The moment the Iowa-Nebraska series became a true football rivalry came not during a game but in an offhanded remark.
On Nov. 30, 2014, two days after the Huskers had rallied from a 17-point deficit to beat Iowa 37-34 in overtime, Nebraska athletic director Shawn Eichorst held a news conference to discuss the firing of coach Bo Pelini, who had led the program into an unfortunate state of purgatory of good but not great football.
Pelini was 67-27 in seven seasons and had won nine or 10 games each year, but his teams had also lost exactly four games each season, and every important game ended in embarrassing defeat. Two weeks before beating Iowa in 2014, Pelini’s vaunted defense gave up 408 rushing yards to Wisconsin’s Melvin Gordon in a 59-24 loss. Huskers faithful aspired to return to their perch atop college football, and Pelini wasn’t the guy to get them there.
Eichorst, who was a nondescript administrator until that decision, stepped in front of the cameras and unwittingly launched the pseudo-rivalry between Nebraska and Iowa into a blood feud. When asked whether the Huskers’ comeback gave him pause in his decision to fire Pelini, Eichorst replied, “Our kids showed great character and resiliency in a tough environment, so it did play a factor. But in the final analysis, I had to evaluate where Iowa was.”
With those two sentences, Eichorst served his base with a juicy slice of Go Big Red meat. Nebraska fans viewed Iowa in the way they did Kansas or Iowa State or Missouri, programs that were beneath them and their five national championships. The Huskers’ real challenge was to compete with Ohio State and Michigan for Big Ten titles. Beating Iowa was seen as a formality, not an accomplishment.
Iowa’s program was at a crossroads at that moment, too. After compiling four top-10 finishes and two Big Ten titles from 2002 to ’09, the Hawkeyes had slipped into mediocrity. From 2010 to ’14, the Hawkeyes went 34-30 overall and 19-21 in Big Ten play. Nebraska joined the Big Ten in 2011, and the teams met every year on Black Friday. The Huskers hadn’t seen the best version of the Hawkeyes, only a different shade of gold from their pals in Colorado.
It was at that moment that the two passionate fan bases discovered how much they disliked one another. A decade later, their mutual disdain grows every time Iowa fans gloat after another win. It’s understandable for Nebraska’s proud fan base to hate what Iowa has done to the Huskers. Since the start of the 2015 season, Iowa has an 89-38 overall record, a winning percentage of 70 percent. The Hawkeyes rank fourth among Big Ten teams in victories, behind Ohio State, Michigan and Penn State.
Nebraska has a 49-69 overall record to sit 11th in the Big Ten in wins (not counting this year’s four new arrivals). The Huskers entered Saturday one win behind Maryland and one ahead of Illinois.
Iowa has earned bowl eligibility all 10 years, won three Big Ten West titles, hit double-digit wins four times and won at least eight games in every season. Nebraska has posted one winning campaign in the last decade (9-4 in 2016), played in two bowl games (one came after a 5-7 regular season in 2015) and was the only power-conference team not to earn a bowl berth from 2017 to ’23. This year, the 6-6 Huskers have earned their third bowl bid in that 10-year block.
The Hawkeyes have won nine of the programs’ 10 meetings since Eichorst’s remark. Only two Iowa wins were blowouts. The remaining eight games were decided by one score, including each of the last seven. The programs’ 40-win disparity over the last decade could lead one to deduce Nebraska flexes its rivalry muscles in this series while Iowa plays down to the competition. Or, to use the verb BTN analyst and former Minnesota defensive back Brock Vereen coined, no team gets “Iowa’d” more than Nebraska.
In the last seven years, four different Iowa kickers have drilled game-winning field goals with either no time remaining (2018, 2023, 2024) or one second left (2019). Two took place in Lincoln, and two were in Iowa City. In the last two years, a Nebraska turnover caused by a backup Iowa defensive end inside the game’s final 20 seconds has given the ball to Iowa in Huskers’ territory and led to a field goal in a 13-10 victory.
Last year, Iowa defensive end Ethan Hurkett dropped off in a zone blitz and intercepted Chubba Purdy with 15 seconds left. Iowa backup kicker Marshall Meeder replaced struggling teammate Drew Stevens and barely pooched the ball over the goal post from 38 yards out. Friday, Iowa defensive end Max Llewellyn crashed into Nebraska quarterback Dylan Raiola and stripped the football. Stevens then drilled a 53-yard attempt that snuck inside the right goal post.
Last year’s benching fueled Stevens, who vowed to put himself in that same position against Nebraska. Stevens, never one to lack confidence, said he had made plans in the second quarter to run directly to the north end zone and grab the Heroes Trophy after making a game-winning kick. What Stevens cites as the separation between Iowa and Nebraska isn’t just his confidence or that the Hawkeyes have better kickers; it’s the intangibles.
“I think it’s the details, man,” Stevens said. “I think it’s the little things that we do well, that’s what we focus on. We even focus on that way back in summer, like you miss a line, everybody goes back five yards. One guy messes up, everybody messes up.”
Stevens may have envisioned beating Nebraska because of last year’s moment, but he didn’t spend the offseason preparing strictly for the Huskers. The Hawkeyes did use a picture of former Nebraska wide receiver Kenny Bell catching the overtime touchdown pass in 2014 as a weight-room motivator for cornerback Greg Mabin the ensuing offseason, but that’s no different from their methods before facing other teams. Tight end George Kittle once said Northwestern’s cat roar at full blast was the most annoying sound he encountered during an Iowa practice. Others have said the same thing about the Minnesota fight song.
The Hawkeyes have four annual rivalries, and each one fills a different category. With Wisconsin, it’s about physicality, respect and the Big Ten standings. Minnesota is Iowa’s most-played series, with the feistiest history and the greatest trophy in Floyd of Rosedale. Iowa State is most heated overall, the opponent Iowa players detest more than any other. However, Eichorst’s shade in 2014 and the ensuing antics like the Huskers captains not shaking hands before kickoff have led to more barbs from Iowa players toward Nebraska than any of the other three combined.
This certainly wasn’t the vision Eichorst had for the Huskers when he dissed the Hawkeyes a decade ago. But he awoke something in Iowa that has ramifications for today’s Huskers, who are on their third different head coach since his remarks. Said another way, upon the final analysis, you fool around and you find out.
(Photo: Matthew Holst / Getty Images)
