Iowa's emergency quarterback throws three touchdowns to rout Washington

A statement win in Seattle

Iowa opened the Big Ten half of its schedule with a decisive road win Friday night, using a career performance from running back Kamari Moulton and a three-touchdown passing debut from backup quarterback Jeremy Hecklinski to beat Washington 41-24 at Husky Stadium. The result was posted in Iowa's own athletics coverage under the headline "Hawkeyes Dominate Huskies in Seattle." It pushed the Hawkeyes to 5-1 overall and 2-1 in conference play, while Washington, which opened the season ranked 17th nationally, fell to 3-3 and 0-3 in its third season in the Big Ten.

Hecklinski, a redshirt third-year quarterback who had attempted only a handful of passes in his Iowa career before this season, completed 14 of 19 attempts for 202 yards and three touchdowns — two of them to tight end DJ Vonnahme — in what the program confirmed was his first career start, according to the game's official box score. Moulton carried 26 times for a career-high 208 yards and two touchdowns, and tight end DJ Vonnahme turned just two catches into 44 yards and both of his touchdowns, helping Iowa pile up 465 total yards on only 57 plays, an average of 8.2 yards per snap. Washington ran 76 plays to Iowa's 57 but could not match that efficiency, averaging just 4.2 yards per play; the Huskies' passing attack produced 320 yards, but their running game finished with minus-3 yards on the ground, a collapse that left Washington one-dimensional against an Iowa defense that forced no turnovers but needed none, per the official box score. Iowa also won the time-of-possession battle efficiently in reverse, controlling the ball for less time (28:19) than Washington (31:41) while still outscoring the Huskies by 17 — the product of explosive, high-percentage plays rather than long, clock-eating drives.

From a nationally televised rout to a change at quarterback

The win capped a turbulent month for Iowa. The Hawkeyes beat then-No. 18 Michigan 20-19 on a last-play touchdown pass from starter Hank Brown — Iowa's first win over the Wolverines since 2016 — then were routed 31-14 at home by No. 5 Ohio State on Oct. 3 in a game that drew ESPN's "College GameDay" to Kinnick Stadium. Brown left that game with a shoulder injury and was listed as a game-time decision heading into the trip to Seattle, where he had completed 62.9% of his passes for 832 yards and five touchdowns on the season before getting hurt. Coach Kirk Ferentz signaled on his weekly radio show that Hecklinski would likely get the start, and the backup delivered in his first career outing under center.

Washington's slide has been steeper and more puzzling. The Huskies started 3-0 and were ranked in the preseason Top 25, but third-year coach Jedd Fisch — who has called plays himself since his offensive coordinator left the program in February — has now lost three straight conference games, falling at home to Minnesota, on the road at No. 18 USC and now to Iowa at a home game the Huskies entered as slight favorites. Washington's run defense never found an answer for Moulton, and an offense that had moved the ball well through the air in September could not overcome being shut down on the ground for the third straight week.

The game carried some historical weight beyond either team's record: it was Iowa's first-ever visit to Husky Stadium and its first trip to Seattle since 1963, a 63-year gap that reflects how rarely the two programs crossed paths before realignment put them in the same conference. It was also Washington's only home game in a 41-day stretch, a scheduling quirk that made Friday's loss sting more for a Huskies fan base that will not see its team at Husky Stadium again for weeks.

The result also reshuffles the muddled race atop the Big Ten's newer West Coast contingent. Washington entered its third season in the conference — after more than a century in the Pac-12 — hoping a 3-0 start and a preseason Top 25 ranking signaled it could contend immediately; instead, back-to-back-to-back losses to Minnesota, USC and now Iowa have dropped the Huskies to the bottom tier of the conference standings at the season's midpoint. Iowa, meanwhile, has alternated statement wins and bad losses all year, beating a ranked Michigan team on the final play one week and getting routed by Ohio State the next, making Friday's result the clearest evidence yet that the Hawkeyes' floor is higher than last week's blowout suggested.

What happens next

Iowa still has Minnesota, Wisconsin, Northwestern, Purdue, Illinois and Nebraska left on its Big Ten schedule, and Ferentz has not said publicly whether Brown will reclaim the starting job once his shoulder is fully healed or whether Hecklinski's performance has complicated that decision. For Washington, the schedule does not get easier: the Huskies travel to West Lafayette, Indiana, to face Purdue on Friday, Oct. 16, part of a slate of 2026 matchups the athletic department shifted to a Friday broadcast window under this year's conference television arrangement. That means another game away from Husky Stadium, extending the long homestand gap that already defined this past week, before Washington gets another shot at home. At 0-3 in Big Ten play, the Huskies are already fighting to stay in contention for a bowl bid in just their third season in the conference after more than a century in the Pac-12.