Locked On Hawkeyes - Daily Podcast On Iowa Hawkeyes Football & Basketball - Iowa football commit Caden Crawford joins the show and we break down what happened in the Big Ten this weekend

Episode Date: October 25, 2021

We are joined by Iowa football commit Caden Crawford for the show today. Caden is a three-star prospect out of Kansas who is enrolling early this spring to join the Iowa Hawkeyes. Caden was one of the first commits in the class and has been up to Iowa five times in the last few months so we discuss those visits, how loud it was for the Penn State game, and how freshman success Arland Bruce IV helped Caden make a decision on early enrollment. After chatting with Caden, we break down what happened in the Big Ten this weekend and how it impacts the Iowa Hawkeyes' season.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!SweatBlockGet it today for 20% off at SweatBlock.com with promo code LockedOn, or at Amazon and CVS.Built BarBuilt Bar is a protein bar that tastes like a candy bar. Go to builtbar.com and use promo code “LOCKED15,” and you’ll get 15% off your next order.BetOnline AGThere is only 1 place that has you covered and 1 place we trust. Betonline.ag! Sign up today for a free account at betonline.ag and use that promocode: LOCKEDON for your 50% welcome bonus.Rock AutoAmazing selection. Reliably low prices. All the parts your car will ever need. Visit RockAuto.com and tell them Locked On sent you.PrizePicksDon’t hesitate, check out PrizePicks.com and use promo code: “LOCKEDON” or go to your app store and download the app today. PrizePicks is daily fantasy made easy! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You are Locked on Hawkeyes, your daily podcast on the Iowa Hawkeyes. Part of the Locked on Podcast Network, your team every day. Welcome back Hawkeye Nation to another episode episode of the Lockdown Hawkeyes podcast, your daily podcast covering your Iowa Hawkeyes on the Lockdown Sports Network. As always, I am your host, Andrew Wade. Excited to be back for another show today. We are kicking off an awesome week as we get into the Iowa-Wisconsin game. And we are joined here by Iowa commit, Caden Crawford.

Caden, my man, how are you doing today, buddy? I'm doing great. How are you? I'm doing well. Obviously, you're kind of struggling. The Chiefs just lost. I'm a Broncos fan. I haven't been happy in four or five years. So you can feel my pain now. You've at least had some good runs, though. Yeah, yeah. It's been rough this year. Absolutely, man. So when we talked last, it was, I believe, in March, and you had just committed to Iowa. We spoke about three weeks after that. A lot has changed since we talked.

I mean, that was only, that was what, six months ago at that point, seven months ago? And I feel like a lot has been flipped upside down. You've made several big decisions to this point already. You've also visited Iowa a lot more after having committed to Iowa, and Iowa got off to quite a hot start. So we're going to talk about all that today. Before we get into any of that, though, I want to thank all of you Hawkeye listeners out there for making the Locked on Hawkeyes podcast your first listen every single day. You can find the Locked on Hawkeyes podcast wherever you get podcasts at, and also on YouTube for free Monday through Friday at Locked on Hawkeyes.

So, Caden, let's kick it off the first thing. When we talked, the biggest thing I took away from that is you were not sure of whether or not you wanted to enroll early to the University of Iowa. You have since decided that you are enrolling early. So walk me through that decision. What brought you to that decision? What are you excited about that? What are you nervous about that? Yeah, so just kind of going back and forth throughout the spring and summer with my parents, my coaches, just decided it was the best decision for me to graduate early for my goals, which obviously play early in my career, whether that's first year, second year. Obviously, I want to play my first year there.

That's what everyone wants to do. But I thought it fits me in the best position to play earliest in my career. Absolutely. And does it help seeing guys like Connor Colby, Arlen Bruce, Keegan Johnson? I mean, those three guys, they also enrolled early. And this is not a normal thing for a Kirk Ferens team. You know, from everything I understand, right, I'm not obviously being recruited to play football for Kirk,

but he wants you to do what's best for you, what's best for you and what you want to do. So with that all being said, how much of an impact has the success and playing time of Connor, Arlen, and Keegan kind of factored into your decision? Oh, it helped out a ton. Arlen Bruce, also a Kansas kid, I talked to him a lot. He said that I was talking about it, just graduating early,

put him so much far in front, just learning the playbook, getting used to being a college student. Obviously the off-season weight room, getting in the program and stuff, and then talking with the coaches too. They all said either way, graduate early or enroll in the summer, like most people do. It didn't matter. They'd obviously love for me to come up early,

but either way is the right decision. Even some of them said, enjoy your senior year. Like, you only get it once. There's no need to rush it. And then some, like, wanted me to come up. But either way, it was cool. So really just talking with most of the players, mainly Arlen about it, is what helped me make my decision along with the coaches.

