Preview: Iowa State vs. Northern Iowa

I apologize in advance for the heartburn I am about to cause any Cyclone fans who read this. The conversation around this game just wouldn’t be quite complete if we didn’t go down the road I’m about to go down.

Here we are. Game one. By the time the game kicks off on Saturday, it will have been 245 days since we last saw the Cyclones. We spend eight months waiting for the season. Talking. Making plans. Anticipating.

Anticipating, of course, the tailgating. Getting into Jack Trice Stadium for the first time in the season. Seeing the team play. This year, the anticipation is higher. This is the special season. The season we have been waiting for.

We think. We hope.

Before we get into the negative stuff, let me start by saying this. If I was a betting man (which, by writing a book about this season I am making a bet of sorts), I would pick Iowa State to win on Saturday. I would probably pick Iowa State to win comfortably, by at least two scores. Keep that in mind.

OK, here we go.

There is a certain reality to Saturday’s game. All of our hopes and dreams can get crushed in one afternoon.

Sure, a loss to the Northern Iowa Panthers does not prevent Iowa State from having a shot to get to the Big 12 Championship. It does not even necessarily take away all hope of a College Football Playoff berth.

However, it would be awfully disappointing. Devastating, even.

The diehards know this, but for anyone who may be a novice college football fan reading this, let me explain. Anytime you see a team in Iowa State’s level — a Power 5 conference in the Football Bowl Subdivision — play against a team in Northern Iowa’s level — the Football Championship Subdivision — it should be an almost automatic win. Throw in the fact that Iowa State is a top 10 team in the FBS, and well, the thought of losing should not honestly cross my mind.

The Iowa State vs. UNI series, however, has been anything but automatic.

This series parallels the Iowa vs. Iowa State series in some ways. As much as Cyclone fans do not always want to admit it, for much of history, Iowa State has been the little brother, so to speak, to Iowa. Whenever we win it’s considered an upset. It’s widely expected that we will play with more emotion in that game than most games on our schedule. Some seasons, a win against Iowa is the highlight of the season. (That has probably, finally, changed in the Matt Campbell era.) My perception has always been that UNI fans feel the same way about the game with Iowa State. Throw everything at it. Pull the upset. Beat up your big brother.

In my mind, it shouldn’t be this way. No offense to my Panther friends, but UNI shouldn’t be able to defeat Iowa State. It should be easy for the Cyclones.

Some years, it has felt like Iowa State doesn’t belong on the same field as UNI.

I am reminded of 2013, when head coach Paul Rhoads’ entered his fifth season. We caught the end of the Hawkeyes’ opener in the tailgate lots. Iowa lost on a last-second field goal to Northern Illinois. Fueled up on adrenaline and beer, I declared “let’s prove this is OUR STATE!”

I believed something special was building in Ames. It was even easier to believe that, as we filed into the stadium full of the optimism of a new season on a warm August evening to watch ISU play UNI.

It’s difficult to say exactly when I stopped believing.

The fun, and sometimes maddening, part of when UNI comes to town is there are thousands of Panther fans who travel with them. It creates a rivalry atmosphere, and can be quite annoying when the rival (who, again, in my opinion shouldn’t really be a rival), is winning. At some point in the first half, UNI running back David Johnson broke off a big gain. It could have been his 37-yard touchdown run in the first quarter to give UNI the lead. It could have been early in the second when he caught a 9-yard touchdown pass. Heck, it could have been his 27-yard touchdown to give UNI a 21-7 lead midway through the second quarter. It doesn’t matter. Whatever point it was, at some point a UNI fan a few rows away from us stood up to cheer, and he waved a white towel, or maybe it was a t-shirt. The fans had plenty of reason to cheer loudly, and he was the loudest.

“It’s too easy!” he yelled.

The first time, I was slightly annoyed. OK buddy, it’s the first half. Just chill.

The second time, my annoyance grew into what could only be described as anger. Anger over a mixture of factors, I’m sure. The score, the UNI fans around us cheering (“It’s too easy!!!”), the fact that some running back from an FCS school was running untouched on our field.

