LOS ANGELES — The 2025 Iowa football season, no matter how it finishes from here, will forever be filled with frustration.
The No. 21 Hawkeyes added to their oh-so-close reputation on Nov. 15, blowing a 14-point lead and falling short, 26-21, at No. 17 Southern California.
Iowa had been 64-1 in its last 65 games when leading by 14 points entering Saturday’s game at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. Make that 64-2.
And make that 0-13 in its last 13 games against ranked opponents.
Iowa has proven all season it can play with the best of the best in college football.
A three-point loss at ranked Iowa State. A five-point loss to Indiana and a two-point loss to Oregon, both top-10 teams.
Mark Gronowski’s fourth-down pass to Kaden Wetjen was incomplete with 1:59 to go, in another oh-so-close moment. Wetjen caught the ball inside the USC 10, but came down out of bounds, just barely.
Wetjen nearly had his right toe down inside the boundary. After an official review, it was ruled he was out by about a shoe size.
USC took over at its own 29 instead and was able to run out the clock, getting two first downs … including on an unsportsmanlike-conduct penalty on an assistant coach (who wasn’t immediately identified or named).
Iowa, meanwhile, blew a 21-7 lead and failed to score in the second half on four possessions … with the game’s only turnover (more on that soon) as a key swing play.
The Hawkeyes dropped to 6-4 overall, 4-3 in Big Ten Conference play with a home game vs. Michigan State next. USC improved to 8-2, 6-1.
Crucial deflection goes USC’s way
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Now three Iowa losses this season have been flipped by somewhat-fluky tipped passes.
In this one, the Hawkeyes were nursing a 21-19 third-quarter lead when Mark Gronowski rolled right on third-and-5 against an all-out USC blitz. He had Jacob Gill open briefly but probably threw a moment too late, and the ball was deflected into the air. USC freshman defensive lineman Jahkeem Stewart pulled the ball out of mid-air for the game’s first turnover, an interception with 1:54 left in the third quarter.
Suddenly, USC had the ball at Iowa’s 40. The Trojans’ offense was rolling at that point, and they took the turnover and converted into a touchdown for a 26-21 lead with 13:36 to play.
Iowa fans know this was certainly not the first time that a bad deflection proved costly.
Against Iowa State, in a 13-13 game in the fourth quarter, a ball thrown by Iowa State’s Rocco Becht caromed into the air and instead of a third-down stop, Gabe Burkle pulled it in for a key conversion that led to Iowa State’s winning points in a 16-13 score.
Iowa’s 20-15 loss to Indiana began with a tipped interception on the second play of the game. The Hoosiers turned that into a first-minute touchdown, which proved important as that game also went 13-13 into the final two minutes.
The Penn State game also had one tipped interception go both teams’ way … so those probably canceled out in a 25-24 Iowa win.
So much for Iowa’s ground-and-pound game plan
Amid all-day rain in Los Angeles, of course the Hawkeyes decided to air it out.
Offensive coordinator Tim Lester went against tendency in the early going, coming out on the very first play with receiver Kaden Wetjen in the backfield – and faking a toss to him, with Mark Gronowski delivering a 14-yard pass to a wide-open DJ Vonnahme.
A few plays later, Gronowski sprung out of the pocket and uncorked a dart down the right sideline to Jacob Gill, who made a fantastic leaping catch, came down in bounds and raced downfield for a 44-yard gain. That opening-drive connection marked Iowa’s second-longest pass play of the season.
And then on fourth-and-inches from the USC 2 … a sneak, right? Nope, a bootleg pass from Gronowski to Dayton Howard, whose leaping grab helped Iowa secure a good first-drive start that had been elusive vs. ranked teams.
Perhaps Gronowski gained confidence from last week’s connections of 38 yards (to Gill) and 40 yards (to Vonnahme) in the rain against Oregon. But one of the country’s worst passing offenses seemed to find a rhythm in tough throwing conditions.
Gronowski hit Vonnahme in the second quarter for a 32-yard pickup on third-and-5 from Iowa’s 30. That was the crucial play of a response drive to USC’s lone first-half touchdown and put Iowa back in charge, 21-7, with 3:21 left in the second quarter.
Gronowski’s first-half passing numbers: 8-for-11, 107 yards and that one score. Iowa entered the game ranked No. 133 out of 136 FBS teams with 133.2 passing yards per game.
Iowa sputtered in the passing game in the second half. It ended up running for 183 yards and passed for 137.
Linebacker play stands out for the Hawkeyes
The most maligned position group on Iowa’s defense did some interesting and good things in the first half.
The interesting: Starter Jayden Montgomery ceded time to Jaden Harrell, who began the season as the starter but has been recovering from a knee injury, as the pair of middle linebackers alternated at times in the first half.
The good: Weak-side linebacker Karson Sharar came up with a monster fourth-and-1 stop in the first quarter, with USC going for it from its own 45-yard line with Iowa leading, 7-0.
Sharar shot through a thin hole on the under-center run and delivered an ankle tackle on King Miller as he approached a hole that would’ve given him a sure first down.
Iowa turned that Sharar stop into seven points, with Gronowski sneaking in from 1 yard out early in the second quarter to give the Hawkeyes a 14-0 advantage. Yes, Gronowski scored again. He remains the only FBS player to score in every game this season (10 of 10).
Oh, and Gronowski wasn’t done scoring … but not as a runner
Much of the discourse this past week (admittedly from me) revolved around Iowa’s lack of success on two-point conversions, with misses on seven straight tries – including 0-for-6 in Lester’s two years as OC.
Well, Lester reached into his bag of goal-line tricks to deliver a great two-point call – except for a touchdown in this case.
On first-and-goal from USC’s 5, Wetjen again lined up in the backfield and took a pitch from Gronowski and flowed left and tossed a pitch to receiver Reece Vander Zee. The former high school quarterback rolled to his right and tossed a perfect throw to Gronowski in the end zone for a 5-yard touchdown and 21-7 Iowa lead late in the first half.
That play is well-known as the “Philly Special” from a years-ago Eagles touchdown involving quarterback Nick Foles in the Super Bowl. Lester, who came to Iowa with an NFL pedigree, dialed up a beauty there. That made Iowa 3-for-3 with three touchdowns in the red zone to start the game.
Thus, Vander Zee became the first non-quarterback Hawkeye since punter/holder Colten Rastetter in 2018 at Penn State (also played in the rain) to throw a touchdown pass in a game. And Gronowski became the first Iowa QB to record a receiving touchdown since Matt Sherman caught a pass from Tim Dwight at Minnesota in 1994.
Hawkeyes columnist Chad Leistikow has served for 31 years with The Des Moines Register and USA TODAY Sports Network. Chad is the 2023 INA Iowa Sports Columnist of the Year and NSMA Co-Sportswriter of the Year in Iowa. Join Chad’s text-message group at HawkCentral.com/HawkeyesTexts. Follow @ChadLeistikow on X.
