What We're Watching: Iowa at Wisconsin

Iowa travels to Madison, WI on Saturday (3:00 PM CT, FOX) to face Wisconsin in the biggest game of the season for the Hawkeyes (and, probably, the Badgers as well). The winner of this game will have a huge leg up on the loser in the Big Ten West division standings -- even with half the season to play out, that advantage may be insurmountable.

So what will we be watching as Iowa tries to keep its Big Ten West hopes alive -- and win in Madison for the first time since 2015?

There have been few predictors more reliable than this one: the team that wins the rushing battle takes home the Heartland Trophy. Going back to 2009, the team that outruns the other in this game is 11-1. The only exception came in 2009, when Iowa ran for 65 yards and allowed 87 but still came away with a win in Madison.

Controlling the game via running the ball has been a key to this series for three decades now and it feels like it's probably going to hold true again on Saturday. For Iowa to win this game, the Hawkeyes are going to have to find success in the ground game. Iowa hasn't been very good on offense this season, but the best moments have tended to feature a strong showing by the running backs (250+ yards against Western Michigan, 180+ yards against Purdue).

Effectively running the ball would also take pressure off Deacon Hill (making his first career road start), which could reduce the likelihood of Hill turning the ball over. Putting as little pressure on Hill's shoulders as possible seems like the best strategy for Iowa in this game. To do that, the Iowa offensive line will probably need to produce its best -- and most consistent -- performance of the season.

While the strength of the running game feels like a bigger factor in determining the outcome of this game, it doesn't mean that the passing game (and specifically the involvement of the receivers) won't be a factor as well. No wide receiver caught a pass for Iowa last week against Purdue, one of those stats that would seem impossible for any offense but the iowa offense.

That Iowa managed to defeat Purdue without a single catch from a receiver is mostly a testament to the excellence of Erick All last week, as well as a strong showing from the running game, and the usual steady play of the Iowa defense. It's not a formula that anyone should be eager to repeat; Iowa needs to get the ball to receivers in the passing game.

There will probably be opportunities for Iowa to make plays in the passing game -- the Badgers do have the 13th-ranked pass defense in the Big Ten, though it's been better in their most recent games. And with Wisconsin likely to load the box to smother Iowa's running game, there should be chances for Hill to get the ball to receivers in single coverage. Iowa will need to hit on some of those plays to move the ball and get the defense to back out of the box, which would also free up lanes for the running game.

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After a disastrous performance in the turnover department against Penn State (-4), Iowa has gone +3 over the last two games against Michigan State and Purdue. While the Hawkeyes have still been turning the ball over themselves (two giveaways against MSU, one interception against Purdue), the defense has returned to its ballhawking ways, forcing six turnovers over the last two weeks, including three interceptions against MSU and two more against Purdue.

Going back to 2009, the team that wins the turnover battle is 8-4 in the Iowa-Wisconsin series. It's been more important for Iowa to win the turnover battle than the Badgers -- in Iowa's four wins over Wisconsin since '09, the Hawkeyes have won the turnover battle in each of those wins and finished +7 in turnover margin in those games. Wisconsin has won the game despite losing the turnover battle four times in that span (although the turnover margin was just +1 to Iowa in all four of those Badger wins).

Winning the turnover battle feels even more important than normal for Iowa in this game, given the oft-documented struggles of the Hawkeye offense. The Iowa offense isn't likely to produce long drives or methodical drives against the Wisconsin defense; the Hawkeyes are going to need some short fields in order to have success on offense. And if the defense can score on those forced turnovers as well -- even better.

For decades, the Iowa and Wisconsin programs have been two peas in a pod when it comes to football. They may have used slightly different ways to get there (Iowa has preferred a 4-3 defense, while Wisconsin favored the 3-4 for years; Iowa's running game has been an outside zone run team, while Wisconsin has been a power run team), but the end result was very similar: a team built around running the ball and playing stout defense.

The Badger transformation began over 30 years ago with the arrival of Barry Alvarez, an assistant coach at Iowa. Alvarez gave way to Bret Bielema -- another former assistant coach at Iowa. Bielema was succeeded (briefly) by Gary Anderson and then by Paul Chryst and while Chryst didn't have ties to the Iowa program himself, he was an assistant under Alvarez and Bielema and maintained the Wisconsin program in the same image that the two former Iowa assistants had built it.

Enter: Luke Fickell, a former Ohio State player and assistant coach (under both Jim Tressel and Urban Meyer) and a highly successful head coach at Cincinnati. Fickell has no ties to the Iowa program, nor to past Wisconsin teams. He's an outsider brought in to transform the Badger program. He hired Phil Longo from SMU to run the Badger offense and make it more of an air raid attack.

Whatever happens to Wisconsin under Fickell, it's probably not going to look like the Badger program that was Iowa's (slightly) thicker, (slightly) meaner, more successful cousin. What will that mean for the Iowa-Wisconsin series -- and for this game in particular? For years, both teams have known what the other team wants to do -- especially Wisconsin, who seemed to know what Iowa was going to do on offense even before Iowa snapped the ball for years in the 2010s.

But Fickell is a wildcard. He has a little familiarity with Iowa from his days at Ohio State -- he was the Buckeyes' co-defensive coordinator for wins over the Hawkeyes in 2010 and 2013 -- but not the bone-deep familiarity that Alvarez, Bielema, and Chryst had. But on the flip side, the Hawkeyes also knew what to expect from the Badgers on offense under Alvarez, Bielema, and Chryst (even if they often struggled to stop it), while Wisconsin under Fickell and Longo are a less certain entity.

Ultimately, it may not matter much on Saturday -- the repeated struggles of the Iowa offense this season suggest that it won't take intimate familiarity or years of experience to slow down this Hawkeye attack. But the divergence of the Iowa and Wisconsin programs will be an interesting item to watch as the seasons roll on. For years, Iowa and Wisconsin often seemed like two sides of the same burly coin, but soon the Hawkeyes and Badgers may no longer feel like they're looking into a mirror when they line up across from one another.