The Iowa Hawkeyes drew a manageable slate going into the 2022 season. As always, the Big Ten can be a treacherous road to navigate week in and week out, but sometimes a few breaks are nice to catch.
It is always daunting to take on the Big Ten with its hard-nosed mentality, the bad weather, intense fan atmospheres on the road, and “no weeks off” mantra. It gets a little harder for the Hawkeyes as they have a new target on their backs as defending Big Ten West champs.
All of that said, their schedule allows them the opportunity to handle some of the big games at home in Kinnick. CBS Sports’ Tom Fornelli has ranked the Hawkeyes with just the ninth-hardest schedule out of 14 in the Big Ten conference.
Iowa’s nonconference schedule isn’t a bear, but it’s not to be ignored, either. South Dakota State is one of the better FCS programs, and there’s the annual rivalry game with Iowa State. However, Nevada shouldn’t be too difficult. The Big Ten schedule starts with Rutgers, which is the conference’s way of saying, “we’re sorry we’re making you play both Michigan and Ohio State this season,” because that’s what it’s done. The good news for Iowa is that it gets Wisconsin at Kinnick Stadium late in the year, but road games against Purdue and Minnesota will be tricky. – Fornelli, CBS Sports.
The Hawkeyes open up with a nice slate. There is no reason to believe they can’t start 4-0 against South Dakota State, Iowa State (wonder boy Matt Campbell couldn’t even beat Iowa with NFL talent and lost all of that), Nevada, and Rutgers.
Like Fornelli said, the draws of Michigan and Ohio State are arguably the two toughest teams in the conference to play. It just happens Iowa gets both this season in their cross-division games in a matter of three weeks. While Michigan has to come to Kinnick, Iowa has a road trip to Ohio State which is about as tough as a road game gets. Illinois sandwiched between these two is a little tougher than one may think,…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at Football | Hawkeyes Wire…