After handling Georgia Tech 24-14 in Tuesday’s night’s Orange Bowl, the Iowa football team probably is going to finish in a very familiar spot in the final Associated Press poll.

The Hawkeyes are likely to be eighth, which is exactly where they were at the end of the 2002, 2003 and 2004 seasons.

They were 10th entering the bowls and they clearly are going to leap ahead of No. 9 Georgia Tech and No. 7 Oregon, which lost to Ohio State in the Rose Bowl.

The only way they can go higher is if the voters severely penalize No. 4 Cincinnati for getting routed by No.5 Florida in the Sugar Bowl. It was the Bearcats’ first loss, but I could see some voters dropping them down below the Hawkeyes. No. 3 TCU also lost but it was a close enough game that I don’t think they’ll fall to lower than sixth.

If the Hawkeyes should get up the No. 6 or No. 7, it will be their highest ranking since they were third in the 1960 poll.

The most impressive thing about Iowa’s 24-14 conquest of Georgia Tech, I think, is that the Hawks didn’t even radically change their defense to shut down Tech’s much-feared (and clearly overrated) triple option. They didn’t need to bring their safeties up close to the line to add extra run support.

They left it to their front seven to manhandle Tech’s front, and they did.

I came away thinking that if Tech defensive end Derrick Morgan is a top 10 NFL draft choice, as some experts are saying, then Iowa’s Adrian Clayborn is too. Fortunately, Clayborn is not going pro this year. Look for him on some All-American teams next season.

The Hawkeyes announced their team award winners at the team post-season banquet Saturday night in Iowa City. It’s quite a list.

A total of 36 different players won some sort of award. By my count, there were only five starters who didn’t win anything at all. Surprisingly, one of those was Amari Spievey, who played almost every defensive down of every game and may be the best cornerback the Hawkeyes have had in the Kirk Ferentz era.

Not surprisingly, middle linebacker Pat Angerer was the biggest winner. Angerer, who also was named a first team All-American by the Football Writers Association of America on Saturday, shared the team MVP award with Ricky Stanzi and won three other awards. I think most of us who watched this team all year would have given the MVP award to Angerer alone. Nothing against Stanzi, but Angerer was the undisputed leader of the defense on a team that was significantly better defensively than it was offensively.

The full list of awards:

Hayden Fry Extra Heartbeat award: Angerer and Tony Moeaki.

Iron Hawk award: Angerer.

Comeback Player of the Year: Dace Richardson.

Next Man In awards: Riley Reiff, Adam Robinson, Brandon Wegher, Joe Conklin, Derrell Johnson-Koulianos and Colin Sandeman.

Forest Evashevski Scholastic Achievement award: A.J Edds.

Coaches Appreciation awards: Bryan Bulaga, Marvin McNutt, Tyler Sash, Broderick Binns, Tyler Nielsen and Jeff Tarpinian.

Reggie Roby Special Teams Specialist of the Year: Andrew Schulze.

Reggie Roby Special Teams Player of the Year: Ryan Donahue.

Hawkeye Hustle awards: Allen Reisner, Brett Morse, Trey Stross, Karl Klug, Christian Ballard, Adrian Clayborn, Paki O’Meara and Bruce Davis.    

Team Leader awards: Nick Kuchel, Zach Furlong, Joe Forgy, Thomas Nardo, Brad Rogers and Zach Derby.

Permanent captains: Stanzi, Moeaki, Edds, Angerer and Clayborn.

Win During The Week awards: Stanzi, Edds, Rafael Eubanks, Brett Greenwood and Troy Johnson.

The Hawkeyes also gave a few awards to regular people for the support they have given the university and the football program through the years. A Player Appreciation Award was given to three couples who are long-time supporters: Jim and Darlene McCord of Iowa City, Dale and Marilyn Howard of Iowa Falls and Stew and LeNore Hansen of West Des Moines. The Bump Elliott Appreciation Award went to businessmen Mike Riggan and Ed Huff, who have helped transport the Hawkeyes and all their equipment when they go on the road.

There were only a few surprises on the All-Big Ten teams that were announced Monday night. One of the surprises was that Iowa was as well-represented as it was.

