Today, the Jets signed former Hawkeye Shonn Greene to a four-year deal. The Doak Walker Award winner's contract includes a $905,000 signing bonus (not too shabby, though Peyton Manning's signing bonus a few years ago was a ridiculous $3.5 million!). Greene was drafted by the Jets as the first pick in the 3rd round of this year's NFL Draft and was New Jersey's 2nd overall pick. The first was USC's QB Mark Sanchez was drafted in the 1st round and has also signed a deal with the Jets.

Anyway, it's great to see Shonn Greene get signed on and a big congratulations to him. I hope he makes a positive impact on the Jets this year and in the future.

The Minnesota Golden Gophers are Iowa's last opponent of the year as usual. While the Hawkeyes look to repeat last year's 55-0 beatdown, the Gophers are doing their best to forget it even happened. (I just re-watched that game on the BTN over the weekend…what a great game. Here's a link to the highlights.) Minnesota will be returning almost its entire team, but has a lot of new faces on the coaching staff as both the offensive and defensive coordinators resigned after last year. On offense, Jedd Fisch will be installing a more balanced pro-style offense opposed to the pass-heavy spread from 2008. On defense, Kevin Cosgrove and Ronnie Lee are co-defensive coordinators and don't plan on changing much schematically. So it will be especially interesting to see how all of the returning players fit into the new offensive scheme.

Offense: Key Returning Players
Basically everyone is back as 10 starters return. QB Adam Weber was the team's leader in 2008 and threw for 2761 yards ad 15 touchdowns. His favorite receiver, All-Big Ten receiver Eric Decker also returns after his junior season included 84 catches for 1074 yards. The other 2 starting receivers are also back, Ben Kuznia and Brandon Green. At runningback, DeLeon Eskridge returns. Though Eskridge led the team with 678 rushing yards, he will need to do much better than his 3.7 yards per carry average if the Gophers are going to succeed with a more run-heavy offense. That or he will likely be replaced by Duane Bennett, who was the starter last year until a season-ending knee injury.

Offense: Key Losses
The one guy not returning on offense is TE Jack Simmons. Simmons was the Gophers second leading receiver with 36 receptions for 331 yards.

Defense: Key Returning Players
Like the offense, basically everyone is back on defense. The top two leading tacklers, LB Lee Campbell and FS Kyle Theret both return. Cornerbacks Traye Simmons and Marcus Sherels were both good last year combining for 25 pass breakups. On the line, DT Garrett Brown returns after having a strong junior year in 2008 with 34 tackles (7 for loss).

Defense: Key Losses
The Gopher defense only loses 3 starters (like Iowa) though all 3 will really be missed. Willie VanDeSteeg was a very good defensive end. In 2008 he racked up 10.5 sacks and 19 tackles for loss which earned him All-Big Ten honors from the media. Also gone is LB Deon Hightower. Hightower was a 3 year stater (30 total starts) and was 4th on the team with 67 tackles last year. The final starter leaving is SS Tramaine Brock. Brock was 3rd on the team with 73 tackles and was expected to be a large contributor in 2009 but left school after having academic issues.

BTN Team Breakdown: http://www.bigten.org/auto_pdf/p_hotos/s_chools/big10/sports/m-footbl/auto_pdf/minn
ESPN Spring Wrap: http://myespn.go.com/blogs/bigten/0-3-361/Minnesota-spring-wrap.html

College Football Live on ESPN highlighted the state of Iowa today. They talked about the best player, coach, game, and team for the state and no surprise it was all The University of Iowa. Best Player = Nile Kinnick, Best Coach = Hayden Fry, Best Game = 1985 Iowa vs. Michigan, Best Team = 1958 Iowa Hawkeyes (8-1-1, finished #2). No real arguments here from me. Here's the video:
Kirk Ferentz was also featured and had a few minutes to talk Iowa Football and about football throughout the state. He was is usual self, very positive, kind of funny, and as always a class act. Here's that video:

I didn't actually get to see the rest of the piece on Iowa, but I guess there was a compilation of some of the best players from the state. So if anyone out there (who doesn't work or something) got a chance to see it, let me know what you thought.

Today on College Football Live Iowa (as a state) will be featured. As a special guest, Iowa Football coach Kirk Ferentz will be making an appearance. Check it out today at 2:30 on ESPN or catch a replay at 4:00 on ESPN 2.

Another quick note...there are more pictures up on hawkeyesports.com. Check out the new pictures of the FieldTurf in Kinnick Stadium. At the end of the gallery there are also a couple pictures of the new freshmen who have come to Iowa City for summer workouts.

This is just a reminder that Iowa Day on the Big Ten Network is today! It's 24 hours of Iowa programming and includes some of the best moments in Iowa sport history. Here is the full Iowa Day Schedule. There are 3 football games on (too bad that if you work or sleep it'll be hard to catch these):

7:00 AM - Iowa vs. Purdue (2002)
9:00 PM - Iowa vs. Penn State (2008)
4:00 AM Thursday - Iowa vs. Michigan (1990)