Iowa Football: 5 Bold Predictions for September

5. Don’t worry about Sutton Smith

Depending on how closely you’ve followed the Iowa football media contingent on social media this past week, there’s a good chance you’ve heard about Sutton Smith. He ruffled some feathers with his comments about Iowa in his interview with Mark Emmert of the Des Moines Register.

"“It’s not like we’re going to go into Iowa thinking, ‘Man, I hope we can keep up with them.’ That’s not our mindset. We’re coming in there to punch them right in the face, just like we did at Nebraska.”"

Hopefully this has found its way to a bulletin board somewhere in the Iowa locker room and has lit a fire underneath the Iowa offensive linemen. The task is going to be tough as Iowa’s starting tackles Tristan Wirfs and Alaric Jackson are suspended for this first game. However, the Iowa offensive line has depth and Sutton Smith will have no more than a sack in the first game.

Smith is a great defensive linemen, no question there, but his 6-foot-1 stature at defensive end might not be enough to go at Big Ten caliber offensive linemen who stand at 6-foot-4, 6-foot-5, 6-foot-6 and beyond. It’s likely redshirt freshman Mark Kallenberger will draw the assignment to Smith and I believe Kallenberger is going to impress many with his performance.