It was probably about the time that Johnson caught a 29-yard touchdown pass in the fourth quarter that my anger turned to shame. As our new acquaintance a few rows away waved his white t-shirt in the air, yelling “It’s too easy! It’s too easy!”, it was impossible not to agree. It was too easy.

Johnson ended up with 199 rushing yards and four touchdowns. We didn’t yet know that he would go on to play in the NFL and amass more than 6,000 all-purpose yards (and counting). All we knew was that somehow the best player on the field played for the team that was literally in a lesser subdivision than Iowa State. He, and UNI, just made it look so easy in a 28-20 win.

This was not the first time I had seen UNI come to Ames and look like the better team. In 2006, my second year in the ISU marching band, I couldn’t believe my eyes as I watched the Panthers put themselves in position to win before missing a last-minute field goal. In 2007, UNI broke through and won in Gene Chizik’s second game as ISU’s coach. In 2011, the same Iowa State team that went on to beat the #2 team in the country later on needed a near-miracle from Steele Jantz to Josh Lenz, and then another game-winning drive to save a 20-19 victory.

And for as much good as ISU coach Matt Campbell has done, he has not been immune to the UNI slipup.

The 2016 UNI game was the first game that I ever went to with my now-wife, Paige. It also led to one of the biggest fights we probably have ever had. During the first game with Campbell as coach, the excitement of a new era was quickly doused with cold water as UNI won, 25-20. After a rough start, it looked like all was going to be OK after a 33-yard touchdown pass to Allen Lazard in the fourth quarter gave the Cyclones a 20-19 lead. I high-fived everyone around me, and noticed Paige doing the same thing. “This is great,” I thought, so thankful that I could share my love of Iowa State football with her.

A few minutes later, after the Panthers had regained the lead, Iowa State threw an interception with 1:10 left, down 25-20. The game was effectively over as Iowa State could no longer stop the clock. I could feel my body temperature rise with my level of frustration.

I had always been taught by my dad that we stay until the end of the game, and he and my mom sat through some miserable games when I was in the marching band. Paige’s dad had taught her the same thing. Everyone around us started filing out, our group included.

Perhaps the worst feeling in the college football world is watching a rival, even a rival who you feel shouldn’t be a rival, win on your team’s field and celebrate after the game. The opposing fans cheer raucously. The opposing marching band plays the fight song. The players run over to face the stands where all their fans are standing and cheering, and share the beautiful experience. When Iowa State is on the losing end of this, it makes me want to scream.

As Paige and I stood there, all of a sudden with empty seats surrounding us, I turned to Paige and said “Let’s go.” I didn’t want to stick around for the celebration. I wanted to get out of that stadium as fast as possible.

“No. We stay until the end of the game.”

“The game is over.”

“No, they are still playing. See?” she said as UNI players took a knee to run out the clock.

“But the game is OVER!”

“I’m not going to leave.”

I had no choice. As frustrated as I was, I wasn’t going to leave her.

When we got back to the car, my friend Chris and I began our favorite ritual after a loss: dissecting our every emotion about what we just witnessed.

“I can’t BELIEVE we lost to UNI!”

“How embarrassing. The new coach lays an egg his first game.”

Paige didn’t get it. In her mind, she had seen an entertaining, back-and-forth game that our team just happened to lose. She didn’t see our perspective: Iowa State should never lose to UNI.

“Would you guys stop talking about it? It wasn’t that bad.”

If Chris’s head could have exploded, there would have been brains everywhere. I listened in horror as my best friend of 10+ years got into an argument with my girlfriend of a year.

“It is embarrassing. We should never lose that game.”

“No it’s not. It was a five-point loss.”

Silence. Uncomfortable, squirmy silence.

I’m happy to report that eventually everyone cooled down. Nobody’s relationship or friendship ended that evening. We can all look back and laugh about it now. In recalling this story to Paige, she’s pretty sure we turned on Taylor Swift’s “Shake It Off” to lighten the mood.