Absolutely. And when you had committed to Iowa, you had not officially visited Iowa to that point. Kind of an interesting time. You were kind of an interesting time you were kind of the the main guinea pig of a class going through this COVID period you decided to commit to Iowa though before having officially visited since then you've been Iowa I believe four times is that correct um yeah four visits and then one I went up to one of the spring games so four or five whatever way you want to count it awesome and how has that been for you man is everything

you had thought it would be? Yeah, it was everything I thought. And then add a little on to my official visit. It was kind of crazy because it was like my first real college visit just with all the other dudes and meeting the coaches in person and seeing the facilities. I mean, I went up in the spring and got to see them practice, but really hadn't talked to the coaches in person

or been anything like behind the scenes with all the facilities and tours and stuff. But it was awesome. Amazing top tier facilities. One of the best nutrition nutrition tables in the country. Obviously, they feed their players well and they train them well, as most of you guys know. But it was it's been awesome. I went to that and then I've been to three games this year, the Indiana game, the Kent state game, and then the Penn state game. All right. Well, I got to ask you about the Penn state game here in a little bit,

but I, you mentioned nutrition. Your 24 seven sports profile has you at 240 pounds. I know one of the things we talked about was putting on more weight. Where are you at today? Just because of the football season wearing tear, I'm between 240 and 245. I imagine like once football season ends and like the last month or two before I go up there,

I'll probably be 245 or high 240s, maybe 250 at most. I don't really want to put on too much weight because they said, I mean, if you come in and you just put on this weight, they'll take it off and put it on right. So I'm not super focused on just adding a ton of weight, but I just want to stay clean weight and making sure that I'm still up there. I love it, man. And so you were, I know you were really close with Aaron Graves. I know you talked to him quite a bit. Um, how has this recruiting

class has developed? How have you gotten close to some of the other guys in the class? Um, like social media is a huge thing um talking on twitter like retweet stuff telling them to commit um and then on the visits to talk to them about how they feel and so many people are always like commit here commit here and i don't really want to be like that i just want to like see where they're at tell them that i mean no pressure it's obviously your decision you gotta do what's best for you we We'd love to have you here. But I've gotten close to a lot of the commits, like Carson May, Addison. I've talked to them a lot on social media.

Obviously Aaron, too. And then my Kill Crow and Jack Dotsler also are the ones I'm pretty close with. All right, y'all. We're going to quickly pause the conversation with Caden to tell you about PrizePix.com. PrizePix is for all of you college football fanatics out there. PrizePix is daily fantasy made easy.

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by searching Locked on Hawkeyes. Awesome. I've talked to Addison a couple – or I think twice. Very good kid. Really excited to see him in an Iowa Hawkeye uniform as well. So you mentioned the Indiana game, the Kent State game, and Penn State game. First, let's talk about Indiana. What was it like being in Kinnick? Because I feel like Kinnick would have been just bumping

and loud for Indiana but also I want to get your your perspective of seeing Indiana versus Penn State and what that crowd was like um like I've been to a few like games growing up college football games um but nothing like the Indiana game was like the loudest it's ever been, especially with like it first game all the students coming back. It was crazy. People were tail. I got there early for like the recruiting stuff and people were tailgating hard like four or five for the game.

So it was pretty cool. And then just how loud it was like there are a lot of like Tyler Goodson starts off the game with a 50 whatever yard run and then Riley Moss gets two pick sixes. It was crazy. And then compared to the Penn State game, man, it's not comparable. The Penn State game, the energy was up the entire time. Obviously in the first half, the offense and defense struggled a little bit. But towards the end, like once they started getting real loud and they started false starting,

you couldn't like hear the person talking next to you. It was a, it was quite an experience. Dude, that's amazing. How, how excited did that experience get you for being able to play at Kinnick stadium at night in a ranked game like that in the future? Oh, it was awesome. Like we were high line warming up. Like we were, we were down there. I was, I was ready to go out and play. I mean, it was awesome. Like, we were – timeline warming up. Like, we were down there. I was ready to go out and play. I mean, it was just –

Dude, that's super cool. How do you – did you rush the field with the other guys? Man, I tried to. There's just so many people. I kind of, like, stood up towards the tunnel and, like, with all the players or whatever when they're walking by. But I was not one of the first ones to go down, no. That's fair.

