Can Iowa football add Ducks to its list of notable November knockout prey?

This is Iowa football. This is November. This game Saturday against Oregon is all Hawkeyeville can reasonably want.

It kind of crept up on us. The picture got sharper Tuesday when the College Football Playoff committee ranked Iowa No. 20, knowing losses by a late 54-yard field goal at Iowa State and by one score to Indiana weren’t disqualifiers.

Now, November. To get from 20th in the CFP to the promised land of the final top 11 — 12th won’t get it done this year — requires a month without a scratch.

A tall order, that one. After facing the CFP’s ninth-ranked Oregon, the Hawkeyes go to CFP No. 19 USC next Saturday. Then there’s still Nebraska at Lincoln to close the regular-season.

The only thing that matters here and now, of course, is Oregon. Unlike all the Eagles, Cardinals, Owls, Falcons, Blue Hens and Hawks of major college football, the Ducks fly in the stratosphere.

Even if Iowa would lose sometime between next week and Black Friday, a win in this showdown with Oregon would burn brightly long after Saturday night’s partying in Iowa City.

That’s because the opponent isn’t Brand X. Oregon football is nationwide.

When the Ducks began Big Ten football play last year, they didn’t transition to their new league. Instead, the Big Ten had to adjust to them. Oregon won all nine conference games and then beat Penn State in the league championship.

Oregon’s depth chart has players who left Alabama, USC and other big-time programs to play in Eugene. The Ducks are the cool kids, explosive players who wear explosive uniforms.

They’re the favorite sons of the Lord Paramount of college sports sponsors, Nike. That Oregon-based corporate juggernaut has poured tens of millions of dollars into Ducks athletics.

Oregon quarterback Dante Moore and wide receiver Dakorien Moore have NIL deals with Nike. That’s Caitlin Clark stuff. It’s not Hawkeyes football stuff.

So we’re quite aware of the Ducks here though this is the first time they’ve come to Iowa since 1989, when they were just another football team. We know if Iowa can prevail against them, it leapfrogs the Hawkeyes over Oregon and others in the CFP rankings and creates a national buzz of its own for a while. In November.

This is an interesting enough game to bring in the Fox Big Noon extravaganza, a pregame show with as much yammering as any episode of “The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City.”

There’s been some “biggest game in Kinnick since …” chatter this week. I don’t know how you compare this to 2021 when No. 3 Iowa beat No. 4 Penn State, 23-20. That was in midseason.

An all-Top 5 clash here was a large thing in the moment, but it didn’t have legs. The Hawkeyes lost their next two games and dropped two more after that, while Penn State plummeted to a 7-6 mark.

The 2015 Hawkeyes went 12-0 in the regular-season, but didn’t play a ranked team at home. That was a club in need of a 12-team playoff. It missed the 4-team CFP by inches.

Iowa beat No. 9 Wisconsin, 30-7, in Kinnick to claim a share of the 2004 Big Ten title, but there were no national implications. The Hawkeyes ran the table in 2002 conference play, but without any imposing opponents or drama down the stretch.

With the 12-team CFP, getting to 7-2 with a win over Oregon would immediately put the Hawkeyes in the playoff discussion. As Ohio State can tell you from last season, making the playoffs is more important than participating in the Big Ten championship game.

There have been November days and nights at Kinnick under Kirk Ferentz that are forever stamped in the Iowa memory banks. The shocking, 55-24, pummeling of No. 3 Ohio State in 2017. The 14-13 last-second stunner over No. 2 Michigan — a three-touchdown favorite — the year before. The 24-23 win over No. 3 Penn State in 2008.

Each of those games was followed by fans storming the field.

One might hope time has tempered your rowdiness, and you’ll stay in the stands and applaud politely if the Hawkeyes add a win over Oregon to their list of November bombshells.

One might hope it, but that sure wouldn’t stop it from happening.

Comments: (319) 398-8440; mike.hlas@thegazette.com