Iowa Football: Hawkeyes rebound, throttle Illinois in Week 12

It came a week too late to make a difference in the division race, but the Iowa football offense returned Saturday in a big way against Illinois.

The Hawkeyes racked up a season-high in points, earning a 63-0 victory over Illinois to improve to 7-4 on the year and snap a three-game losing streak.

Iowa could have still been playing for the division crown in the Big Ten had it not been a for loss last week to Northwestern, which allowed the Wildcats to earn the spot in the championship game next month.

It seemed as if Kirk Ferentz and the Hawkeyes were primed to make a run to that game sitting at 6-1 after a 23-0 shutout of Maryland. But a six point loss at Penn State, a two-point defeat at Purdue and a 14-10 setback to Northwestern followed.

This marked the sixth time Iowa has scored at least 30 points this year, and the third game they have surpassed 40 in the Big Ten. The Hawks scored 56 and 55 in wins over Nebraska and Ohio State a season ago.

Nate Stanley was effective, hitting on 13-of-21 for 178 yards with three touchdowns. The Iowa ground unit racked up over 100 yards and eight different players caught passes.

Sophomore running back Mekhi Sargent had the best game of his young Hawkeye career, running for 121 yards and scoring two touchdowns. Sargent went for 91 earlier this season vs. Penn State and has scored eight times on the season.

Defense and special teams also got in on the scoring spree, as A.J. Epenesa recovered a fumble that he forced and returned it 19 yards for an early second quarter touchdown, while Kyle Groeneweg returned a punt 61 yards for a score in the third.

Stanley put the contest out of reach with two second quarter touchdown passes to T.J. Hockenson covering 11 and 37 yards. He earlier hit his other tight end, Noah Fant, on a 9-yard pass-and-catch for the first score of the contest.

For the Fighting Illini, they are now 4-7 and will miss out on a bowl game once more. The last postseason appearance for Illinois came in 2014 when they lost to Louisiana Tech in the Heart of Dallas Bowl after going 6-6 in the regular season thanks to late November wins over Penn State and Northwestern.

Ra’Von Bonner, a sophomore from Cincinnati, ran for a season-high 111 yards to lead the Illini. He also had 81 yards last week and has now carried the ball 31 times over the past two games.

Iowa now sets its sights on Nebraska this Friday, while Illinois tries to finish with an upset over in-state rival Northwestern next Saturday.