43 seconds to put up more points on the board. Johnson and Patterson combined for 21 yards while wide receiver Jacob Gill gobbled up nine on a reverse. After a Gopher stop on third down, Iowa kicker Drew Stevens nailed his first field goal try of the day, a 46-yarder to grant the Hawkeyes a 10-point lead. 

Iowa put the game on ice with a six-play, 52-yard, touchdown drive of all run plays. Backup quarterback Brendan Sullivan – who again entered the game when Iowa reached the zone – edged his way through a sea of maroon and white for a one-yard score. 

Iowa safety Quinn Schulte intercepted Brosmer’s pass on the final drive, and the Hawkeyes ran out the clock.

The first half of the ballgame was a defensive battle save for one scoring drive for the Hawkeyes and back-to-back scores for Minnesota to close out the frame. Iowa opened the scoring after linebacker Jay Higgins snagged an errant Max Brosmer pass to set Iowa up at the 38-yard line.  

Johnson continued his dominance on the ground, dashing 26 yards down the sideline for an apparent score until a replay review ruled him out of bounds at the two-yard line. On the ensuing play, the star running back took a handoff from Sullivan and plunged into the end zone for his seventh touchdown of the season. 

“I just remember, just like, I didn’t see nothing,” Johnson said of his 24-yard run. “So I said, ‘Just do what Kaleb Johnson do.’ So I went and broke a tackle and took off. They said I was at the one, but I finished it off.”

After not driving for more than 30 yards in each of their first five drives, the Gophers found life late in the first half, posting a seven-play, 64-yard drive highlighted by a 28-yard completion from Brosmer to wideout Lemeke Brockington on third down. Brockington made a juggling grab down the sideline and even though the play went under review, the call stood a catch. On the next play, Brosmer rolled out right and spotted tight end Jameson Geers in the back of the end zone to notch the game at seven. Geers was blanketed by Hawkeye safety Sebastian Castro but made a leaping grab in front of the raucous Minnesota student section. 

“They were a good team, a good offense,” Higgins said of the Gophers. “You know, we have similar defenses [as Minnesota], so it’s like, they’re super used to playing our type of defense.”

After the Hawkeyes’ fourth three-and-out of the half, the Gophers rallied down the field again, posting 68 yards on eight plays. Minnesota had three double-digit plays during the sequence – a 28-yard dime from Brosmer to wideout Daniel Jackson, a 17-yard run from Darius Taylor on third down, and an 11-yard completion to wide receiver Elijah Spencer for a score. Spencer caught the ball short of the goal line but bounced off multiple tacklers and fell into the end zone. 

At the half, the Hawkeyes posted 107 total yards with only 16 coming through the air as McNamara completed seven of his 13 pass attempts. Johnson’s 88 yards on the ground paced the Hawkeye running back room. Despite totaling 57 rushing yards in the opening frame, the Gophers finished the half 5-of-9 on third down. 

“The last 10 minutes of the first half, we kind of got punched in the face,” Iowa left tackle Mason Richman said. “We had a decision to make. If we’re going to sit there and whine about it, or are we going to punch back? So I think we did just that, and obviously the coaching staff did a heck of a job adjusting at halftime.”

For Johnson, last season’s infamous invalid fair catch call gave the Hawkeyes some motivation, and this time around, despite not having replay review go its way, Iowa got the job done in convincing fashion.

“We just said, ‘We got to win this. We got to come on top,” the running back said. “So we just kept our heads down, kept moving forward, and came out with the win.”

Up Next 

The 3-1 Hawkeyes will head into the bye week. Iowa next plays on Oct. 5 against No. 3 Ohio State in Columbus. The Buckeyes defeated Marshall, 49-14, in Week 4 and will venture northward to take on Michigan State in Week 5.