116 3rd St SE
Cedar Rapids, Iowa 52401
Iowa football 2024 early opponent preview: Iowa State
With abundance of returning production, overlook Cyclones at your own risk
Editor’s note: Second in a 12-part series previewing each of Iowa’s 2024 regular-season opponents.
IOWA CITY — Iowa State has more things going for it than one would expect from a football team that has gone 18-20 in the last three seasons.
Iowa State is expected to return 18 out of 22 starters on offense and defense in 2024. The Cyclones lead the country with 86 percent of production returning, as measured by ESPN’s Bill Connelly.
Rocco Becht will enter his second season as the Cyclones’ starting quarterback after completing 62.9 percent of his passes and throwing 23 touchdowns and eight interceptions.
Other key offensive players returning include wide receivers Jaylin Noel and Jayden Higgins and offensive lineman Jarrod Hufford.
Defensively, the Cyclones are coming off a season in which they led the Big 12 Conference with only 5.22 yards allowed per play. Two of their defensive backs — Myles Purchase and Beau Freyler — both have 25 career starts ahead of this season. Linebacker Caleb Bacon and defensive lineman J.R. Singleton are among other key defensive players returning in 2024.
As has been the case in past years, this year’s Cy-Hawk game could be a bellwether for the Hawkeyes’ season. Since 2011, the Hawkeyes have averaged 9.4 wins per year when they beat the Cyclones. During that same span, they have averaged 6.5 wins per year when they lose to the Cyclones.
Iowa has a 47-23 advantage in the all-time series, including seven wins in the last eight games. Here are some things to watch when Iowa and Iowa State face off for the 71st time on Sept. 7 at Kinnick Stadium:
Iowa vs. Iowa State: 3 things to watch
- Rocco Becht vs. Iowa’s secondary. Becht is one of 12 returning FBS quarterbacks who accumulated 3,000-plus yards while throwing fewer than nine interceptions. He will have a tough task, though, against an Iowa secondary that lost only one starter.
- This will be the first big test for Tim Lester’s offense. Yes, there’s Illinois State the week before. But this will be the first Power Five foe that Iowa’s new-look offense will face.
- How well do the Hawkeyes contain Iowa State running back Abu Sama III? When Sama faced the Hawkeyes in Week 2 of last year, he had a pedestrian performance — eight carries for 24 yards. But the then-freshman showed big-play ability later in the year, racking up 276 yards and three touchdowns against a ranked Kansas State team. Iowa graduated key defensive linemen Logan Lee and Joe Evans, but the Hawkeyes will benefit from returning their entire first-team linebacker corps.
2024 prognosis
Iowa will likely be the favorite in this one, but with all of Iowa State’s returning production, overlook the Cyclones at your own risk.
Comments: john.steppe@thegazette.com
Sign up for our curated Iowa Hawkeyes athletics newsletter at thegazette.com/hawks.
Daily Newsletters