I figured the Hawkeyes might get as many as five first-team selections, but they had a league-high seven first-team players on the team chosen by the BigTen coaches, only four on the media team.
The five I thought were deserving: Linebacker Pat Angerer, strong safety Tyler Sash, defensive end Adrian Clayborn, offensive tackle Bryan Bulaga and cornerback Amari Spievey. All of those players made the coaches team and all but Spievey were honored by the media.

The coaches also put Dace Richardson and Tony Moeaki on the first team even though Richardson missed the last 4 ½ games of the conference season and Moeaki was more or less missing in action over that same span.

Other thoughts:

– The offensive line, which never really got its act together, had four players selected. In addition to Bulaga and Richardson, Rafael Eubanks and Kyle Calloway made the second team.

– Although 19 Iowa players received some sort of mention, there was at least one more that merited at least honorable mention. Receiver Marvin McNutt scored six touchdowns in a span of four Big Ten games, including some of the clutch plays of the season.

– Iowa’s defense received the recognition it deserved. The only two starters who didn’t get some sort of mention were Jeremiha Hunter and Shaun Prater.

– Although everyone knew Wisconsin’s John Clay and Penn State’s Evan Royster would be the first team running backs, I thought Adam Robinson had a chance to make the second team. He ended up being honorable mention on both teams with Purdue’s Ralph Bolden and Ohio State’s Brandon Saine making the second team.

– There was widespread disagreement on the first team wide receivers. The coaches picked Minnesota’s Eric Decker and Michigan State’s Blair White. The media went with Indiana’s Tandon Doss and Purdue’s Keith Smith. I would have voted for White and Smith.

– It was interesting that Penn State defensive tackle Jared Odrick was the coaches’ defensive player of the year, but he wasn’t even first team on the media squad. There’s no way he had a better season than Wisconsin’s O’Brien Schofield, Michigan State’s Greg Jones (the media pick) and Angerer.

– You can’t help but wonder how the coach of the year voting might have gone if the voting hadn’t been done with a week to go in the season. Iowa’s Kirk Ferentz won the award, but Pat Fitzgerald’s Northwestern club finished very strong, beating Wisconsin in the final game to finish 8-4. Fitz might have gotten a few more votes if the voting was done later.

The All-Big Ten teams selected by the coaches and the media will be announced Monday night and it will be interesting to see how the Hawkeyes are rewarded for the season they’ve had.

They have plenty of guys who have a chance to make All-Big Ten, but the only two sure things on the first team probably are linebacker Pat Angerer and safety Tyler Sash. I’ll be stunned if those two aren’t there. Angerer may even have a shot at being the league’s defensive player of the year.

Cornerback Amari Spievey is a great player but could get overlooked because his statistics don’t necessarily reflect the type of player he is.

Adrian Clayborn has the stats, but the Big Ten is loaded with quality defensive linemen this season. Wisconsin’s O’Brien Schofield is a great player. So are Penn State’s Jared Odrick and Ohio State’s Thaddeus Gibson. And you could make a case for Michigan’s Brandon Graham, Indiana’s Jammie Kirlew and Purdue’s Ryan Kerrigan each being the best player on their teams.

There probably are a dozen other Hawkeyes with a chance of getting some sort of All-Big Ten mention.

Then, of course, there is the Coach of the Year award. I think Kirk Ferentz probably gets it although there might be some sentiment for Northwestern’s Pat Fitzgerald. I don’t really see another viable candidate unless Ohio State’s Jim Tressel gets some votes for winning a fifth straight league title.

It was pretty easy to see the biggest area of improvement for Iowa on Saturday in an impressive 27-17 victory over Arizona: The Hawkeyes’ defensive line, especially end Adrian Clayborn, played much better than it did in the first two games of the season.

The other two layers of the defense – the linebackers and secondary – were solid (and occasionally spectacular) in the first two games of the season and the line also came together in a fairly thorough shutdown of what had been a pretty good offense.

The statistics don’t really tell how well the D-line played although the stats weren’t bad. The Hawkeyes had two sacks, five tackles for losses and four quarterback hurries (three by Clayborn). They’d had only two sacks in the first two games against less talented, more pass-oriented teams.

They also allowed 148 yards rushing (about half Arizona’s season average), with almost none of it coming between the tackles. Most of it came on three plays – a reverse, a quarterback scramble and a draw play in the final minutes against a prevent defense.

All told, it was an important step forward for an area of the team that had to be retooled following the graduations of Mitch King and Matt Kroul.