Cooper DeJean, a sudden standout on a star-studded Hawkeye defense

PISCATAWAY, N.J. — Cooper DeJean wasn’t hiding under a rock in northwest Iowa while in high school, but who saw this coming?

Who comes from a town of under 1,000 people, a high school (OABCIG) that doesn’t have the longest acronym in Iowa, gets just one scholarship offer from an FBS program, and does what cornerback DeJean is doing in his second year as an Iowa Hawkeye?

Saturday night at SHI Stadium with Iowa trailing 3-0 in the first quarter and Rutgers with the ball, DeJean made an over-the-shoulder interception of a long Evan Simon pass at the Rutgers 45.

It was DeJean’s third-straight game with a pick, and it was fantastic. Then he may have done something even more fabulous when he changed course on the return, followed good blocks, eluded tacklers, and ran a lot more actual yards than 45 for a touchdown.

“The instincts kicked in there once I got the ball in my hands,” DeJean said.

“I got the ball on one hash, so I knew everybody would be coming to that side, all the linemen. I don’t want to get in there with all those big boys. So I just cut back to the other side of the field and saw there was a lot of grass over there.”

Iowa led 7-3 and didn’t look back in its 27-10 win. Its defense forced three turnovers, with two returned for TDs. That was the story of the game.

DeJean was a 3-star recruit with an athletic resume that was beyond sensational at OABCIG, which is Odebolt-Arthur-Battle Creek-Ida Grove. He’s from Odebolt, which identifies itself as "a lovely small town nestled along tree-lined streets, located amid the rolling soybean and corn fields of Sac County in northwest Iowa.“

Oh, it has also produced a football player who has emerged at Iowa from a deep and veteran secondary. This guy is different, and in the best possible meaning of the word.

“Small towns, that doesn’t mean anything,” Iowa Coach Kirk Ferentz said. “Athletes are athletes and good players are good players.

“The most-surprising thing about Cooper as far as I know, he really wasn’t offered a scholarship by anybody.”

DeJean did get other scholarship offers … from the Missouri Valley Football Conference. Northern Iowa and South Dakota State, two schools with great quarterback traditions, recruited him as a QB. He was scheduled to visit Virginia, but canceled that trip after Iowa offered and he jumped at the chance.

Iowa recruiting director Tyler Barnes was sold on DeJean after watching him play basketball. Ferentz said his own “Kodak moment” was one of OABCIG’s two state-championship football title-game wins with DeJean at quarterback/defensive back.

“He did everything,” said Ferentz. “I think he scored the tying touchdown, he recovered the onside kick when they were down or whatever, he got the onside kick and then they scored again. I think he had the 2-point play and then he sold popcorn on top of it.”

Oh, DeJean also won the long jump and 100-meter titles at the 2021 Class 2A state track and field championships, was part of the winning 4x100 relay, and was second in the 200 meters.

DeJean played sparingly last year as an Iowa freshman. But even with all the experienced defensive backs on the team and the excitement for incoming freshman Xavier Nwankpa, you kept hearing DeJean’s name as someone Iowa would have to use somewhere.

Now he has three picks in three weeks. He didn’t brag about it Saturday after the game. He doesn’t brag. He just does.

Iowa quarterback Spencer Petras said DeJean played “a bunch of different positions” in the first week of fall camp, so the offense picked on him.

“Probably by Week 2 of camp he started getting me a little bit,” Petras said. “Throws that most guys can’t defend, he was picking off.

“He’s a special athlete.”

The merger of the OA with the BCIG was acrimonious and took several years to come to full fruition. But now, they all share two state football titles and can claim someone who may be starting a storybook career.

DeJean’s OABCIG team beat MVAOCOU (Maple Valley-Anthon-Oto-Charter Oak-Ute) 63-14 in 2020.

Acronyms are acronyms. Athletes are athletes.

Comments: (319) 398-8440; mike.hlas@thegazette.com