Our D Next Year Could be Off the Charts

H

Hawk1960

Well-Known Member
We finished the 2018 regular season with the #1 Defense in the B1G. Looking at the numbers, next year's D should be right there again and could be one of the best in the nation.

> We had 20 players make at least 10 tackles in 2018. 15 of those 20 players return next year.

> The top 20 tacklers accounted for 728 tackles for the season. The 15 players returning next year accounted for 76.6% of those tackles.

> Our loss to graduation are spread out by positions ... Gervase at safety, Hockaday at LB, Nelson at DT, Hesse at DE and Brinks at DE. So not huge holes to fill out any one position like we had this year at LB.

Finally, we have a kid from the Chicago area named Sebastian Castro coming in as a Freshman who could see some serious time at safety. In my opinion, this kid is going to be a game changer, If not next year, the year after. If you have not seen his film before, check out his senior year highlights linked below.

http://www.hudl.com/video/3/6559359/5bf3704cda5b3d0b4c770cce

Jestin Jacobs (LB) and Dane Belton (S) are two additional highly rated Freshman coming in who could see some playing time and of course we have Nixon coming in at DT after redshirting this year. He held an offer from Alabama.
 
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okeefe4prez said:
With a few exceptions in November of 2009 and the last few weeks of November 2015, next year is pretty much always a nice time to look at as an Iowa fan.
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Better than looking back, of which plenty of words have already been typed.
 
Hawk1960 said:
We finished the 2018 regular season with the #1 Defense in the B1G. Looking at the numbers, next year's D should be right there again and could be one of the best in the nation.

> We had 20 players make at least 10 tackles in 2018. 16 of those 20 players return next year.

> The top 20 tacklers accounted for 728 tackles for the season. The 16 players returning next year accounted for 76.6% of those tackles.

> Our loss to graduation are spread out by positions ... Gervase at safety, Hockaday at LB, Hesse at DE and Brinks at DE. So not huge holes to fill out any one position like we had this year at LB.

Finally, we have a kid from the Chicago area named Sebastian Castro coming in as a Freshman who could see some serious time at safety. In my opinion, this kid is going to be a game changer, If not next year, the year after. If you have not seen his film before, check out his senior year highlights.

http://www.hudl.com/video/3/6559359/5bf3704cda5b3d0b4c770cce

Jestin Jacobs (LB) and Dane Belton (S) are two additional highly rated Freshman coming in who could see some playing time.
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Matt Nelson will be a pretty big loss at DT. They hope has to be that Lattimore has a senior year as good as Nelson's (certainly not an unreasonable hope, Lattimore has been in the DT rotation since his true Fr year). Brinks was a valuable piece of that rotation this year, but there is no reason Reiff can not be every bit as good next year (better pedigree, has more playing time than Brinks did coming into the year). The X-factor will be how good Lindebaum, Shannon, and Nixon can be.

Hesse was hugely valuable to this year's team, but when most of his lost snaps get taken up by AJE and Gholston, Iowa should not take a step back. Someone will have to emerge as a 4th DE for depth (maybe Simon?), and I would love to see more speed used for situational pass-rush situations (e.g. some of those under-utilized LBs now that Iowa is basically a 4-2-5 team).

The LBs should be talented and deep. If we continue to use 2 LBs as our base D, we have a lot of bodies to fill those 2 spots (Colbert and Niemann will start, but Wade/Welch/Jones/Doyle/Benson all have promise). I think the freshman from Cedar Falls might be an immediate impact guy, especially on special teams, and you mentioned Jacobs.

We lose Gervase on the back end (potentially Hooker, we will see), but we return 2 starting safeties (Hooker and Stone) and 4 corners with starting experience (Hankins/Ojemudia/Brents/Moss). I could see Ojemudia taking a safety spot, or perhaps the Star spot, and Brents starting opposite Hankins. Some interesting young guys we haven't seen yet (Johnson, Craddieth, Merriweather, Creamer, Castro, Belton) in the mix as well. I swear, Belton has had at least one interception and at least one TD in every game this year (at least that is how it seems from the weekly highlights posted on twitter).
 
Gervase was solid, but we're not gonna miss his poor tackling angles. If we go Stone-Hooker the majority of the time Safety will be a definite upgrade.

Can't forget about Daviyon Nixon on the inside. He might be a game changer.
 
BVHawk95 said:
Gervase was solid, but we're not gonna miss his poor tackling angles. If we go Stone-Hooker the majority of the time Safety will be a definite upgrade.

Can't forget about Daviyon Nixon on the inside. He might be a game changer.
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No doubt, at 6'4" 305 he's going to be the perfect fit at DT for us. With him and Lattimore we have some bulk in there. Glad Nixon chose the Hawks over Alabama and he still has 3 years of eligibility left.
 
If we go 5-4 with the best defense in the Big Ten while only winning against sub .500 teams, then having the super duper bestest defense isn’t probably going to make much difference.

Stanley has to start hitting throws when it counts and special teams has to stop dribbling piss down their legs or it’s back to the Thingamajig Bowl again.

Eliminating your weaknesses is orders of magnitude more important than stressing your strengths.
 
Fryowa said:
If we go 5-4 with the best defense in the Big Ten while only winning against sub .500 teams, then having the super duper bestest defense isn’t probably going to make much difference.

