Hawkeyes pull some tricks, provide fans treat (premium)
Posted on 31. Oct, 2010 by admin in Iowa Football
By Brendan Stiles
HawkeyeDrive.com
IOWA CITY, Iowa — In an appropriate fashion, the No. 18 Iowa Hawkeyes showed they had a few “tricks” up their sleeves.
On this Halloween weekend, those tricks were put on display, and the Hawkeyes “treated” the Kinnick Stadium faithful to a 37-6 clobbering of Michigan State, who came in 8-0 and ranked fifth in the country.
The first such treat came on Iowa’s opening series on offense. Facing a x– and — from the Michigan State 49-yard line, quarterback Ricky Stanzi went back to throw, and looked to have slightly overthrown an open Marvin McNutt.
However, McNutt had the presence of mind to use skills he had from playing baseball in his youth, and made a one-handed catch over his head near the Iowa sidelines. The reception was good for 17 yards and was the highlight of the Hawkeyes’ first scoring drive of the day.
“I didn’t even see what happened on the catch because I got hit, but it looked like from what I could tell, it looked like a tremendous catch, and that’s a credit to him making a tremendous play,” Stanzi said. “He has done it many times, so you know that when you put the ball up, and he’ll go out and make a play for you.”
Then there was the trickery of one Tyler Sash. The junior safety made the 13th interception of his career on Saturday late in the first quarter. But what followed could be best described as bizarre.
Sash found himself tossing a lateral to cornerback Micah Hyde. As it turned out, Hyde ran 66 yards for a touchdown that put Iowa ahead 17-0.
What made the play all the more memorable for Hyde was that his older brother, Marcus Hyde, was starting this game at safety for Michigan State, thus the entire family was on hand at Kinnick Stadium to witness the younger Hyde’s memorable score.
“It was an amazing play,” Hyde said. “I’m just glad it worked out and that I actually caught it instead of dropping it.
“He caught the ball, and I actually thought he had a better position to run with it than I did. But the receiver was right there, and he just pitched it back.”
The tricks would continue the rest of the afternoon. On the following series, Prater came up with an interception that led to a play-action pass by Stanzi, who found running back Adam Robinson for a 32-yard touchdown pass to extend the lead to 23-0.
Then just before halftime, Stanzi again threw a pass that on this day, was being caught. This time, it was a pass over the middle of the field to tight end Brad Herman, who ended up getting 56 yards on the play and being brought down at the Spartan 5-yard line.
It was a throw that looked like it could be Stanzi’s third interception of the season, but as it turned out, the play wound up being a heck of a catch by Herman.
Stanzi finished the afternoon 11-of-15 passing for 190 yards and three touchdowns, with the third toss coming in the third quarter.
The play resulted in a 22-yard score after McNutt caught the ball and eluded a Michigan State defender on his way into the end zone.
But even with a 37-6 lead, there was one more trick up the Hawkeyes’ sleeve. A reverse pass was called in the fourth quarter, where Stanzi handed off to Robinson, who then gave the ball to McNutt, a former quarterback, who proceeded to look deep for Derrell Johnson-Koulianos.
Although the play resulted in an incomplete pass, it was a call that excited McNutt when it was called.
“They told me we might have had a chance to call it, and I was ready for it,” McNutt said, adding that he maybe had too much adrenaline running on that play, which he said was why they weren’t able to execute it successfully.
Nevertheless, all these tricks added up to Hawkeye fans being treated to a pleasant afternoon at Kinnick Stadium, as Iowa now has put itself back in position to be a part of the Big Ten title race.
Recent Comments