Iowa spoils Utah State’s season opener
Utah State opened its season in Iowa against No. 25 Hawkeyes. With an almost entirely new team, the Aggies fought hard and fell short losing 24-14 at Kinnick Stadium.
“As you can imagine, I am frustrated with the outcome. Clearly, we felt that we had a plan in place that if we executed it well, it would give us a chance to win. I’m not much for moral victories, so keeping it close and beating the spread doesn’t fire me up a lot. But, what does is how hard the guys played. The fact that we showed at times that we could compete with that group, that’s a really really well-built football team,” head coach Blake Anderson said.
Utah State had 26 players make their Aggie debut today including 15 played in their first Division One game.
Senior quarterback Cooper Legas passed for 213 yards and one touchdown to leading wide receiver Terrell Vaughn. The senior caught a career-high 12 passes for 93 yards and made the only Aggie touchdown of the game. The touchdown was followed by a two-point conversion by junior running back Rahsul Faison leaving the Aggies at their final score.
Snow College transfer Faison stood out in his USU debut as he led the Aggies in rushing with 59 yards on seven carries.
Legas was 32 of 48 in passing yards with 17 yards rushing on seven carries and threw one interception.
The Hawkeyes scored the first points of the game on the opening drive, their first opening drive touchdown pass to start a season since 1991.
Following a 54-yard return by Kaleb Johnson, the Hawkeyes scored two plays later on a 36-yard touchdown pass from McNamara to Seth Anderson to make it 7-0.
McNamara threw his second touchdown of the quarter on Iowa’s next series, a 3-yarder to Erick All to give the hosts a 14-0 lead with 7:44 remaining.
Both teams kept each other from the endzone for the remainder of the first half. Junior placekicker William Testa got the Aggies on the board with 11:03 to go in the second quarter to make it 14-3, capping a 16-play drive.
Drew Stevens split the uprights from 20 yards out to send Iowa into the breakup 17-3.
Utah State junior placekicker Elliott Nimrod cut the deficit to 17-6 when he drilled the first field goal of his Aggie career, a 45-yarder with 12:02 left in the third quarter.
The Hawkeyes made it 24-6 with 10:17 remaining in the game on a 3-yard touchdown run by Johnson.
After the final points scored for the Aggies, Utah State attempted an onside kick, but Iowa recovered it and later took a knee to end the game.
Grad senior inside linebacker MJ Tafisi Jr. led the Aggies with 12 tackles, while junior safety Anthony Switzer and sophomore safety Simeon Harris recorded eight tackles apiece in their respective Utah State debuts.
Sophomore S Ike Larsen (6) blocked his fourth-career punt, which is a school record. Larsen also tied his career high with two pass breakups to give him four in his career.
Utah State had more penalties than most in the 2022 season. Today proved similar with 10 penalties for 91 yards vs. Iowa’s seven for 50 yards. Anderson hopes they’ll be able to correct the mistakes for the rest of the season.
“Too many unenforced errors. You’re going to struggle to beat a bad team with the errors that we had today, much less a team of this caliber. If we went out there and started this game over, in the first quarter, if you eliminate five personal fouls, four missed turnover opportunities, a turnover on our part, two missed third-and-ones, and really just us not doing what we’re supposed to be doing, it’s a completely different football game,” he said.
Utah State finished with 329 yards of total offense (116 rushing, 213 passing) as compared to 284 total yards for Iowa (88 rushing, 196 passing).
The team opens the home portion of its season on Saturday, Sept. 9, against Idaho State on Merlin Olsen Field at Maverik Stadium. Kickoff is slated for 6 p.m.
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