A week ago, current Iowa commit Reese Fleming teased on twitter that there was a "top prospect" committing soon. Fleming predicted Tuesday, but we didn't hear anything until late Wednesday afternoon when a few people around 247Sports started tweeting that Jaleel Johnson had made the decision to go to Iowa. On Thursday it was official presumably after Johnson called the Iowa coaches (the Eric Johnson "new member of the Iowa family" tweet didn't come out until Thursday morning).

Johnson is a consensus 4-star defensive tackle (Rivals, Scout, 247Sports). He is the sixth player in the 2012 Iowa recruiting class.

Johnson in High School

Johnson plays on both the offensive and defensive line for Montini Catholic High School, located just outside of Chicago. Montini is back-to-back Illinois Class 5A state champions.

Stats:

• 44 tackles, 7 TFL, 3 sacks

Video:I usually only post one video, but the second showing Johnson going against and in some cases dominating a few of the top offensive linemen recruits in the country was too good not to post.

Initial Thoughts

The first thing that stands out with Johnson is his size. According to ESPN he's 6-4 and 295 pounds...and he still has a year of high school left. If he was on Iowa's roster today he'd be the second biggest defensive lineman, behind Carl Davis and the sixth biggest player overall behind a few offensive linemen. In his videos Johnson shows his strength and ability to lay a good hit. He even shows off his wheel running down field to make a block at about 0:37 in the first video.

Iowa has had success turning undersized guys into successful defensive tackles, so it'll be interesting to see what happens with some of these bigger guys. This year will be a good test with Carl Davis, who I think could win the spot next to Mike Daniels as the second tackle. Incoming freshman Darian Cooper is starting off with some size at 6-1, 280.

Defensive linemen are definitely needed, so Johnson's commitment is a great early get in the 2012 class. With 3 of the likely starters this year seniors (Daniel, Daniels, and Binns), there will be plenty of opportunity for an underclassman to start next year. I think Johnson will be able to come in and at least compete for a spot right away.

A few weeks ago when I posted the Hawkeye License Plate Generator I ran into a number of issues. For starters trying to deploy it in Blogger was a huge pain. I couldn't easily test its functionality until I actually posted it and rolled it out to the masses. Testing in production is not a great way to go. Also, posting apps like this in a blog post slow down the page, are not available to everyone (more people use Internet Explorer to view this site than any other browser and a lot of things don't work in IE), and just seem a little strange when a blog is generally meant for reading. Using Blogger also doesn't allow me to add in any server-side functionality, which is limiting.

So, I decided to create a new place for me to play around and house the little apps I like to make. Without further ado, I present to you Apps For Iowa. The url is pretty easy to figure out, just replace the "www" with "apps" and you've got it. Right now I just have 2 pretty trivial apps: pick your starters - offense, and a countdown to kickoff.

I don't know how far this project will go, but it's definitely a work in progress. I'll still post on the blog whenever I create a new app. Anyway, it's out there and now you know about it. If you have any ideas of an app you'd like to see, let me know.

A year later, a Ricky Stanzi patriotic photoshop is still completely apropos for this holiday. Love it or leave it. USA #1!

Recruiting has been heating up lately for the Hawkeyes, but I didn't expect it to be so hot that there would be a late commitment for the 2011 class. In retrospect it is not overly surprising as Iowa had a scholarship open up when Rodney Coe failed to qualify academically. That scholarship will be going to Dean Tsopanides who commited to Iowa on Thursday.

Tsopanides is a defensive end from Torrington, CT. The story goes KOK saw Tsopanides participating in a combine held at Milford Academy (you may remember Milford as the prep school Shonn Greene attended before coming to Iowa) and was impressed enough to get his film and eventually offer the scholarship. Tsopanides was orginially planning on attending Milford before comitting to Iowa.

The Game

The Basics

Location: Monroe, LA
Head Coach: Todd Berry
Mascot: Warhawks
Conference: Sun Belt
2010 Record: 5-7 (4-4)

The Offense

Returning Starters: 9
Key Players: QB Kolton Browning, WR Luther Ambrose
Key Losses: RB Frank Goodin, TE Alvin Jordan

ULM runs a spread offense (with some pistol mixed in) that last year revolved around its quarterback, Kolton Browning. In 2010 Browning accounted for nearly 3,000 yards, around 70% of the Warhawks' total offense. As a passer, Browning was mediocre in his freshman season last year. He was 234/378 for 2,552 with 18 TDs and 12 INTs. Against the two best defenses he faced last year, Arkansas and LSU, Browning went 15/34 for 135 yards with 1 TD and 3 INTs. This year though, the offense will also utilize quarterback Cody Wells, in a dual-QB system. Wells played a very limited role last year with just 18 passing attempts, but looked good in the spring game. Wells went 12/21 for 199 yards, while Browning was just 8/18 for 124 yards.