Iowa HC Places Trust in Explosive Return Man

The common phrase in football is always about the three phases of the game, offense, defense and special teams. If you were to hypothetically divide that into a pie chart, you wouldn’t be blamed if you gave each the offense and defense 40% of the pie and left just a sliver for special teams, most would. 

Yet when the Iowa Hawkeyes (3-1) (1-0) and their mixed-bag offense took on a stubborn Rutgers team last Friday, little thought it would end up being the special teams that played the pivotal role in pushing Iowa to a 38-28 victory over the Scarlett Knights, yet it was graduate wideout/kick returner Kaden Wetjen who stole the show. 

Wetjen’s 100-yard kickoff return touchdown wasn’t the first time he had done so; as a matter of fact, heading into the season, Wetjen was tipped as one of the nation’s best returners by a number of nominations, including Phil Steele, The Sporting News, Athlon Sports and the Jet Award. 

After Wetjen’s game-breaking performance against Rutgers, during head coach Kirk Ferentz’s weekly conference, he was asked if Wetjen was given a metaphorical “green light” by the Hawkeyes' coach. 

“Not total green light. We don’t want to be stupid. I’m glad you brought that up. Probably won’t get many opportunities with the guys they have, who actually is from Nebraska, actually, their kicker. But boy, he puts it in there deep and he puts it up there pretty high.

“Just got done telling our guys this morning, we probably won’t get many opportunities, maybe a little window to factor in or something like that. I can’t imagine they’re going to kick it where he could intentionally return it, so this may not be a great week. But you don’t want to do something that’s stupid. You can’t start on your own 15.

“But to flip it around, though, if he gets an opportunity to go, we want him to go. You might give him a little bit more liberty in the punt return game than you would a normal guy.”