Iowa vs. Michigan State
Iowa and Michigan State have 51 meetings on file, the first in 1953; officially, Iowa leads 25–22–2; as played, 26–23–2 in the games on file. Over the last 10 meetings it’s even at 5–5. The NCAA vacated Michigan State’s win (2024) and Iowa’s win (2023); they don’t count officially. This page counts every game as it was played. Share
- Official series
- Iowa leads 25–22–2
- Iowa wins on file
- 26
- Michigan State wins on file
- 23
- Ties
- 2
- Earliest on file
- 1953
- Longest streak
- 5 Iowa
- Current streak
- 1 Iowa
- Last 10 meetings
- even at 5–5
- Most recent
- 2025
The series at a glance
| ’0 | ’1 | ’2 | ’3 | ’4 | ’5 | ’6 | ’7 | ’8 | ’9 | W–L | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1950s | 2–1 | ||||||||||
| 1960s | 2–2 | ||||||||||
| 1970s | 2–7–1 | ||||||||||
| 1980s | 6–3–1 | ||||||||||
| 1990s | 4–2 | ||||||||||
| 2000s | 5–3 | ||||||||||
| 2010s | 2–4 | ||||||||||
| 2020s | 3–1 |
- Both ranked
- 5 meetings: Iowa 4, Michigan State 1; 1 both in the top 10
- Average margin
- 14.4 points; 23 decided by one score (8 or fewer)
- At Iowa
- 16–10–1 Iowa’s record at home
- At Michigan State
- 12–10–1 Michigan State’s record at home
- Neutral sites
- 0–1 Iowa first
- Shutouts
- 3
Every meeting on file, as played. Ranks are the AP poll’s going in.
Games that tell the story
- Iowa’s biggest win2020: Iowa 49, Michigan State 7by 42 points
- Michigan State’s biggest win1966: Michigan State 56, Iowa 7by 49 points
- Upset2000: Iowa 21, Michigan State 16Iowa had a 20% chance, by our ratings before kickoff
- Upset1984: Michigan State 17, Iowa 16Michigan State had a 22% chance, by our ratings before kickoff
- Upset1990: Iowa 12, Michigan State 7Iowa had a 26% chance, by our ratings before kickoff
- Ranked showdown2015: Michigan State 16, Iowa 13No. 5 Michigan State at No. 4 Iowa
- Ranked showdown1960: Iowa 27, Michigan State 15No. 3 Iowa at No. 13 Michigan State
- Ranked showdown1954: Iowa 14, Michigan State 10No. 7 Michigan State at No. 12 Iowa
Coach against coach
| Years | Iowa | Series | Michigan State |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1954–1960 | Forest Evashevski | 3–0 | Duffy Daugherty |
| 1966–1970 | Ray Nagel | 1–2 | Duffy Daugherty |
| 1976–1978 | Bob Commings | 1–2 | Darryl Rogers |
| 1980–1982 | Hayden Fry | 3–0 | Frank Waters |
| 1983–1994 | Hayden Fry | 5–4–1 | George Perles |
| 2000–2002 | Kirk Ferentz | 2–1 | Bobby Williams |
| 2007–2017 | Kirk Ferentz | 4–5 | Mark Dantonio |
Head-coach pairings with three or more meetings on file, the series read from Iowa’s side (Evashevski 3–0 against Daugherty). A season split between coaches goes to the one credited with the game.
Both programs through the years
Our Elo rating at the end of each season, a measure of how strong a team was, not a forecast; 1500 is an average FBS team.
Stars of the series
Named most valuable
| Connor Cook Michigan State | 2015 |
Most valuable: as the games’ Wikipedia articles name them (CC BY-SA).
From the newspapers
Public-domain newspapers from the Library of Congress’s Chronicling America, found through the American Stories dataset (Dell and Harvard, CC BY 4.0). The earliest meetings with a story on file; each game’s page has the full text.
On television
ESPN’s College GameDay has broadcast from this game once: 2015.
| 2025 | FS1 | 1.1 million viewers |
College GameDay’s sites from Wikipedia’s list of its locations (CC BY-SA). Viewers: Nielsen, as compiled by nschultz7’s ratings tracker.
Every game
Every game is listed as played on the field; a win the NCAA later vacated is marked “vacated”; the official series above counts them the NCAA’s way.