I mean, it kind of gets a little dangerous when you get down there at certain parts, and it's just pretty cool to be down there anyways. So are you planning on being there again the rest of the season? Are you planning on going back up to Iowa, or are you good for the rest of the year? I think the Minnesota game. They got two more home games. I think Illinois and Minnesota.

Is that right? Yep. I'm pretty sure I'll try and go to the Minnesota game. I'm not sure about the Illinois game yet, though. Fair enough. Well, if you're at the Illinois game, let me know, man. I will be out there as well. I would love to meet you. A lot of things have changed, obviously, since March, though. We talked about

the recruiting aspect. Name image likeness is also something that has popped up. Having talked to you doesn't seem like that's something that you would probably care about a lot. You're probably very focused on being at Iowa and getting ready for stuff, but just wanted to get a sense from you. What has been your thoughts on name image likeness?

I think it's a great thing. Way for players to express themselves and honestly gain revenue off their name. I mean, there's a lot of high schoolers that have already gotten deals and stuff, but I'm not super nervous about it or worried about it. Like if something happens, an opportunity comes up, awesome. But I'm not gonna be like out there stressing

about trying to get a deal and get a buck here or there. I'm not too worried about it. Absolutely, if you had to do a brand deal with one company in the entire country, it could be anything, what would you do? Man, I don't even know. I think like i think like carhartt would be pretty cool because they got a lot of cool stuff but i love it man i love it

actually uh was just spending some time with a bunch of my family from iowa and everyone was wearing carhartt i forgot what it's like to be back in back in iowa i'm in denver now you don't see a lot of carhartt in denver so well cool um last thing i'd ask you then as far as this season goes iowa started off six and one um what were your thoughts coming into this season as far as expectations for this team? And what are your thoughts now after seeing Iowa go 6-1? How excited are you to join a team that is a top 10 program and continue that on? three games out of the first like that. I didn't really think so. Just the way they played last year towards the end of the year. And then after they beat Indiana,

the first game, I thought like the team was pretty legit and people were still doubting them. And I had no doubt in my mind, they're going to be to Iowa state. Cause it's just Iowa state. And I mean, they, the two games,

the Kent state and Colorado state people try and overlook them. They're not good teams. Colorado state's a really good team, like people don't realize kent state we played not very good against either of those teams to be honest and then the penn state game was that yeah penn state game we didn't rip our man there's maryland and penn state yep maryland i didn't get to see because i was playing that night but i watched the uh like rerun of it or whatever and they had seven turnovers playing out of their minds offense was playing great too and obviously a great team and then penn state everyone knows how that game went so i thought they started out real well and then purdue a lot of talk all week about david bell and he just torched us and i think i don't get a bye

week to kind of sit down um a lot of like fans and stuff or point fingers at people and like who needs to do what but I think it's good just to like recollect during the bye week and I think they'll come out pretty good this next week yeah I sure I sure hope so as well how does you mentioned one thing I wanted to touch on and you can decline to answer but as as a as fans stay stuff on Twitter right right, everyone has an opinion. Everyone's talking. Kind of my big mantra is I don't want to ever throw anyone under the bus, right? Y'all are – you're playing a game for free, essentially. I mean, you're getting a scholarship.

You have NIL stuff. But at the end of the day, you're putting a lot on the line, and so I don't want to throw any players under the bus. But there's a contingent of people who do across all fan bases. Do you see that kind of stuff? Do people talk about that stuff as recruits? I'm seriously curious, like, how big of an impact does that have on recruiting for people?

Recruits, really, they don't talk about – they don't really talk about players or nothing like that. They kind of just talk about the program, really. I mean, that's how a lot of dudes I've talked with, that's what it's about. And then the fans saying stuff, like a lot of people will say stuff about this or that, but ultimately, like, I mean, they can say whatever they want and completely cool with that.

