BOHNENKAMP: Iowa's defense adds another Kinnick show

IOWA CITY — Three was fine.

More than fine, actually.

Well, no, it wasn’t.

“We don’t like giving up points,” Iowa defensive tackle Daviyon Nixon said. “Not even three points.”

Saturday’s 48-3 victory for the No. 14 Hawkeyes over Middle Tennessee State at Kinnick Stadium was another defensive show for the home crowd.

Fourteen points in the season opener against Miami (Ohio).

Zero against Rutgers in the Big Ten opener.

And now three against the Blue Raiders.

Three was fine.

Zero, of course, would have been better.

“Take pride in your work, really,” said defensive end A.J. Epenesa. “We’re defenders, we play defense. We prevent people from scoring. It’s something we can hang our hat on.”

The month has ended, the Hawkeyes are 4-0 heading into the full brunt of the Big Ten schedule beginning with next week’s game at Michigan.

Other than a few brief moments in last week’s 18-17 win at Iowa State, Iowa’s defense has been stifling while surviving through injuries on the back end. There have been some big plays, but none that were devastating.

The goal of this game was no big plays.

Zero.

So here is another stat for hat-hanging — Iowa held Middle Tennessee State quarterback Asher O’Hara, a spinmaster of running and passing, to 33 yards rushing and 110 yards passing.

And that’s what Iowa wanted. O’Hara was a concern because, as Epenesa said, “he was the biggest threat.”

The Hawkeyes talked about O’Hara earlier in the week, during Tuesday’s media availability. They talked about him again after surrounding him all day Saturday.

“We got after them a little bit,” Epenesa said. “We made them uncomfortable.”

How?

“They tried to pass the ball a lot,” Epenesa said. “And we were able to disrupt it.”

The disruption came up the middle. Nixon had a career-high seven tackles, including 2 ½ for loss. Defensive tackle Cedrick Lattimore’s one tackle was a sack of O’Hara, and he was also credited with a hurry.

“We were trying to stop the quarterback,” Lattimore said. “He’s a guy who likes to run around.

“We got after him.”

“Whenever they’re showing up and making plays like that, it’s big,” Epenesa said of his interior teammates.

“I saw what I saw on film,” said O’Hara.

Well, welcome to the show everyone else has been seeing so far this season.

Middle Tennessee State coach Rick Stockstill knew what he saw.

“They whooped us today,” he said.

On offense. On defense. Everywhere.

The only Blue Raider points came on a 43-yard field goal by Crews Holt in the third quarter. It was 27-3 at that point.

Three.

Just fine, except that it wasn’t.

Oh, and more hat hooks — 216 yards of offense for the Blue Raiders, 12 first downs (compared to 30 for the Hawkeyes), 24 minutes and 3 seconds of possession, four three-and-outs among MTSU’s 11 possessions.

“It means a lot,” Lattimore said of all of those numbers. “We strive for that on defense. We talk about that all of the time.”

Epenesa, who had just two tackles as he continues to be the focus of so many blockers, knows that there is work ahead.

“We have a lot to fix,” he said.

Nixon was the first player brought to the post-game press conference, and he smiled throughout the opportunity.

He seemed disappointed that his time at the front of the room was only a couple of minutes.

“Any questions?” Nixon said with a laugh as it was time to go.

Nope. The answers had already been delivered.

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