PASADENA, CA – The Iowa football team fell to UCLA, 20-17, on Friday night at the Rose Bowl Stadium. Hawkeye starting quarterback Brendan Sullivan left the game in the third quarter due to an ankle sprain while the defense allowed 211 rushing yards to an offense averaging less than half that total. Iowa fell to 6-4 on the season and 4-3 in conference play and has yet to win a game in the Rose Bowl since 1959.

“I just got done telling the team, basically, is one thing about football is that you typically get what you deserve,” Iowa head coach Kirk Ferentz said in his postgame press conference. “We certainly didn’t play well enough to expect to win tonight, basically in any category. So, disappointing. Nothing really went right for us.”

UCLA quarterback Ethan Garbers completed 21 of 34 passes for 204 yards, two touchdowns, and two interceptions. In his second start of the season for the Hawkeyes, Sullivan completed six of nine passes for 157 yards and two picks. On the ground, the Big Ten’s leading rusher Kaleb Johnson managed 49 yards and a touchdown on 18 carries while his UCLA counterpart T.J. Harden piled up more than twice the yardage, finishing with 125 yards on 20 carries.

“It’s getting better each and every week,” UCLA head coach Deshaun Foster said of the Bruins’ resurgent ground game. “It wasn’t all of a sudden we just came out there and it came together … I just think we had a little bit of juice, and [UCLA players] were fired up for the challenge … I think they took pride in wanting to outrush them.”

An uncharacteristic first half turned into a nightmare third quarter for the Hawkeyes. Facing a touchdown deficit opening the second half, Sullivan was hit hard on a scramble. He played the following series but tossed an unsightly interception – his third turnover of the game – before being subbed out for Jackson Stratton, a sophomore who transferred from Colorado State over the offseason.

With only 17 prior collegiate pass attempts, Stratton’s arm made the difference on his first drive. He converted two third downs on completions to Gill before running back Kamari Moulton scored on a 1-yard rush to knot the game at 17 apiece.

“He didn’t seem overwhelmed by things, and a real credit to him there,” Ferentz said of Stratton, who finished 3-of-6 for 28 yards. “But obviously, it limits what you can do.”

UCLA answered with a methodical, 13-play drive that ate up 6:38 of clock. Sitting five yards from the end zone, an Iowa defense missing its leading tackler in Jay Higgins, who left in the first half due to injury, stood tall, stuffing Harden for a loss of four yards to force a Bruin go-ahead field goal.

The Hawkeyes mustered their third three-and-out of the evening before giving the ball back to the Bruins, who notched three first downs, including a nine-yard gain on 3rd-and-8 that put the game away. The conversion was the Bruins’ ninth of the contest, as they finished with a 64.2 conversion percentage. They entered the contest with a 41.4 percent rate.

“It comes down to your keys, it comes down to your fundamentals, it comes down to really just making the play,” Iowa linebacker Nick Jackson said. “I think that we switched up our coverages, we switched up a lot of stuff, whether we’re blitzing, whether we’re sitting in a zone coverage. It really comes down to executing the game plan and knowing exactly where you’re supposed to be.”

The Hawkeyes capitalized on two Bruin turnovers to gain an early first-quarter lead before falling victim to the same mistakes. Starting in Iowa territory in two of its three scoring drives, UCLA rattled off 17 unanswered points to take a seven-point lead into the break.

Garbers entered the contest with nine interceptions, and it only took him three plays to hit double digits on the season. An errant pass on third down wound up in the hands of second-year defensive back Zach Lutmer for his first career pick.

Sullivan and the offense needed only three plays to find the end zone as Gill ran for 32 yards on a screen pass for Johnson and delivered a two-yard plunge into the end zone for an early lead. The score was his 20th rushing touchdown this season.

Garbers’ next turnover was even more untimely. The Bruins had their most productive drive of the first half, driving 72 yards on 13 plays and converting two third downs. But on second down a mere three yards from the goal line, linebacker Nick Jackson slammed into the quarterback’s blind side as he threw, forcing a wounded-duck pass that fell into the lap of safety Quinn Schulte.

Iowa set itself up to score with another long pass play to Gill, this time a 59-yard bomb that the Northwestern transfer caught mid-stride before being tackled at the 27-yard line.

The Hawkeyes advanced to the 10-yard line before Sullivan’s third-down scramble couldn’t get past the sticks. On 4th-and-2, Iowa settled for a 24-yard field goal.

After scoring a field goal of their own – a 57-yarder that tied a program record from 2015 – the Bruins started their next drive in enemy territory after a Sullivan interception – his first as a Hawkeye. After a 29-yard rush from Harden, the Bruins found the end zone with a two-yard pass to Titus Mokiao-Atimalala.

“They ran harder, they blocked harder,” Ferentz said of the UCLA offense. “The right thing was to play defense harder. I know one thing: When you don’t tackle, it’s hard to play good defense.”

Sullivan gave the ball away on the following drive on a scramble. Faking out linebacker Kain Medrano near the line of scrimmage, the quarterback raced up the field, only to have the ball stripped by Medrano, who returned the ball to 12 yards and into Iowa territory. The Bruins got to the 9-yard line, but Garbers coughed up the ball again, as Iowa linebacker Kyler Fisher knocked stripped the quarterback on a scramble near the goal line.

The Hawkeyes couldn’t capitalize, going three-and-out and punting to the UCLA 44-yard line. Five plays and 56 seconds later, the Bruins had the lead as Garbers hit wide receiver Logan Loya on a 29-yard strike.

The first half produced five turnovers and one punt as the Bruins, entering the contest as the Big Ten’s worst rushing offense with 73.9 yards per game, tallied 146 yards on the ground. Meanwhile, the Hawkeyes, entering Pasadena with the FBS’s second-leading rusher, managed only 34 yards on 15 attempts.

Ferentz said the Hawkeyes were seeing more blitzes, which created more negative plays for what was a consistent bright spot for the Iowa offense.

“We haven’t had many of those, but we got a few tonight,” Ferentz said of Iowa’s negative plays. “They took us off our game, off our spot. And we couldn’t counter that.”

Injury updates

Gill went down with an apparent injury in the second half but returned in time for Stratton’s debut drive. The wideout said he had been dealing with stomach flu all week and that he was just cramping from dehydration.

Ferentz said the team wouldn’t know the timetable of Sullivan’s injury until next week. As for Higgins, the coach said he was dealing with a tissue injury in his hamstring.

“We’ll know more next week,” the coach said. “He tried to come back in and just watching come off the field, I just couldn’t imagine him covering guys. Hopefully, it’s not too bad.”

Tight end Addison Ostrenga, who hasn’t played since Iowa’s Oct. 5 game against Ohio State, has a “realistic chance” at making it back in time for Iowa’s next game, Ferentz said. The coach added that quarterback Cade McNamara, who’s sat out the last two games with a concussion got some practice time in at the end of the week. Wide receiver Reece Vander Zee is in more of a “gray area” on his comeback from an injury suffered against Michigan State.

Up next

The Hawkeyes are on bye for next week before traveling to Maryland for a game on Saturday, Nov. 23. Start time has yet to be announced. The Terrapins are 4-4 on the season and 1-4 in Big Ten play and take on No. 1 Oregon on Saturday afternoon.