Stanzi puts it on Stanzi

EVANSTON, Ill. -- It wasn't the final drive. It was the interception that lost the game for the Hawkeyes.

Iowa quarterback Ricky Stanzi had a hand in both and that's what he said. His opinion counts here.

"That's not the reason we lost," Stanzi said. "We lost because I threw a stupid interception and that switches momentum. They rip off two really good drives. Dan Persa played out of his mind. The interception, it cost us the game."

The interception was definitely a part of the No. 13 Hawkeyes' 21-17 loss at Northwestern on Saturday.

Linebacker Jeremiha Hunter picked off Northwestern quarterback Dan Persa and gave the Hawkeyes a first down at their 38. At this point, with 13:23 left in the fourth quarter, Iowa led 17-7 and looked to be going in for the kill.

Stanzi hit tight end Allen Reisner for an 18-yard gain to NU's 40. Two more plays later, Iowa faced a second-and-11 at NU's 43.

Stanzi dropped back and lofted a pop fly into an area that contained two Northwestern defenders and Iowa receiver Derrell Johnson-Koulianos. Safety Brian Peters picked it off. Stanzi missed wide receiver Marvin McNutt breaking wide open underneath.

"I lost the guy I was supposed to read, I just lost him in the shuffle of things," said Stanzi, who finished 23 of 41 for 270 yards, two TDs and the interception. "Marvin's running wide open, but I would thought a guy would've jumped down on him."

After an unnecessary roughness penalty, the Wildcats took over at their 15 and marched 85 yards on 13 plays, pulling to 17-14 on Persa's 6-yard TD pass to wide receiver Jeremy Ebert.

"Disappointing, we got the turnover and we couldn't make something out of it," Iowa coach Kirk Ferentz said.

Stanzi didn't let Stanzi off the hook. His teammates did.

"There's never going to be one play," guard Julian Vandervelde said. "There's never going to be just one person responsible. Every single one of us can look at plays we did wrong and every single one of us can take the blame for this."

Of course, Stanzi still carries the interception stigma from the 2009 season, when he threw 15 picks. He has 22 TD passes and just four interceptions this year. Guess which number he thought about on the bus ride to Iowa City last night?

To a man, every Iowa player that dealt with the wind Saturday at Ryan Field said it wasn't a factor. At the beginning of the game, it was 10 mph out of the west/southwest. By the end, it whipped up to at least 18 and probably 20 to 25 mph.

Every point was scored in the north end zone, including Iowa kicker Mike Meyer's 32-yard field goal that pulled Iowa within 7-3 at halftime. Stanzi threw two TDs with the wind to his back, including a 70-yarder to Johnson-Koulianos, a career-long for him. Into the wind, Stanzi threw no TDs and the interception.

Still, Stanzi didn't give an inch to Stanzi. The wind, the defense that allowed a fourth-quarter TD drive in all three of Iowa's losses, the puckering of an offense with 1:22 left when it needed to be its best -- no, Stanzi wasn't hearing any of that.

"I made a costly mistake in the fourth quarter that turned the game around," he said. "That's why we lost."