That's fine or whatever, but none of us truly know, unless you're on the team, like what's going on behind the doors and stuff, reporters and everything. So I think ultimately whatever the, whoever the coaches put on the field is the best because that's what they're with them every day um when you don't see them most people just see them sometimes at practice and then on saturdays but no one really knows on behind uh behind the doors from while they're working absolutely well it sounds sounds like from recruiting aspects uh fans chirping on twitter about players isn't bothering folks,

which is good. You never want to be listening to the Twitterverse. If you're in that mode, then probably have other things you should be focusing on, right? Right. Absolutely, man. Well, cool. Caden, as always, really enjoyed chatting with you. Where can the folks find you at? And obviously, how much more of your senior season do you have left? Are you almost done with your football season? Yeah. This week will be the first week of playoffs, and then depending on how we do, you know how it goes, lose your gun, plans. But, yeah.

Awesome. Where can folks find you at, man? Oh, like on social media and stuff? Yeah. Oh, my Twitter is Caden Crawford Zero, and then my Instagram is Caden.W.Crawford. Love, man. Go follow Caden out there so we can make some money off those NIA deals at

some point in time. Caden, as always, it's a pleasure talking to you, buddy. And I think the next time we'll probably chat, you'll be an Iowa Hawkeye man. So good luck and looking forward to that,

pal. Thanks for having me on. Absolutely, man. All right, y'all. And that does conclude our interview with Caden Crawford. Make sure to go check him out on Twitter and Instagram.

He's going to be a phenomenal player for the Iowa Hawkeyes. And I've really enjoyed talking to him. Now this is the second time. I'm really excited to see what he can do in an Iowa Hawkeye uniform. I do want to tell you, though, about Bilt Bar. Bilt Bar is the best tasting protein bar on the market today. It is the protein bar that tastes just like a candy bar, and if you haven't tried Bilt Bar by now, you are absolutely missing out. They say it's a protein bar, but it literally does not taste like one. You have to try one of these amazing bars yourself to believe it, and believe me, I have tried so many protein bars,

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Use the promo code LOCKED15 for 15% off at Bilt.com. All right, y'all, and we are back for our third and final segment of the Lockdown Hawkeyes podcast today. We were talking to Caden Crawford. I did mention I want to talk about what happened in the Big Ten this week because it is very important as we look ahead for the next five weeks, what can happen for the Iowa Hawkeyes schedule. They are 6-1. They've beaten some quality teams.

Iowa State's now ranked. Penn State is still a good team, even after they lost to Illinois. Indiana has honestly probably had the worst schedule and luck of anyone in the entire conference. I mean, these are good teams Iowa has beaten. Now, they have to go on a run. If they want to win a Big Ten West title and go to the Big Ten Championship game, they need to do what hasn't been done since 2015. They need to win out this back half of the season.

And it starts with Wisconsin, but before we get to that, let's talk about what happened this weekend in the Big Ten. Purdue, fresh off of dominating the heck out of a top five Iowa Hawkeye team, loses to Wisconsin. Penn State, off of bye week after getting narrowly beat by the Hawkeyes, return with Sean Clifford healthy and lose to Illinois in nine overtimes. Meanwhile, Minnesota takes care of Maryland 34-16, Michigan makes quick work of Northwestern 33-7, and Ohio State puts an obliteratingly large smackdown on Indiana, beating them 54-7.

Here's what we learned about those games. Purdue to Wisconsin. Wisconsin realized their identity cannot be passed in the ball. They said, you know what, screw it, we're running it. They ran for 290 rushing yards against Purdue. Graham Mertz only threw 8 passes, he completed 5, and only threw for 52 yards. This is important to note.

What Purdue does to Iowa, I knew that they wouldn't be able to do this against other teams. I don't know what it is, I don't know why Purdue has Iowa's magic number, but they do this kind of crap where they beat a team like Iowa and they go out and lose to a team like Wisconsin the following week. They've done this before. When they have top five wins, they go out and lose the next week. So it should have been expected, but the good thing about this is two things.

One, Purdue does no longer control their destiny, and they have Ohio State and Michigan State coming up. We could very well be looking at a Purdue team that was just in the top 25, finished with five losses. Wisconsin seems to have found their identity, and I think with Iowa having three linebackers that they really trust, they are in an opportunity to finally stop Wisconsin's running attack, and I believe with Iowa having Matt Hankins and potentially Riley Moss back, they can really play a 4-4-3 if they want to, and man up, and force Wisconsin to throw the ball.

And you don't want to throw the ball when you're a struggling quarterback going against Matt Hankins and Riley Moss, and Dane Belton,ton or Jack Kerner or Kayvon Merriweather, who we might not see play a lot because of Iowa going to a 4-3 and probably a 4-4-3 at some point. But this is something that Iowa's going to be watching for. They need to stop the run. They stopped Wisconsin's run. I have no doubt they can stop the passing attack. This is what they need to do against Wisconsin. Now, Illinois beating Penn State is interesting. Anything can happen on any given Sunday. We know that.

