With spring practice just a few weeks away I decided it was time to roll the blog forward to the 2011 season. I updated the main schedule and roster pages as well as the ones in the sidebar.
Quick Thoughts on the Schedule
This is the first year of the 12-team B1G TEN. Iowa, in the Legends, will play Michigan, Michigan State, Minnesota, Nebraska, and Northwestern every year. The other annual game will be against Purdue as Iowa's cross-over rival. Iowa's other two cross-over games are actually quite favorable with Penn State and Indiana (which means no Ohio State or Wisconsin).The non-conference schedule sets up nicely and gives Iowa a good shot at a 4-0 start to the season. Tennessee Tech and Louisiana-Monroe should be easy enough. Iowa State could provide a good test in Ames...though the Cyclones have a lot of reloading to do, especially on offense. Pittsburgh has been going through a coach carousel this off-season so could still be adjusting to a new coach so early in the season.
The home schedule is a little disappointing as it includes no rivalry games. Iowa State, Minnesota, Nebraska, and even Purdue on are on the road and Wisconsin is off the schedule.
Homecoming will be October 22 against Indiana. Senior Day will be November 12 against Michigan State. Iowa has a bye week October 1 which will separate the non-conference schedule from the B1G TEN slate.
Quick Thoughts on the Roster
The roster will become more accurate when Iowa released its Spring Prospectus, but I took a stab at updating it with the 24 incoming recruits, the 3 preferred walk-ons that I know about (Brendon Boerm, Marshall Koehn, and Travis Perry), and by taking off all the 2010 seniors and the other departures.Breakdown by year:
- Seniors - 19
- Juniors - 23
- Sophomores - 24
- RS Freshmen - 16
- Freshmen - 26
There are 41 Iowans on the roster. 15 are from Illinois and 11 are from Ohio. No other state has more than 5 on Iowa's roster.
Despite the seemingly complete lack of depth at running back at the end of last year, Iowa now has 8 on the roster. There are 4 incoming freshmen and it looks like Jason White will stay on the offensive side of the ball after moving back-and-forth the past couple of years. Running back will still be very young with 1 junior (White), 1 sophomore (Coker), and 6 freshmen.
The offensive and defensive line are the two positions Iowa has the most players. There are 16 O-linemen listed and 17 D-linemen. Punter and long snapper (which go hand-in-hand) have the least amount of players on the roster with 2 each.