Fun Facts: Albany-Iowa. The Hawkeyes’ first game vs. a team called “Great Danes”

1. Iowa’s 40 points against Illinois State last year were its most in its last 11 games against an FCS opponent.

2. UAlbany is 1-9 all-time against FBS foes, with the win coming at Buffalo in 2016. The Great Danes lost 49-14 at Virginia last year, 69-10 at Baylor in 2022, and 62-24 at Syracuse in 2021.

3. UAlbany has won its last two season-openers … against Fordham and Long Island.

4. At the start of training camp, UAlbany interim coach Jared Ambrose said he wants the Great Danes to be “the most aggressive team in college football.”

5. Since 2015, Iowa is 78-5 in games in which it held a lead of at least eight points. However, it lost to Missouri in last year’s Music City Bowl after leading 24-14.

6. The last time a Hawkeyes club played in Albany was when the women’s basketball team defeated LSU in 2024 to advance to the NCAA Final Four.

7. UAlbany has players from 18 different states, including Kansas, Missouri and Arkansas.

8. Iowa has held its opponents to under 20 points per game in each of the last nine seasons. No other FBS team has a similar streak longer than three years.

9. This is the 25th night game at Kinnick Stadium. Iowa won 17 of the first 24.

10. This game’s starting quarterbacks played at Buffalo and South Dakota State in 2023.

11. Iowa opened the week as a 37.5-point favorite. It hasn’t been this big a favorite since it was a 39-point pick over Eastern Illinois in 2010. Only two bigger underdogs have ever won. Howard, a 45.5-point dog, beat UNLV in 2017. Stanford was a 41-point dog when it shocked USC in 2007.

12. The Hawkeyes have 17 college graduates on their roster.

13. Albany is New York’s state capital. Four New York governors went on to become the U.S. president. That’s four more than Iowa.

14. Albany, Iowa is an unincorporated community in Fayette County. It’s near the Volga River State Recreation Area, sometimes known as “Little Switzerland.”

15. UAlbany is the only U.S. college team with Great Danes as its nickname.

16. Great Danes have floppy ears. Emotional expressiveness is part of the appeal of dogs with floppy ears.

17. UAlbany’s Damien the Great Dane won the State University of New York’s Mascot Madness contest last April, edging runner-up Red the Dragon of SUNY Oneonta, 39,810 votes to 39,424.

18. Before 1965, UAlbany was the Penguins. In 1965, the school held a contest to pick the new mascot. Student Kathy Earle submitted the Great Dane because “it has a proud bearing and imposing stature. It is clean, graceful, and proud.” She was awarded a $25 savings bond for the winning entry.

19. A 2025 movie called “The Friend” stars Naomi Watts, Bill Murray, and Bing, a Great Dane from Iowa.

20. Maurice’s Pearl Street Deli in Albany is deli heaven. That’s Fun Opinion based on personal experience, not Fun Fact.