We've seen that as Iowa Hawkeye fans. Illinois beating Penn State in nine overtimes is just absurd. Now, maybe Brett's comments on his Illinois players really motivated them, or more than likely Penn State just came out flat and they couldn't get it done. And I think it's important to note that we are still playing high level college football even if it is Illinois now Iowa gets Illinois the last weekend before Thanksgiving I'm actually going to be at that game so I'm really excited about that and if you are at the Iowa Illinois game and you see some kid that looks like me say hi I would love to meet y'all just let me know I would love to love to meet anybody

who listens to the show but Iowa gets Illinois that is not going to be a cakewalk easy game i would need to be on his toes and illinois has done a very good job in the past like at least last two years well last year i guess you could say really of getting out in front of iowa they are a dangerous team even if they are not as talented as iowa so i would need to be able to come up and play well in that game to solidify their potential postseason success run. Ohio State putting the smackdown on Maryland, on Indiana, excuse me. I mean, this offense is legit and they are finally taking off. Their defense still has some concerning issues,

but this is an Ohio State squad that's looking a lot better than they did early on in the season. Minnesota beating Maryland. Honestly, when you're looking at this, you would have preferred Minnesota to lose so that Iowa has a bigger buffer in terms of controlling their own destiny. But Iowa gets Minnesota. I think Iowa and their offense and defense matches up pretty well against Minnesota across the board. So that'll be interesting to see as well. down Northwestern, this didn't really matter a ton. What's really going to matter is Michigan versus Michigan State next week. Whatever happens there, you have to say that team is the front runner to compete with Ohio State coming out of the East. Now, I think Iowa has the ability to play with both Michigan and Northwestern, or Michigan and Michigan State. Ohio State would be kind of interesting. I don't know if we can handle that offense as much. I think probably our best bet is Michigan out of all the teams. Our best matchup would be Michigan.

So it'll be really interesting to see how Michigan and Michigan State play out. Again, the most important takeaway though is that Iowa controls its own destiny to this point. When out, you're in the Big Ten Championship game. You're almost guaranteedly going to a New Year's Six Bowl. Actually, if you don't go to a New Year's Six Bowl winning out and only losing two games, then something's wrong there. But if Iowa wins out, they are going to the best bowl they've been to since 2015. If they win out and win the Big Ten Championship game, there's a very good chance we're talking about Iowa as a college football playoff team. Now when you look at the rankings, Iowa moves up to 9th.

Michigan State's at 8th. Michigan's at 6th. Oregon's at 7th. Ohio State is at 5th. Oklahoma 4th. Bama 3rd. Cincinnati 2nd. And Georgia 1.

If Bama beats Georgia, or I'm not actually going to dive into the SEC stuff. It's not even worth it at this point. But from a Big Ten perspective, Iowa is still pretty far up there. You win the rest of your games, Michigan State or Michigan is going to lose. Also, both those teams have to play Ohio State. So there's going to be some cannibalization amongst the Big Ten. Oregon has struggled mightily in a lot of their games. I expect them to lose another one.

Oklahoma was on the ringer versus Kansas. So none of these teams are really safe, in my opinion. Even Bama was struggling for a little bit against Tennessee. So there's a lot of opportunity for Iowa to continue moving up. But as we've said the whole year, these rankings are not relevant right now. What is really important is when the first college football playoff rankings come out and where Iowa is there. But again, the biggest thing is you win out.

That's all you can do here. Win the next five games. See what happens. That does do it for our show today. I want to remind you to check out the Locked On Big Ten podcast where you can get all the news across the Big Ten with host Nate Dickinson covering the Big Ten on the Locked On Big Ten podcast, which you can find for free wherever you get podcasts at and also on YouTube. Just look for Locked On Big Ten.

I appreciate you all tuning in to today's episode. On tomorrow's episode, we're going to be breaking down all the potential Big Ten awards for the Iowa Hawkeyes. We're also going to be doing a deep dive into this offense and the offensive line situation. We're going to take a look back to 2019 when Iowa's offensive line was struggling and what changed from there on out. So we're doing all that on tomorrow's show, so stay tuned for that. Thank you all for tuning in though. Have a phenomenal Monday, and as always, let's go Hawks!