There comes an inflection point in every Iowa campaign when a fan knows whether the season is going to be special or a slog.

In 2021, the gutty come-from-behind home win over a Top 5 Penn State team served notice Iowa had the goods to be a Big 10 title contender.

In the fourth quarter Saturday against Top 5 Michigan, with Iowa down 13 and driving and Kinnick in full roaring throat, it felt like another improbable, season-defining comeback might be in the offing.

But the season-long offensive woes that have plagued this team surfaced again with Iowa deep in the red zone, hoping to tighten the score. An inexplicable outside run on 3rd and 1 followed up by an even more idiotic 1-yard pass on 4th and 2 from inside the 10-yard line killed the drive, Iowa’s hopes to spring the upset and served as a perfect example of why Iowa fans have had it with the team’s current offensive coordinator.

A slog it shall be.

To add insult to injury, the very good Michigan team that dismantled the Hawkeyes played a style shared by some of Kirk Ferentz’s vintage teams: physical, complementary football featuring a bruising running game and a passing game good enough to sting and a stingy defense. They took care of the ball, were more physical than Iowa and looked every bit like a well-oiled conference championship caliber squad.

Iowa, on the other hand, looks much like the rest of the Big 10 West teams: good at some things, weak in other areas and exceedingly average overall. I guess the good news is the Hawkeyes could still find themselves in the thick of the West race if they can get past upset-minded Illinois next week. The bad news is that winning the West looks like offering yourself up as a sacrificial lamb in Indy to whichever much better team comes out of the East.

One positive from Saturday is that the boo birds seem to have taken a break at Kinnick. In fact, it was encouraging to see the crowd still fully invested and cheering hard for a comeback despite the 20-0 third quarter deficit. There were a smattering of boos when Spencer Petras airmailed passes over wide-open receivers a couple times, but at this point, it seems the quarterback situation is what it is: wildly inconsistent and prone to major misses at critical points. That said, the players on both sides of the ball visibly reacted to the swelling crowd noise, a good sign that they are still fully invested and believing they can win.

If I had written in August that the game against in Illinois in Champaign could be a tipping point between an acceptable season and a disaster, few would have believed me. But here we are. Two of the West Division coaches have been axed early into Big Ten play, with pre-season favorite Wisconsin’s Paul Chryst ignominiously shown the door despite his sterling .700 success rate in conference games. It looks like the West will be a dogfight between flawed teams, and as we sit on October 4, Illinois can legitimately claim to have the inside track.

I will be curious to see how much antipathy and energy the Illini will have for Iowa after embarrassing Bret Bielema’s former team thoroughly. It seems to me that Bret and Illinois had that Badger game circled for some time. Will they be as up for the Hawkeyes, who also have humiliated them frequently in the past?

That answer may depend on whether or not Michigan truly is a Top 5, College Football Playoff contender type team. If they are, a 27-14 loss that featured a semi-comeback isn’t the end of the world. If the Wolverines are just another average Big 10 team, the loss will not look as good.

The key next week will be stopping the Illini running attack. Michigan showed that Iowa’s stingy rush defense may have been a bit of a mirage due to less-than-stellar previous competition. The Wolverines had little trouble on the ground on their way to scores on their first four offensive possessions. That is not a recipe for winning for Iowa.

Bielema is going to want to pound the ball as well, and Iowa had better be ready to answer the bell early Saturday or they will find themselves in another deficit. Given Iowa’s anemic offense, that is a recipe for disaster.

Let’s hope Spencer Petras’ odd propensity to play better on the road than in Iowa City continues in Champaign. If Iowa comes back up Interstate 74 with a loss, the mood in Iowa is going to turn very dark indeed.

Follow me on Twitter @ToryBrecht