Daily Staff Writer

In a brief post-practice discussion, The Daily sat down with four starters that hail from the state of Iowa, sharing their experiences and emotions going into the game against Iowa on Saturday. The players were:

Austen Arnaud, quarterback (Ames)

Ben Lamaak, right guard (Cedar Rapids Kennedy)

Jesse Smith, middle linebacker (Southeast Polk)

Michael O’Connell, free safety (Iowa City Regina)

The Daily: What does the Iowa-Iowa State rivalry mean to you, as guys that grew up in Iowa?

Austen Arnaud: It’s a big game, but we have to treat it like any other game. It’s the next game on our schedule, it’s the next thing we have to do. It does mean a lot to us because we’re from Iowa, but in the same sense it’s just another game to us because that’s how everyone’s prepared this year.

In football nowadays, you can’t be excited for one game and then play bad the rest of the year.

Jesse Smith: That’s it right there.

TD: Do you think the rivalry is fan-made, or do you feel it down on the field against the Iowa players?

Ben Lamaak: I think it’s basically everything. It’s a rivalry game, I think the fans, the players, the coaches, everybody wants to win, so it’s just your team against the other team.

JS: There’s no pro teams in Iowa, so this is it. These are the two teams in Iowa, two big teams anyway.

TD: How do you feel about the game being in the second week? It’s not as much time to game plan as in prior years. Is that going to have an impact?

JS: We know what they do.

AA: We have a new system, but it’s the same deal. They’ve been around their stuff and it works for them. They beat up on teams last year with the same stuff, and we expect what we’re going to see, but there’s always something different.

TD: Being from eastern Iowa, how do you deal with friends that are Hawkeye fans?

BL: Yeah, my brother went to Iowa, graduated from there. We have a family rivalry, I guess. My older brother is for them, I’m playing here, and my little brother goes back and forth.

Mike O’Connell: For me, graduating from high school in Iowa City and growing up in Iowa City, a lot of my classmates and friends went on to Iowa. My brother currently lives in Iowa City with an Iowa basketball player, that’s kind of the same thing. Growing up in eastern Iowa, most of the people I know are Hawkeye fans, it’s just part of the whole process.

TD: Does home field advantage feel like as big of a thing as it has been the last couple seasons?

AA: It’s huge in this rivalry. [It] feels like it has been going back and forth, and whatever city it’s in that team has been winning. We’re definitely trying to play with our home crowd, but there will be a lot of Iowa fans here, too.

MO: We love our fans here, so anytime we can play in front of them it’s going to help our football team.

TD: With fans so close to the field at Kinnick Stadium, did Iowa’s home field advantage have something to do with how you played last year?

BL: I don’t think it has anything to do with the fans. We were just inconsistent and had some chances to make plays and didn’t make them.

TD: What’s your favorite single memory of the series?

AA: Two years ago.

BL: That’s it. A field goal at the end of the game to win it, definitely.

MO: That’s like that storybook ending. You’re trying to live that at least once in your college career, and to have that come in a rivalry game couldn’t be any better.

TD: Has head coach Paul Rhoads emphasized the importance of this game to you guys?

AA: We just finished with North Dakota State, so he hasn’t said much about it. He’s an Iowa guy, too, so in the back of his mind you know what he’s thinking, this is a big game. It’s a big game for this university and the state.

TD: (Rhoads) had been sort of sarcastic, but just called it the second game on the schedule.

JS: That’s all it is, it’s the next game.

TD: What’s it going to take to beat the Hawkeyes on Saturday?

MO: The bottom line is that we’ve got to execute when we have the opportunities, offensively and defensively. We just have to take care of the ball on offense and force some turnovers on defense. When the plays are there, we’ve gotta make them.

AA: That’s the order for all our games.