The injury bug bit Austen Arnaud again on the opening drive of the Cyclones’ 27-0 victory over the Northern Iowa Panthers on Saturday, handing the reins of the offense over to Jerome Tiller.

The injury Arnaud suffered is to the same shoulder that he injured in the Cyclones’ previous game against Kansas State.

“He got thrown down on the play and jammed his elbow,” said ISU coach Paul Rhoads said. “Jerome played from the second series on, and away we went.”

Arnaud threw two passes, completing one for 6 yards to running back Alexander Robinson.

Tiller then entered and played the remainder of the game, completing 11-of-22 passes for 87 yards.

Rhoads said the training staff is going to monitor and evaluate Arnaud’s health as well as Tiller’s performance to make a decision on next week’s starting quarterback.

While Tiller hasn’t played significant minutes since the team’s loss to Texas A&M, Rhoads saw Tiller make some progress.

“He certainly didn’t lose the football game,” Rhoads said. “He kept us moving and got us down the field and got field goals out of a couple drives.”

Tiller’s most impressive pass came in the third quarter, completing a pass over the middle to Sedrick Johnson for 15 yards that set up a rushing touchdown by Robinson.

While Rhoads acknowledged that Tiller didn’t play a perfect game and that there is room for improvement, he described Tiller’s performance as “admirable.”

One of the areas in which Rhoads feels Tiller needs to improve is in his decision-making.

“He’s got to understand the checks,” Rhoads said. “He’s got to understand what he’s looking for; and when the sideline gives him a decision he needs to execute it, and he’ll do that.”

Tiller, who was sacked four times, felt that he could have performed better in multiple areas of the game.

“I’m not so used to the [starting] offensive line being different from the [second team], so I got a little antsy when I shouldn’t have been,” Tiller said. “I should have been calm when I had time, but I was acting like there wasn’t time.”

Tiller said he prepares in practice all week like he is going to be the starter in case anything happens to Arnaud, which has happened the past two weeks.

“I could have done a lot better at everything in general,” Tiller said of his performance. “Running, throwing, seeing the defense, seeing the personnel that was out there.”

Northern Iowa’s offense won the yardage battle with 320 total yards to Iowa State’s 210 total yards.

Robinson, who had 81 yards on 15 carries, felt the offense didn’t operate much differently with Tiller in the game as opposed to Arnaud.

“There’s not much of a difference,” Robinson said. “They are both intelligent players and they’re both trying to make the right decisions all the time … I think he managed the game pretty well.”

With Arnaud on the sidelines, he took more of a vocal leadership role throughout the game.

Arnaud spent a significant amount of time on the sideline phone communicating with offensive coordinator Tom Herman on what he saw, and then helped communicate that to Tiller.

“He’s a great leader,” Rhoads said of Arnaud. “He understands our offense very thoroughly. He knew what coach Herman was saying, and sometimes players have a way of saying things that make quicker sense than a coach can.”

While Tiller’s performance wasn’t spectacular, Rhoads saw him make some strides and make some improvements that he needs to make.

With this just being Tiller’s fourth game of significant playing time, there are going to be growing pains.

“We’re talking about a redshirt sophomore who hasn’t played a lot of games,” Rhoads said. “There’s a lot of growth and maturity that has to take place there and he understands that, and I think he grew up tonight and that’s step one.”