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Iowa vs. Nebraska: Final takes and grades

On3 imageby: Sean Callahan11/28/25Sean_Callahan

Iowa (8-4, 6-3) has now won 10 out of the last 11 games in the Heroes Trophy series, as Nebraska (7-5, 4-5) has no answer for the Hawkeyes.

It was a thorough beating in multiple phases of the football games. Here are the final takes and grades from Friday.

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What I saw on Friday

***It was a tough scene to see Memorial Stadium nearly half full by the early fourth quarter. I’m not sure we have ever seen something like that in a long time. The reality is that’s what winning 10 out of 11 will do to your fan base. Kirk Ferentz has completely sucked the soul out of Husker fans over the last 11 years.

***Ferentz has now won seven straight games in Memorial Stadium. No other coach has done that to the Huskers in modern-day history, as Oklahoma’s Bud Wilkinson won six consecutive games in Lincoln.

***The shame of this loss for Nebraska was that it wasted one of the best running back games we have seen at NU since the days of Ameer Abdullah. Emmett Johnson ran as well as we’ve ever seen, but unfortunately, he was the only Husker who played at that level for four quarters.

***The defense appeared to have alignment issues at times, along with getting to Mark Gronowski when it mattered. They had several chances to get to him, and his mobility gave NU problems the entire game.

***TJ Lateef’s performance definitely adds to the intrigue of the quarterback discussion moving forward. Lateef was 9-of-24 for 69 yards and had just 2 yards rushing. After UCLA, Lateef had a lot of momentum. Now, it’s hard to know what to think after two subpar performances against Iowa and Penn State.

Quarterback Dylan Raiola was present on the sidelines during pregame, as he was off his injured leg on a scooter.

***With Iowa’s win, the Hawkeyes are a near lock to head to Tampa for the Reliaquest Bowl. NU appears to be bound for Las Vegas, with Nashville being the other option.

The final grade out


Grade		HOL take
Rushing offenseB+Emmett Johnson had a career day, with 29 carries for 217 yards. He’s the first NU back to go for over 200 yards in a game since Ameer Abdullah. The problem was NU did not have much around Abdullah in the ground game.
Passing offenseD-Lateef battled a hamstring injury on Friday. He finished 9-of-24 for 69 yards. Nothing was working for the Huskers in the passing game. The winds were also a factor.
Rushing defenseFIowa ran for 213 yards on the ground on 46 carries. The Hawkeyes had four rushing touchdowns and dominated all the situational running parts of this football game. Iowa had runs of 35, 26, 43 and 27 yards.
Passing defenseDFour of Iowa’s nine completions went for 131 yards. Iowa didn’t throw it much on Friday, but when they did, it was effective. They converted first downs three times on third down passing plays.
Special teamsFThis was a phase of the game where we didn’t expect to see Nebraska get dominated. But the Hawkeyes controlled the early field position in the return game and Jacory Barney also muffed a punt that led to a safety and turned a 24-16 game into 26-16. That was the turning point on Friday.

Sean Callahan can be reached at [email protected] and is heard daily at 6:45 am and 5:05 pm on Big Red Radio 1110 KFAB in Omaha during the football season. He can also be seen on KETV Channel 7 in Omaha during the fall, and each week, he appears on Nebraska Public Media’s Big Red Wrap-Up Tuesdays at 7 pm.

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