Winning a title is much sweeter at home, and Hawkeyes have that chance

The T-shirts and ball caps will be ready, and presumably, a trophy for the occasion will be waiting somewhere inside Kinnick Stadium.

Iowa will proclaim itself the champion of the Big Ten West well after darkness has descended upon the old brickyard Saturday. If, that is, the Hawkeyes get the better of Illinois.

History tells us there won’t be an on-field ceremony should Iowa prevail. The only time the Hawkeyes secured a West crown at home was 2015 when they beat Purdue to get to 11-0 on the way to 12-0.

The trophy was kept in the Iowa locker room, along with the special shirts and caps ordered for the occasion.

Iowa’s other division championship was in 2021, and it was a weird one. The Hawkeyes won at Nebraska to assure themselves a tie for first place in the West, but needed 7-point underdog Minnesota to trip up Wisconsin in Minneapolis the next day to give Iowa the outright title. No one seemed overly optimistic.

“Go Gophers,” Iowa running back Tyler Goodson said in a postgame interview session. He and his teammates wore “2021 West Division champions: Iowa” T-shirts after rallying from a 21-6 deficit to down the Huskers, 28-21.

Iowa Coach Kirk Ferentz didn’t proclaim himself a newly minted Minnesota fan, but said he was hoping for “the right result.”

Wisconsin had a 14-game winning streak against Minnesota entering that Saturday, but the Gophers became the Hawkeyes’ dear friends for a few hours as they were beating the Badgers, 23-13.

Iowa was off to Indianapolis, where it was flattened 42-3 by Michigan. The bloom was off the rose, but better that than no flower at all. That happened last year when the Hawkeyes closed their regular season at home against Nebraska.

Had 10-point favorite Iowa won, it would have shared the West throne with Purdue and gone back to Indy since it beat the Boilermakers during the regular-season.

Instead, the 3-8 Huskers improved to 4-8 with a 24-17 win and Purdue made the short trip to Lucas Oil Stadium to lose to Michigan. All-Big Ten cornerback Cooper DeJean was injured in the first quarter against Nebraska, and was out for the rest of the game. That hurt the Hawkeyes a lot.

Saturday against a team that passed for 507 yards last week against the sieve that is Indiana’s defense, Iowa goes at it without DeJean again.

Bret Bielema’s Illini are trying to write a most-unlikely Big Ten West fairy tale. Left for dead with a 1-4 league record, the Illini went 85 yards in the final two minutes for a 27-26 win at Minnesota two weeks ago.

Last week, John Paddock passed for 507 yards, Illinois gained 662, and the Illini climbed out of a 27-12 hole to take the lead against Indiana, only for the Hoosiers to tie the game with 28 seconds left on a 26-yard touchdown pass.

No worries. Paddock threw a 21-yard scoring pass to Isaiah Williams, and Illinois won 48-45 in overtime.

There is a mathematical path for Illinois to win the West.

But that’s not what most of Saturday’s crowd is coming to see. They want a championship-clincher, a ninth win in a nutty season. They want it in their house.

There’s no traveling trophy to muck things up. This isn’t for a pig or bull or stray cat. This is for the chance to play on Dec. 2 against an unbeaten superpower and quite literally shock the nation. The part that follows college football, anyhow.

If Iowa wins, I strongly urge fans to storm the field. With the stipulation, of course, that they don’t make any sort of contact with another human unless it’s to shake hands or hug by mutual agreement.

If that doesn’t give me legal cover, then forget I mentioned it.

Many of you surely remember the 2004 day in Kinnick when the Hawkeyes walloped Wisconsin 30-7 to lock up a tie for the Big Ten championship with Michigan. There was a crowd storm, a postgame ceremony, a makeshift platform, a trophy, and all-around merriment.

Should things go haywire Saturday, there’s still another chance for Iowa next Friday at Nebraska. But it wouldn’t be the same, would it?

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