We were all still together, older but not wiser, in 2019. I stood in the stands at Jack Trice Stadium as the ISU marching band played the fight song prior to Iowa State’s season opener vs. Northern Iowa. Chris looked at me and said “just think, we could win the national championship this year.”

I think we both had chills at that thought. I know I did. Neither one of us would have predicted Iowa State to win the national championship (and indeed, the Cyclones lost a number of close games in what was ultimately a 7-6 season). But at that moment, the sky was the limit. The team hadn’t yet played, or lost, a game. It was coming off two straight seasons of contending for a spot in the Big 12 Championship game, beating top 10 teams and going to bowl games. There was a sense that if everything fell right, Iowa State could have a special season.

Our feelings in that moment were peak opening day optimism. And a few hours later, they were gone as UNI held a lead in the fourth quarter.

It took a Connor Assalley field goal in the final minute of regulation to send the game to overtime. As Assalley lined up for the kick, Chris left our seating area because he couldn’t bear the thought of being in the stands if the kick was no good. He eventually came back, but when the same scenario happened in the first overtime, I had the same feeling. I left our seating area and stood by the exit as the kick sailed through the uprights. Slightly embarrassed by my actions, and also highly superstitious, I came to the conclusion that I had no choice but to stay in that same spot. After all, if Iowa State needed another field goal to tie or win, one of us would need to be standing there (sounds logical, right?), and we couldn’t just keep inconveniently walking by our neighbors in the stands every time we had to leave the stands and stand by the exit. Time might as well have stopped moving as I awkwardly watched the next two overtimes from the area by the exit.

In the third overtime, with the Cyclones down by three points and needing to score to stave off defeat, Iowa State appeared to be in prime scoring position when running back Sheldon Croney Jr. fumbled near the one-yard-line. In my mind, I had already taken two steps toward the exit, believing in my gut we were about to lose. Knowing I wanted to get as far away from the stands as quickly as possible. Paige wasn’t there to stop me this time. (She had, ironically, left the game early for another engagement.) The ball was on the ground, and in the ensuing scramble ISU quarterback Brock Purdy dove into the pile to come up with it. I realized I had stopped breathing for a few seconds. On the next play, Croney was thankfully able to get into the endzone for the walkoff OT win. I put my hands in the air, laughed weakly, looked up toward Chris in the stands and shook my head in disbelief. Iowa State survived, but just barely.

As I prepare for the 2021 season opener against Northern Iowa, there’s a scary reality to this game. I have been planning for months to write a book. I’ve told my family, friends, coworkers and the universe that I’m writing a book. Because this is the special season. This is the one we’ve been waiting for. For the past eight months we have been basking in the glow of the seemingly never-ending offseason. The real games start Saturday, and with that the anxiety.

Campbell’s teams’ have not exactly been lights out in Week 1, even outside the UNI games. Iowa State is just 2-3 in openers under Campbell.

To be fair, there have also been some comfortable wins in the UNI series for Iowa State over the years. And to try to ease my anxiety, I am reminding myself that all rational signs point to this being one of those games.

This Iowa State team is returning almost all of its starters from the best season in school history. It has a player, Breece Hall, who was arguably the best player on the field in almost every game he played last year against major conference competition, and he is running behind an offensive line regarded as one of the strongest nationally. The defense has stars all over the field. If you trust the process, as Campbell likes to say, the process says this game should be wrapped up by early in the third quarter.

Still, UNI is a well-coached team. The Panthers had a losing record in spring football, but also reportedly dealt with health issues that made it difficult to find any consistency. Based on past history, UNI players, coaches and fans have earned every right to believe they can come into Ames and ruin our special season.

There will be a lot of emotions Saturday afternoon. Among them will be the familiar feelings of the excitement of a new season coupled with the joy of finally being in the stadium after the pandemic-altered season of 2020. Once the game kicks off, though, it will feel just like every other Iowa State vs. UNI game, at least until the Cyclones hopefully take control. As shocked as I will be if UNI has a chance to win this game in the fourth quarter, in some ways I won’t be shocked at all. 

Here’s hoping all my worry is for nothing.