Iowa Football Finalizes 2023 Schedule

The Iowa football team finalized its schedule for 2023. That’s a fun sentence!

Here’s who we got:

2023 Iowa Football Schedule

Sept. 2 Western Michigan

Sept. 9 at Iowa State

Sept. 16 Utah State

Sept. 23 Purdue (FW)

Sept. 30 at Wisconsin

Oct. 7 Rutgers (HC)

Oct. 14 at Northwestern

Oct. 21 Michigan State

Oct. 28 at Penn State

Nov. 4 Minnesota

Nov. 11 Open

Nov. 18 Illinois

Nov. 24 at Nebraska

That’s neat, right?

The big attention-grabber there is the addition of Utah State, a team that just went 11-2 and ended up ranked No. 21 in this year’s coaches poll. They were coached by Matt Wells, who’s now off to Texas Tech. Wells will be replaced by Gary Anderson, a guy we’re kind of familiar with! Who knows if he’ll still be around in five friggin’ years.

Anyway, Utah State could be a good program, and will likely improve Iowa’s strength of schedule, which is really the point, since we know neither of Iowa’s non-conference opponents —Western Michigan and Iowa State—likely won’t do much to move the needle in terms of Iowa’s SOS.

Another interesting note here—Iowa’s bye comes during the third-to-last week of the season. I don’t know what to make of it. The adage that Iowa’s football teams play their best toward the end of the year doesn’t really carry water anymore, and I just don’t like how late this comes, from a momentum AND a rest standpoint. But whatever.

So, there you have it. Iowa’s football schedule. What do you think!?