Mark Gronowski disappoints in Iowa football debut vs Albany

IOWA CITY — Even when Mark Gronowski did something right in his Iowa football debut, something went wrong. It was that kind of Saturday for the South Dakota State transfer and the Hawkeyes.

On a second-and-goal from Albany’s 1-yard line midway through the third quarter, Gronowski took a shotgun snap and powered up the middle for his first rushing touchdown as a Hawkeye. But shortly after he got up to be celebrated by his teammates, he fell back to the ground.

The good news: It was only cramping in his calves.

The optics, though: Fitting for the day.

Gronowski’s first performance as Iowa’s quarterback was underwhelming to say the least, casting a cloud over the Hawkeyes’ 34-7 victory against the University of Albany, an FCS program that went 4-8 a year ago and has an interim head coach.

Gronowski exited midway through the third quarter after cramping again and didn't return. He finished with this stat line: 8-for-15 passing for 44 yards and a touchdown; 11 rushes for 39 yards and a touchdown. Against Albany, a team he throttled in the 2023 FCS semifinals, those stats behind a stellar FBS offensive line are disappointing.

Gronowski’s first drive as a Hawkeye, after Iowa won the coin toss and took the ball, could have been chalked up to nerves. He went 2-for-5 for 14 yards. The three incompletions were ugly.

First, there was an out route to Seth Anderson that was so far off the mark it would have been a wild pitch in baseball. Second, he missed a sure touchdown to Sam Phillips, but the throw bounced several yards short of Phillips, who stood open in the end zone. Third, he fluttered a screen pass that was wildly overthrown to TJ Washington, forcing Iowa to settle for a 28-yard Drew Stevens field goal.

If he had looked that bad in fall camp, there's almost no way he would have won the job over Auburn transfer Hank Brown. So, maybe it was jitters?

That theory seemed to go out the window, though, as the game went on.

Gronowski has a lot of pressure on his shoulders as a highly accomplished FCS quarterback with 49 wins and two national championships. He’s been highly paid to solve Iowa’s longstanding QB issues.

And that’s why it became extra concerning when the struggles for Gronowski festered. An off-target toss pitch on a running play to Washington got the second drive off to a bad start. Then he got sacked.

On Iowa’s third drive, he scrambled — one of his known qualities as a QB — to gain extra time and had Jacob Gill wide open, but overthrew him up the right sideline. On the next play, he underthrew a wide-open Anderson again, and that became an incompletion on review to wipe out a 15-yard gain. His next throw to KJ Parker caromed incomplete.

After that three-and-out, Albany shocked the Kinnick crowd by taking a 7-3 lead.

And at that point, offensive coordinator Tim Lester decided to focus on using Iowa’s most dominant group — the offensive line — to retake control of the game. The Hawkeyes actively decided to take Gronowski’s passing out of the game plan.

And that felt like a damning sign to start this season of hope.

Gronowski looked uncomfortable in the pocket and didn't trust his throws, instead opting to check down or scramble often. With an impressive opponent in Iowa State looming, this wasn't the performance you wanted to see.

That said, on the whole, Iowa did take control of this game and dominated it after falling behind. The Hawkeyes rushed for more than 300 yards. They are 1-0. But it didn't feel like the 1-0 most people were hoping to see, with the quarterback they were hoping would point this offense in a new direction.

Suddenly, there’s a spurt of injuries to track … and a new contributor

Kirk Ferentz jinxed it, obviously, when he said this to open his Tuesday news conference of Week 1: “We were fortunate we came into camp pretty healthy, and fortunate to leave pretty healthy.”

A day later, wide receiver Reece Vander Zee practiced Wednesday, then suffered a fracture in his left foot in what Ferentz called a “very freak” occurrence. Vander Zee, who caught two touchdown passes in last year’s opener, had his left foot in a boot during pregame warmups and is “week to week,” per Ferentz on his pregame radio show.

Speaking of pregame, another fluky thing seemed to happen as offensive lineman Bryce George — the Ferris State transfer — suffered an arm injury and was down on the turf, according to KCRG’s Owen Siebring. George, who finished third in a three-way battle at left tackle, indeed had his left arm in a sling during the game and was not in uniform.

And then during Iowa’s first offensive series, starting running back Kamari Moulton injured his right arm on his third carry. He, too, was in a sling and a sweatshirt later in the first half. He was ruled out for the game by Iowa.

Moulton’s exit opened the door for freshman Xavier Williams to get more opportunities. Williams got his first career carry on Iowa’s fourth drive, after Albany had taken a 7-3 lead, and rumbled 14 yards. Then he went 27 yards on the next play. Williams capped that drive with Iowa’s first touchdown of the season, a 3-yard run up the middle.

Williams (5-foot-10, 225 pounds) has impressed Iowa with his balance and power, and he got carries ahead of returning running back Jaziun Patterson. So, essentially, he came in as Iowa’s third-team running back and moved up to second-team with the Moulton injury.

And he looked like a first-teamer against the Great Danes. Williams logged six carries for 94 yards in the first half alone. He finished with 11 carries for a team-high 122 yards.

Kaden Wetjen returned to Iowa to catch passes, too

Wetjen’s return for a sixth year of college wasn’t a slam dunk. The All-American return specialist could’ve transferred, but he came back to Iowa with the idea that he would be more involved in Iowa’s passing game. (Wetjen finished last season with three catches for 46 yards.)

Against Albany, with Iowa holding a closer-than-expected 10-7 lead late in the second quarter, Wetjen raced to catch a punt on the run — making a risky play on the ball but catching it cleanly near his shoes — and deftly scooted around Albany tacklers for a 17-yard return to start Iowa’s drive at its own 39.

Then, when Iowa really needed a clutch play to finish the drive, Wetjen was there again. He lined up in the right slot on fourth-and-goal from the 2, with 1:54 to go before halftime. Credit to Ferentz for being aggressive and going for the touchdown, rather than a second chip-shot field goal from Stevens.

Gronowski noted that the Albany safety picked up Xavier Williams out of the backfield, leaving Wetjen a step on the linebacker in zone coverage. The throw was on target, and Wetjen made the catch for a 2-yard score — his first receiving touchdown in four years at Iowa, after transferring from Iowa Western Community College in early 2022.

A milestone win for Kirk Ferentz; how about another?

In the most-expected note from Saturday’s win, Iowa’s 27th-year head coach pulled into a tie for first all-time with Ohio State’s Woody Hayes with 205 wins as a Big Ten head coach. Ferentz’s record (all at Iowa) in the Big Ten is 205-124, and yes, that includes a win in last year’s opener, which was coached by Seth Wallace (as Ferentz sat out with a one-game suspension).

But the real celebration — however small or big it is — will come with win No. 206, when Ferentz jumps into the top spot by himself. And there might be no better place to do it than Jack Trice Stadium, where Ferentz has won six straight over Iowa State.

Ferentz already has one significant milestone that occurred at Iowa State. He collected his 200th win as a Division I head coach (including 12 wins at Maine) in Ames in 2023. To succeed on the road against your in-state rival for a seventh straight time while making Big Ten history would be a memorable combination for Ferentz.

But after seeing the quarterback play against Albany, Iowa will really need to regroup to get that done.

Hawkeyes columnist Chad Leistikow has served for 30 years with The Des Moines Register and USA TODAY Sports Network. Chad is the 2023 INA Iowa Sports Columnist of the Year and NSMA Co-Sportswriter of the Year in Iowa. Join Chad's text-message group (free for subscribers) at HawkCentral.com/HawkeyesTexts. Follow @ChadLeistikow on X.

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