| Well, we got the game we all figured we'd get going into last weekend, when all we needed to happen was for Michigan to beat Ohio State for the first time in a decade, and the second time in 18 years; AND then Minnesota to win the Axe game, for also the second time in the past 18 years. Just about the only predictable part of this matchup is that it required Nebraska choking, and Iowa going full Iowa, with weird ways to score points. The Hawkeyes better figure out a similar scoring method this weekend, because I don't know how their offense will score against Michigan. Since letting Kenneth Walker run all over them, the Michigan run defense has absolutely shut opponents down, giving up just 3.1 ypc over their past three games, including just 2.1 last week against Ohio State. And that was with the threat of that wide receiver trio keeping Michigan's safeties and linebackers honest. No such threat from Iowa. And while Ohio State's offensive line got exposed last week, and you figure Iowa will at least put up a better fight, this is far from a typical Hawkeye offensive line. In fact in standard down situations, they rank in the bottom 10 of the entire FBS in line yards, for both run blocking and pass blocking. They are outside the top 100 in 7 of the 9 offensive line metrics that Football Outsiders uses. The two they aren't? #73 in passing downs sack rate, and #27 in power success rate. So really, the only time this offensive line isn't terrible is in 3rd or 4th and short situations. Where Iowa can force at least some issues for Michigan is with their defensive front. I don't think Michigan will absolutely hammer away at will on the ground, as they did last weekend. Thus meaning Cade McNamera won't be in nearly as many easy passing situations. He had a good game, but he didn't go downfield a ton. Against the best run defense they faced, Wisconsin, who held them to just 2.5 ypc, McNamera was able to carry the offense, recording his highest single game QBR of any Big Ten game this season, completing 61% of his passes for 197 yards, 2 touchdowns and 0 interceptions. The reason was that even though Michigan was not running the ball well, the Wisconsin offense wasn't putting any pressure on them to come out of it, so they still ran the ball 44 times, even though they only had two non-QB carries of more than 4 yards. I think you'll see something similar here, although maybe not as extreme. In Michigan's one loss, the Michigan State offense was doing enough that the quarterbacks had to do more, and you saw two QB fumbles (one lost), and an interception in the fourth quarter. Iowa I think is going to look a lot like the Wisconsin game. Michigan's running game will be slowed, but the Hawkeye offense won't do enough (anything) to force Michigan out of their comfort zone. They'll grind away, emphasize ball security, and pick their spots. I don't see any way Iowa wins this without being at least +2 in turnover margin, and Michigan will play call away from it, because they can afford to. |
