Kaevon Merriweather Wins Golden Gavel

Iowa junior safety Kaevon Merriweather was announced as the inaugural winner of the Duke Slater Golden Gavel Award, which was voted upon by a group of Iowa media members who cover the program on a regular basis.

Merriweather, a Belleville, Mich., native, received more than 75 percent of the votes by local media. During a team meeting, Merriweather was presented with an engraved gavel by Scott Dochterman of The Athletic and Chad Leistikow of The Des Moines Register on Wednesday night.

By description, “The Golden Gavel will go to the Iowa football player, who not only is most cooperative with local media, but exhibits themself with professional integrity in all interactions.”

The inaugural award is named after Duke Slater, who was a charter member of the College Football Hall of Fame and a recent inductee of the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Slater earned his law degree from the University of Iowa while playing in the NFL, and he became the first African-American elected to the Cook County Superior Court. The playing surface at Kinnick Stadium was renamed Duke Slater Field in summer 2021.