Hawkeyes Hope To Avoid Another Madison Clunker

Cloud from loss to Badgers two seasons ago lingers heading into Saturday's game.

As clunkers go, Iowa’s 38-14 loss at Wisconsin two years ago landed with an especially loud thud.

One week after dominating Ohio State in a 55-24 home win, the Hawkeyes went to Madison and well, clunked.

Iowa gained 66 yards on 50 plays. The Hawkeyes punted nine times, and had just five first downs. Both of Iowa’s touchdowns came on Josh Jackson interception returns.

It’s why quarterback Nate Stanley paused when asked about that game on Tuesday in preparation for Saturday’s game between the Hawkeyes and Badgers in Madison. Stanley was 8-of-24 passing for 41 yards and an interception in that game. A week earlier, in the win at Kinnick Stadium over Ohio State, Stanley threw for 226 yards and five touchdowns.

Stanley was a sophomore then, a senior now. That kind of maturity, he said, helps. Not just with him, but the rest of the Hawkeyes.

“I think it’s just the experience a lot of guys have on our team now. We didn’t handle that environment well,” said Stanley, who threw for 256 yards and two touchdowns in last season's 28-17 loss to the Badgers in Iowa City. “We have an idea of what to expect and how to handle it.”

Iowa coach Kirk Ferentz has never wavered in his confidence with Stanley, and he's not worried about how his quarterback will handle a game in a place where he struggled.

“Well, he's so much more veteran, I guess, or experienced, whatever the best word would be there,” Ferentz said. “He's been through a lot now. Good, bad or indifferent, and that helps a player. He'll still be antsy out there, and it's a tough road game in a tough environment, but he's played in those now. He's got more experience under his belt, and I think he'll probably handle it a little bit better. Hopefully all of us around him will handle it better, too, and help him a little bit more because there wasn't much good that we did up there a couple years ago, and we'll find out it was either an aberration or a trend. Hopefully not a trend.”

Toren Young, a Madison native who got some late playing time in that 2017 game, says how the Hawkeyes played is not a trend.

“It was definitely a tough game,” Young said. “We took a lot from that game, a lot from that film.

“You can’t get too caught up in previous games, because each year it’s a new team. We take away what we can take away from those games, and move forward.”

Stanley, too, is a Wisconsin native, and Ferentz understands that those kinds of games can put pressure on players.

“I’m thinking positive thoughts about like maybe Toren just knifing through there for a 50-yard gain or something like that,” Ferentz said. “Hopefully it'll give him a little juice and a little impetus to be successful out there, but you worry about guys pressing too hard sometimes.”

Wisconsin is on a two-game losing streak, but Ferentz was more interested in pointing out two of the Badgers’ wins this season. They downed Michigan, 35-14, in a game in which they led 28-0 at halftime. There was also the 38-0 victory over Michigan State, when the Badgers led 17-0 at halftime.

“I think the message to the team is we need to be ready at kickoff. 3:05, we'd better be ready, because if you're not … that really was the story of the Michigan-Michigan State game. It was over pretty quickly,” Ferentz said. “I think Michigan State had around 38 snaps? They had like four or five three-and-outs and a six-and-out, and that was in the first half, and it was 17-0. Now again you're chasing 17 points, it's hard to have a balanced patient game plan when you do that. The Michigan game was 28-0, they turned it over three times. So forget about that if you're going to turn it over, might as well go home because it's not going to be pretty.”

“The message there is if you're not ready to go, these guys know what to do with it. They're going to be ready to go. They've demonstrated that time and time again, not just this year but kind of historically these guys show up ready to play.”

Iowa has had its ups and downs handling road environments this season — the Hawkeyes won in the rainy, noisy mess at Iowa State and the rainy, drab day at Northwestern, and then struggled at Michigan.

The clouds from the clunkers can still linger over a team.

So the message this week was simple — 2017 was two years ago, but don’t forget what happened.

Young didn’t seem to think it would be a problem.

“We’re excited for the opportunity,” he said.