Iowa football offensive coordinator Tim Lester speaks to reporters during Iowa Football Media Day outside the Hansen Football Performance Center on the UI campus on Friday afternoon, Aug. 9, 2024. Lester begins his first year as Iowa’s new offensive coordinator. (Benjamin Roberts/Freelance)
IOWA CITY – Tim Lester has the numbers stored on his computer.
The Iowa football team’s new offensive coordinator didn’t specify last season’s numbers, but they were all bad on that side of the ball – 130th (out of 130 teams) in yards per game and yards per play, 129th in points per game, 126th in third-down efficiency and 129th in completion percentage.
Lester’s “realistic” goal? “Let’s cut everything in half.”
“No matter where we were last year, I want to be halfway there,” Lester said, noting he won’t look at the numbers again until the end of the year. “I look at where we are in some stats nationally, and if we’re 120th, I want to be in the 60s this year. And if we were 50th, I want to be 25th.”
You don’t have to look far at the outdoor practice field where Lester stood during Iowa’s annual media day to see reasons for his and the rest of the Hawkeyes’ optimism about the 2024 offense.
Iowa has more quarterbacks than in recent years. Behind Cade McNamara – himself a former third-team all-Big Ten quarterback – the Hawkeyes have former Northwestern quarterback Brendan Sullivan, who started four games for the Wildcats last year. Sullivan, said head coach Kirk Ferentz, “did a really good job” in his first week of fall camp.
“The space is much more competitive overall than it was at the end of last year, last December,” Ferentz said. “And that was the goal — try to find a space where you have good competition.”
On the offensive line, four of five starters from last year’s team are back, and three other linemen have started at least one game for the Hawkeyes in their careers. With that experience, Ferentz believes “we may finally be at a point where we can play at the pace we’d like to.”
“If our line plays well and our quarterback plays well, we have a chance,” Ferentz said, reflecting on his last 25 seasons as head coach at Iowa and the previous nine years as an assistant under Hayden Fry. “We have a chance to have a good offense.”
Every running back who had at least one carry last year is back this year.
There has been significant turnover at the wide receiver position and it’s no secret that there wasn’t much production last year, but Lester was very optimistic about the young position group.
“The opportunities are huge,” Lester said. “They really took advantage of them. … It was probably the most fun group to watch because they’re improving in leaps and bounds every day.”
While Iowa’s offense pursues its ambitious goals, it doesn’t hurt that the team is “a little healthier than it has been in recent years.” Running back Leshon Williams is one of “four or five guys” out with soft tissue injuries, Ferentz said, but it’s “nothing long-term.”
Of course, the improvement Lester is seeking is no easy task. Then-offensive coordinator Brian Ferentz noted a “fleeting sense of satisfaction in the evening” at media day last year before taking over as head coach of Iowa’s last-place offense and losing his job.
“Nothing that happened in the past matters,” Lester told the team earlier this year, “unless you want it to matter.”
The defense has allowed the most yards per game for the past two consecutive seasons and exudes experience again this year, with eight starters returning from last year’s team, including All-American linebacker Jay Higgins.
“We know and understand the preparation it takes to be a really good team in the Big Ten,” said defensive end Deontae Craig.
The Hawkeyes are ranked 25th in the preseason coaches’ poll, and the Associated Press’ more widely cited preseason poll comes out next week. (If the offense performs at the level Lester and Co. believe it can, the Hawkeyes will certainly climb above 25th in the rankings.)
“I’m pretty sure Ohio State is really good,” Ferentz said when asked about the poll. “I’m pretty sure Georgia is, too. … But other than that, that’s the great thing about college football. Nobody really knows. All I know is this: I like the way our team works. I think we have potential.”
Could this potential help Iowa secure a spot in the 12-team College Football Playoff?
“That’s a very realistic goal for this team,” said McNamara, who was the starting quarterback on Michigan’s CFP team in 2021. “I think – just the overall experience and talent we have on both sides of the ball – we wouldn’t have gotten far enough without that goal.”
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