Stanley has to start hitting throws when it counts and special teams has to stop dribbling piss down their legs or it’s back to the Thingamajig Bowl again.

Eliminating your weaknesses is orders of magnitude more important than stressing your strengths.
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Yeah, but you can't regress either. No doubt the O side needs to improve for us to get to 10 wins or more but we have a lot coming back on that side also.
 
Are we sure Hooker is coming back? I guess I never considered it until I saw him get the BIG DB of the year award, today.
 
Hooker isn't going anywhere. I think people are getting carried away a bit. I don't think his speed is good enough to be a high round pick at safety. Also, just because we have a lot coming back on both sides of the ball doesn't mean we will be all that much better, if any. The ceiling is only so high with some of these guys, and just because they're a year older doesn't necessarily mean much. Our linebackers are straight up awful, and overall on defense and both sides of the ball there is a big lack of speed. We really beat nobody of significance the entire season. I surely hope we don't get matched up with Washington in the bowl game.
 
Hawk1960 said:
We finished the 2018 regular season with the #1 Defense in the B1G. Looking at the numbers, next year's D should be right there again and could be one of the best in the nation.

> We had 20 players make at least 10 tackles in 2018. 15 of those 20 players return next year.

> The top 20 tacklers accounted for 728 tackles for the season. The 15 players returning next year accounted for 76.6% of those tackles.

> Our loss to graduation are spread out by positions ... Gervase at safety, Hockaday at LB, Nelson at DT, Hesse at DE and Brinks at DE. So not huge holes to fill out any one position like we had this year at LB.

Finally, we have a kid from the Chicago area named Sebastian Castro coming in as a Freshman who could see some serious time at safety. In my opinion, this kid is going to be a game changer, If not next year, the year after. If you have not seen his film before, check out his senior year highlights linked below.

http://www.hudl.com/video/3/6559359/5bf3704cda5b3d0b4c770cce

Jestin Jacobs (LB) and Dane Belton (S) are two additional highly rated Freshman coming in who could see some playing time and of course we have Nixon coming in at DT after redshirting this year. He held an offer from Alabama.
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The #1 thing Iowa's defense is lacking is the run stopper in the middle at DT. Will Nixon fill that role?
 
Caddy said:
Hooker isn't going anywhere. I think people are getting carried away a bit. I don't think his speed is good enough to be a high round pick at safety. Also, just because we have a lot coming back on both sides of the ball doesn't mean we will be all that much better, if any. The ceiling is only so high with some of these guys, and just because they're a year older doesn't necessarily mean much. Our linebackers are straight up awful, and overall on defense and both sides of the ball there is a big lack of speed. We really beat nobody of significance the entire season. I surely hope we don't get matched up with Washington in the bowl game.
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Maryland was probably the 2nd fastest team in the B1G, after OSU. They beat Texas and should have beat OSU. We shut them out. For a successful D, the ability to tackle and be in the right position is just as important as speed.
 
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Defense will be awesome - totally agree.

Offense ... we will most likely NOT have either Fant or Hock. A QB that isn’t accurate and accentuates that with an inability to run. 3 good but not great RBs we can interchange, and 2 very good OTs, but weakness on the interior OL once again.

Hopefully they will only have to score 10 points per game to get wins. Either that or we will need our defense to score.
 
Before this season started, I said something to the effect that we could be pretty good this year, but even with a harder schedule next year (bigger the challenge, the bigger the reward) that next year was the best chance at a cfp run.
The schedule this year just didn't shake out well for it. We had unproven wr's and rb's.
Basically I read the stars (or listened) and next year is the best chance.
But that's not up to me. The coaches and players have to put in the work.
But everything is aligned that we could skyrocket to the top next year.
Look you have some pretty good teams (possibly ranked or close) right away.
ISU
Mich
PSU
Northwestern
Wisconsin

Last 3 MN, Illinois, Braska. We probably all agree MN and Braska should be better. Maybe even Illinois given all the youth they started last year will have another year in.
Is it going to be easy? No. But nothing good ever is.
The opportunity is there for this team to really be something special and take the program to Heights itsi never seen.

This is truly a rare opportunity to punch your own ticket.
The amount of dedication will be immense, but the pay off will last a lifetime.
 
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Lumberman said:
Defense will be awesome - totally agree.

Offense ... we will most likely NOT have either Fant or Hock. A QB that isn’t accurate and accentuates that with an inability to run. 3 good but not great RBs we can interchange, and 2 very good OTs, but weakness on the interior OL once again.

Hopefully they will only have to score 10 points per game to get wins. Either that or we will need our defense to score.
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We need our defense to score more often than not in close games. Luckily they have often been pretty clutch in the past.
 
Nice to see Phil Parker play hard-ball with getting a pay raise.
Kirk did it after the 2004, 2009 and 2015 seasons, with the assistants getting crumbs.

Balki Bartokomous is, simply doing this, now, since Iowa was the scoring defense leader of the B1G this past season.
Plus, I'm shocked that he hadn't done it earlier, since Gary Barta is a horrible negotiator.

He is the 8th highest paid assistant coach in the B1G at $675,000.
The top 3 are at Michigan, with Bob Diaco is 4th at Nebraska at $825,000.
 
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