Iowa beats Pitt, 24-20

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Pitt may have dominated the stat sheet but the Hawkeyes walked away with the “W” as Iowa beat the Panthers today 24-20 at Heinz Field in Pittsburgh.

The game started out great for Pitt. RB James Connor rushed for 100 of his 155 total yards in the first half and the Panthers looked fresh and dominate early.

Connor bruised his way on consecutive runs of 7 yards and 22 yards to the Iowa 47 yard line at roughly the 8 minute mark of the 1st quarter. After QB Chad Voyik tacked on two more runs of 3 and 7 yards, Pitt took the early 7-0 lead on a strong 14 yard TD run by true freshman RB Chris James.

The Hawkeyes answered on the very next series as Iowa QB Jake Rudock hit WR Matt VandeBerg for a 44 yard pass to the Pitt 21 yard line. After consecutive runs by RB Mark Weisman (5 yards) and Damon Bullock (3 yards), Rudock found TE Henry Krieger Coble for an easy 13 yard TD on a 4th down play to tie the score 7-7.

The Pitt secondary got burned all day as they gave up several big plays in the passing game and allowed Iowa to beat the Panthers with a back-up QB C.J. Beathard (7 for 8 for 98 yards).

The second quarter was all Pitt following an 18 play, 75 yard drive that ended with a 1 yard TD run at the 9:42 mark by James Connor and gave the Panthers a 14-7 lead.

The Pitt offensive line looked very impressive in run blocking and opened massive holes for Connor in the process.

After the Pitt defense held the Hawkeyes on the ensuing drive, the Panthers took to the air as Voytik made several plays in the passing game with connections to WR Tyler Boyd (for 11 and 24 yards), WR Ronald Jones (for 7 yards), WR Manasseh Garner (for 6 yards) and finally WR Kevin Weatherspoon (for 23 yards) that resulted in a 33 yard Field Goal by PK Chris Blewitt. Pitt led 17-7 at the half.

As Pitt came out flat to start the 3rd Quarter, back-up Iowa QB C.J. Beathard found WR Damond Powell for a big 62 yard pass play to the Pitt 18. A couple of runs later, RB Mark Weisman scampered 10 yards to pull the Hawkeyes within 3 points (17-14) at the 3:18 mark of the 3rd Quarter.

Pitt answered when QB Chad Voytik completed a 39 yard pass to Tyler Boyd to the Iowa 36. However, all the Panthers could muster was 3 points on a 29 yard Field Goal by Chris Blewitt to give Pitt the 20-14 lead.

Iowa traded field goals with the Panthers when Hawkeye PK Marshall Koehn boomed a long 52 yard field goal to trim the Pitt lead to 20-17 at the end of the 3rd Quarter.

Unfortunately for the Panthers, the defense ran out of gas in the final frame after the Hawkeyes scored on a 13 play, 52 yard drive that was capped by 1 yard run by RB Mark Weisman after converting on a series of 4th down plays. It would prove to be the deciding score of the game as Iowa would beat Pitt 24-20.

Weisman finished the day with 22 carries for 88 yards and 2 TDs.

For Pitt, the bright spots were James Connor, who finished the day with 29 carries for 155 yards and 1 TD, and Tyler Boyd, 10 catches for 153 yards.

While Voytik had some positive plays, he was unable to find the endzone in the passing game and finished 19 for 29 passing for 250 yards and 1 INT.

Pitt dominated the stat sheet, however, with the following totals:

Total Yards: Pitt 435 Iowa 311
Passing Yards: Pitt 250 Iowa 178
Rushing Yards: Pitt 185 Iowa 133

Next Up: Akron at Pitt at 1:30pm EST on Saturday 9/27 on ESPN3