Howe: Projecting Iowa's Pre-Spring Depth Chart on Defense

With the back-7 basically returning intact, and a couple of D-linemen having experience, this has all the makings of another salty Iowa D. Not convinced Shannon is the answer in the middle, but what's most notable is the lack of depth experience, even in the back-7. Need to hope for an injury-free year, even more than usual!
 
Is it just me or should we expect the defense to be really darn good again. The secondary has everyone back plus the UNI transfer. They should be dang good again.

The LBs I couldn't be more excited to see. Campbell I think is the next big thing. I don't think you can under hype him. I also like Jacobs. The two of them are just big strong fast athletes. Benson has played a lot and done well. They could be the strength of unit.

The Dline will have some newbies contributing again but we've done some of that the last couple yrs too and not had any regression at all. I'm really not too worried about that.
 
Good defense and a good running game. I hope we dont stumble out of the blocks again. That is the one thing that has to be fixed.
 
Given Iowa’s history with D linemen, they will probably, as usual, end up better than expected. The rest of the D is going to be very strong.
 
DL Van Valkenburg
DL Joe Evans
DL Yahya Black
DL Logan Lee
DL Waggoner
DL Shannon
DL Craig
DL Lorbeck
LB Campbell
LB Benson
LB Jacobs
DB Moss
DB Hankins
DB Koerner
DB Merriweather
DB Belton
DB X. Williams
DB Roberts

That is quite a bit of talent, particularly in the back-end. There are probably 10 guys in the LB and DB group who could be starters. It might take some creativity to find roles for all of them.

For the DL group, there is depth, but no standout like an AJE or Nixon. I think that is going to be a problem unless one of the young guys really explodes on the scene.
 
Without getting immediate help from the transfer portal the d-line looks like it is a year away from being really good. I can see them struggling early and then coming on late. Indiana and ISU could expose that line at the beginning of the year and by the end, it could be pretty salty.
 
I think people are overly optimistic on the DL. After Purdue and the first half of Northwestern...our run defense was really damn good. We completely controlled the line of scrimmage...I mean, Nixon had 33 tackles for loss, which is an incredible stat in 8 games...incredible. We played on the other side of the LOS.

Right now, we don't have a proven interior DL coming back. Shannon was a step down in a big way from Heflin and Nixon. That's not saying he can't make a leap to that level...but he has some work to do to get to that level. Usually, year 3-4 are when DTs get their legs in the Iowa system. You have to be able to stop the run in the B10 to have a shot at winning consistently.

We need portal help. We better hope that Black, Lee, Jones, and Waggoner each add 20lbs before Fall camp starts, because 270 pound tackles usually don't hold up over time in a B10 season.
 
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Is it just me or should we expect the defense to be really darn good again. The secondary has everyone back plus the UNI transfer. They should be dang good again.

The LBs I couldn't be more excited to see. Campbell I think is the next big thing. I don't think you can under hype him. I also like Jacobs. The two of them are just big strong fast athletes. Benson has played a lot and done well. They could be the strength of unit.

The Dline will have some newbies contributing again but we've done some of that the last couple yrs too and not had any regression at all. I'm really not too worried about that.
I think it would be fair to say that our defense is always really good, I have no concerns on that side of the ball until they prove me wrong.
 
Without getting immediate help from the transfer portal the d-line looks like it is a year away from being really good. I can see them struggling early and then coming on late. Indiana and ISU could expose that line at the beginning of the year and by the end, it could be pretty salty.
If I coulda cherry picked one guy to come back next yr on D it woulda been Heflin. He coulda really solidified things for us there. But he's been in college like 5 yrs and it's just time to move on and it's tough to think any different. Nixon has a 1st round draft pick check to be cashing soon so he had to go.
 

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