Gophers get ready to face Iowa's surging defense

When the dust settled on Iowa's 24-10 win against Wisconsin on Saturday, the numbers were clear. The Hawkeyes had held the Badgers to 51 rushing yards — just 1.6 per carry.

Chalk it up as another dominant performance for a Kirk Ferentz defense that has helped Iowa to three straight victories in a tight Big Ten West title race leading into Saturday's matchup with the Gophers.

The Hawkeyes have already faced three of the Big Ten's top four leading rushers in Illinois' Chase Brown, Michigan's Blake Corum and Wisconsin's Braelon Allen.

Now they'll have to face arguably the toughest runner to tackle in the country in the U's Mohamed Ibrahim, the Doak Walker Award running back of the week.

"Like all good players you have to defend him every play and defend him until the whistle blows," Ferentz said at his Tuesday news conference. "He's just a tough football player. Looks like there's nothing there and next thing you know he's got a five or eight-yard gain. So if you don't tackle or get him down, he's not quitting."

Ibrahim, who ran for 178 yards and three TDs in last week's 31-3 win against Northwestern, leads the second best rushing offense in the Big Ten with the Gophers averaging 221.1 yards, behind only Michigan's 251.4.

Iowa's defense has come a long way since giving up 27 points to Michigan and 54 points to Ohio State in blowout losses last month. The Hawkeyes have given up only 26 points combined in the last three games.

"We have enough guys at the top that have been really strong," Ferentz told reporters after beating Wisconsin. "I couldn't sign off on that three weeks ago, four weeks ago, but you bet on people, and you bet on people that you've been around and see how they respond."

The Hawkeyes hold opponents to 3.8 yards per play, the best since Alabama in 2011. Iowa is also giving up just 88.6 yards per game on the ground, third in the Big Ten and eighth in the Football Bowl Subdivision.

Brown and Corum, No. 1 and No. 3 in the FBS in rushing, did their damage in wins against Iowa with 146 and 133 yards, respectively. But in Iowa's last three victories, Northwestern, Purdue and Wisconsin averaged just 52 yards rushing.

"It's the will versus the run, so if you're willing to go out there and stop the run then good things can happen," Iowa linebacker Jack Campbell told reporters Saturday. "These are the kinds of games you fantasize about. It's such a blessing to be able to compete with some of the best in the nation."

Probably as impressive as stopping the run has been the Hawkeyes' ability to score points defensively to make up for a putrid offense. They rank second nationally with 28 points on defense this season (four touchdowns and two safeties).

"What they've done defensively, it's impressive," Gophers coach P.J. Fleck said. "I don't know if I've seen that in college football where the defense creates the majority of the points throughout the year. Sometimes it's like maybe one year you have that and it's a special year. They seem to do it every year."

Iowa defensive back Cooper DeJean played the game of his life in the win against Wisconsin with 10 tackles, a 32-yard interception return for a touchdown and 114 all-purpose yards. That helped him win Rose Bowl Big Ten player of the week honors.

There was one play he just couldn't forget that frustrated him. DeJean was tackled by the punter on a 41-yard return, but that still led to a decisive scoring drive to extend Iowa's lead to 21-10 in the third quarter.

The impact of DeJean's special teams crew has been game changing this year. But the Hawkeyes defense vs. the Gophers run game is at the top of the key matchups with Ibrahim, who rushed for 144 yards vs. Iowa two years ago.

"You think about him coming off the [Achilles tendon injury] the way he did it," Ferentz said. "He's a real veteran player. I have a lot of respect for him. The guy's a winner."