Iowa’s trip to Washington comes with a little bit of history and a lot of timing.
The Hawkeyes will finish a three-game run to open Big Ten play by heading to Seattle, where they’ll face the Huskies for the first time in the city since October 1963. Iowa won that meeting 17-7. The teams also met only about two years ago, when Iowa handled Washington 40-16 in Iowa City.
That result gives Iowa a 4-3 edge in the all-time series, but this one carries a different feel. The Hawkeyes will get to Seattle just days after playing Ohio State at Kinnick Stadium, and the Washington game is part of Iowa’s first of two Friday matchups this season. In a span of 20 days, Iowa will see Michigan, Ohio State and Washington.
That’s a brutal stretch by any measure.
The good news for Iowa is that its bye week comes after the return trip from Seattle. The challenge is getting there in one piece.
Washington brings back starting quarterback Demond Williams Jr. after his first full season as the starter, and he already looks like a player on the rise. Last season, Williams passed for 3,065 yards with 25 touchdowns and eight interceptions, while also running for 611 yards and six scores.
That production earned him an All-Big Ten honorable mention from coaches.
At 5-foot-11, Williams is still not the biggest quarterback on the field, but he’s shown he can run an offense and create problems with his legs. Five of his eight interceptions came in two Washington losses last season, when the Huskies finished 9-4, and the expectation is that he takes another step forward in 2026.
Jedd Fisch enters his third season as Washington’s head coach, and he has pushed a stronger emphasis on physicality in the Big Ten. Washington averaged just 9.3 points per game in its four losses, but Fisch has spent time building up both lines to better handle the kind of fast, physical football the conference demands.
Seattle has not exactly been a friendly place for visiting teams, either. Washington went 6-2 at home last season and is 11-2 at Husky Stadium since joining the Big Ten.
For Iowa, this isn’t just another road game. It’s the last chance to make an early statement in league play before the season reaches its midpoint.
In Other News...
Iowa Fans Wont Love What This New QB Ranking Suggests
EA Sports College Football 27 gives Iowa plenty to like elsewhere, with a deep roster that should look familiar to anyone who has watched the Hawkeyes lean on defense, line play and overall depth. The quarterback room, though, is a different story. Jeremy Hecklinski and Hank Brown are the names at the center of it, and the games initial ratings put both well below where Iowa would hope to be at the sports most important position.
For fans, the concern is less about a video game number than what it hints at for the real season ahead. Iowa is expected to sort through Brown or Hecklinski under center, and neither has started a game for the Hawkeyes yet. The challenge now is obvious: prove on the field that the rating is too low, and give the program a reason to believe the quarterback position can climb out of the bottom tier. [Read more 🡒]
Iowa Football Faces An Uncomfortable 2027 Recruiting Reality
Iowas 2027 recruiting picture is off to an awkward start, with the Hawkeyes sitting at the bottom of the Big Ten in the early rankings. For a program that has long made a habit of finding and developing overlooked players, the number is not exactly fatal, but it is the kind of snapshot that can make fans uneasy this far out from signing day, especially when the league table is already starting to take shape around them.
The bigger question is how much that ranking really matters in Iowa City, where Kirk Ferentzs staff has never relied on splashy recruiting alone to stay competitive. The Hawkeyes have leaned more heavily on the transfer portal to balance the roster and have shown they can still patch together a capable team even when the high school class is slow to build, but the current pace leaves plenty of room for concern until the next wave of commitments arrives. [Read more 🡒]
Top Iowa Prospect Is Coming Home After A Brutal Twist
Brett Harris had spent much of his senior year at Western Dubuque High School looking like one of Iowas most promising baseball prospects, with his play on both the baseball diamond and the football field keeping him squarely on the radar of college programs. The senior had originally committed to Ole Miss, a path that seemed to fit the kind of talent and profile he had built in Dubuque.
Instead, Harris is now headed to the University of Iowa after Ole Miss withdrew its scholarship offer, a stunning turn for a player who has kept competing while undergoing radiation treatment for a brain tumor. The move sends one of the states top prospects closer to home at a time when his athletic future has already been tested far beyond the usual recruiting drama, and it adds another layer to a story that has drawn attention well beyond the box scores. [Read more 🡒]