Iowa’s 30-0 win over Wisconsin has the Hawkeyes back in the conversation, and now the real test arrives: where do they land when the first College Football Playoff rankings drop this week?
At 6-2, Iowa is already bowl-eligible, which is hardly a surprise under Kirk Ferentz. He has reached that mark in 25 of the last 26 seasons.
But the Hawkeyes are looking well beyond that baseline now. If they win out, the path to a 10-2 finish would put them in a spot where, as the source puts it, there would be “a rather difficult time snubbing a 10-2 Iowa from the College Football Playoff field.”
The latest polls suggest Iowa is climbing back into shape after falling out of the AP Top 25 last weekend. This week, the Hawkeyes moved up five spots to No. 21 in the AP poll. One odd wrinkle there: Iowa is slotted between Boise State and New Mexico, the two Group of Six CFP contenders.
The Coaches Poll has treated Iowa a little better all season. After slipping to No. 24 last week, the Hawkeyes climbed four spots to No. 20 this week. In that ranking, Iowa sits ahead of Boise State and New Mexico.
The CFP committee, though, is expected to see Iowa a little differently than the human voters do. The rankings will be unveiled Tuesday, November 3, at 6 p.m. CT in a special release show on ESPN, and the expectation is that Iowa will come in higher than both the AP and Coaches Poll have them.
That’s because the committee tends to dig deeper into the resume, and Iowa has some appealing data points. There’s also a crowded group of 6-2 teams around the country, including Alabama, Texas, Ohio State, Ole Miss, LSU, Tennessee, Houston, USC, and Missouri. The source argues there are reasonable cases to move Iowa ahead of Houston, USC, and Missouri.
So where does that leave the Hawkeyes? The prediction here is a spot inside the top 20, with Iowa landing at No. 18 in the first CFP rankings. That would put the Hawkeyes in position to keep chasing a playoff berth if they keep winning.
In Other News...
Iowa Heads Into Northwestern With New Questions Up Front
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Those changes matter because Iowa enters the weekend ranked No. 21 in the AP Top 25 Poll at 6-2 and tied with Northwestern for fifth place in the Big Ten. The Hawkeyes have been steady enough to stay in the conference race, but the latest alignment up front suggests the staff is still sorting through some important answers before the schedule tightens further. [Read more 🡒]
Iowa Gets Its First Real Test In Ben McCollums Home Debut
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Lipscomb brings some immediate intrigue into Carver-Hawkeye Arena, with Kevin Carrolls team already having opened its season against Southeast Missouri State and featuring three preseason all-conference players. For Iowa, the matchup offers a chance to see how quickly McCollums team can translate offseason preparation into a game that counts, and how it responds when the competition arrives with proven talent and expectations of its own. [Read more 🡒]
Iowas Playoff Path Suddenly Looks A Lot More Real
Iowas path to the College Football Playoff got a lot more interesting after the latest ESPN FPI update, which gave the Hawkeyes the biggest jump of any team in the country. They climbed 14 spots to No. 21, and the model also nudged their projected win total up from 7.7 to 8.5, a sign that the numbers now see a more favorable finish than they did just a week ago.
For Iowa, the broader takeaway is less about a single ranking and more about how quickly the outlook has shifted. The updated projections also improved the Hawkeyes odds to run the table and keep a CFP bid in play, though those are still probabilities, not promises. In a season where every week can reshape the conversation, Iowa suddenly looks like a team with a real lane to matter in November. [Read more 🡒]