Iowa Coach Says He Hopes to Meet BYU in Holiday Bowl

Iowa’s opponent in the Holiday Bowl won’t be known until this weekend. But Coach Hayden Fry has Brigham Young University on his wish list.

The Cougars (7-3-1 overall, 6-0-1 in the Western Athletic Conference) can assure themselves the Dec. 30 bowl bid with a victory this weekend over Utah. They tied San Diego State 52-52 Saturday, but the Aztecs have finished their conference season at 6-1-1.

Fry said at his weekly news conference Tuesday he stayed up until 2 a.m. Sunday rooting for the Cougars.

“No question, I wanted BYU to win,” he said.

The ninth-ranked Hawkeyes nipped San Diego State 39-38 in the 1986 Holiday Bowl. Fry isn’t eager to face the Aztecs again because “that’s their home stadium, the home crowd, the home news media, the whole smear.”

Fry isn’t looking forward to defending against whichever team Iowa faces.

“I was just in awe. I recorded it and I’ve looked at it again since then. Either one of those football teams are just incredible. I’ve never seen such speed. We played Washington. We played Miami,” he said. “I know San Diego State has faster receivers than either one of those two.”

“Brigham Young knew they were going to run deep and they ran right on by them and the guy got the ball to them,” Fry said.

Facing Cougar quarterback Ty Detmer would be no picnic, either, he said. Detmer shook off a cut above his eye that required 20 stitches to throw four of his six touchdown passes in the final 20 minutes to rally BYU.

He completed 31 of 54 passes for a school record 599 yards.

“If I had a vote, I know who I’d vote for the Heisman Trophy. I mean, I love (Desmond) Howard from Michigan. But Detmer in that game, he was unbelievable,” Fry said.

The Hawkeyes earned the bowl trip by locking up a second-place finish in the Big Ten. Iowa (9-1, 6-1) entertains Minnesota (2-8, 1-6) in its final regular-season game Saturday at Kinnick Stadium.

Fry said preparing the Hawkeyes will be difficult because of the attention being focused on the Holiday Bowl and because a number of key players are injured.

They include quarterback Matt Rodgers, nose guard Rod Davis, defensive tackle Ron Geater and running back Marvin Lampkin. Fry said Jim Hartlieb, who’s also nursing a tender shoulder, would probably start in place of Rodgers and third-string quarterback Paul Burmeister “could jump up there and be in there if Hartlieb can’t throw.”

A pleasant surprise has been the performance of the bench, he said.

“I guess I’m more proud of that than anything. It goes down to the second and third-team performers because there’s not a lot of drop off,” Fry said.

“This is really a special football team. We’re sitting here at 9-1 and we’re not overwhelmed with the ability of our football team,” he said. “I can’t understand it because a lot of the guys that are doing things are guys that we didn’t really count on.”