Iowa St Cyclones 2017 NCAA Football Preview

College Football Predictions – Iowa St Cyclones 2017 NCAA Football Preview

2016 Recap

2016 Record – 3-9

2016 ATS – 7-5

Well it sure wasn’t pretty.

The Cyclones limped their way through most of the season and finished up at 3-9 in Matt Campbell’s first season as HC. They did manage to RIP APART Texas Tech 66-10 near the end of the season and head into 2017 knowing that they can jump up and bite conference foes from time to time. That is a good place to start the rebuild.

2017 MEGALOCKS Opening Power Rating

Big 12 – TBD

OFFENSE

No more rotating at QB. Joel Lanning has joined the LB group (!) and the starting quarterback job is now in the hands of Jacob Park who played really well down the stretch. The Cyclones look set at WR with 1,000-yard man Allen Lazard (1st Team Big 12) back for his senior season and Deshaunte Jones had over 500 yards receiving and 6 TDs in 2016. There is a good 1-2 punch at RB with David Montgomery and Mike Warren (over 1,100 combined rushing yards last year) that should make this offense balanced and improved over the prior year.

The ace in the hole ? The OL only returns 1/5 starters but has a lot of size and talent. Matt Campbell had his Toledo offensive lines performing at a high level so we have high hopes for the offense. Of course, they have allowed 30+ sacks for four consecutive seasons, but our hope is that better things are to come in 2017.

DEFENSE

The Cyclones have to get tougher on the DL if they want to even sniff a shot at bowl eligibility. Last season Iowa St could only manage 19 sacks (9th Big 12) and allowed 218 yards per game rushing (8th Big 12) at 5 yards a carry. There will be some new faces aboard but we worry a lot about this area. The back seven looks ok. Last season’s leading tackler LB Willie Harvey returns as do 3/4 players from the secondary including 2nd Team Big 12 performer S Kamari Cotton-Moya. The Cyclones allowed 31 points per game last year and we peg them close to that number again.

SPECIAL TEAMS

This has the makings of a team strength. Iowa St loses excellent PK Cole Netten (16/17 FG last year) but replace him with an experienced leg en route to Ames via Oregon St (Garrett Owens). P Colin Downing does a fine job. Experienced return men are on hand.

Potential ATS Trouble Spot

November 25 – at Kansas St. This will be their 3rd road date in four weeks and their 4th in six weeks. If they are eliminated from bowl contention by this point it could get ugly in Manhattan.

MEGAmazing Tidbits

Legendary coach GLENN “POP” WARNER coached at Iowa St in the 19th century. #FunWithHistory

MEGALOCKS ATS Value Rating (10) 7.0

MEGALOCKS says:

Overall, we give the CYCLONES a 7.0 ATS Value Rating (Good) this season.

Digging deep into the MEGALOCKS ARCHIVES we note the following from our award-winning 2016 Iowa St season preview in which we also gave them a 7.0 ATS Value Rating…….”The Cyclones are on our watch list and we may get some value starting in week four if they indeed do get pasted by Iowa and TCU. Intrigued.” They did get pasted by Iowa. Less so by TCU. However, they finished the campaign with a 7-5 mark ATS despite winning only three games all year.

These guys should be a lot better in 2017. We like the way things are going under Matt Campbell. Iowa St is not a team people are super pumped to back against the point spread so value is going to be there more often than not. They will probably not be a full-fledged money-making JUGGERNAUT due to the suspect defense. Just keep an eye on them.

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News

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