By Pat Harty

IOWA CITY, Iowa –  When ranking the greatest touchdown catches in the history of the Iowa football program, asking for help from a former Hawkeye who made one of those catches seems like a good place to start.

So I reached out to former Iowa All-America tight end Marv Cook and asked where Reece Vander Zee’s 16-yard touchdown catch that beat Michigan 20-19 as time expired this past Saturday in Ann Arbor, Michigan ranks on the list.

Cook wouldn’t go as far as to say it’s the greatest catch in program history, knowing that the competition is pretty stiff, including the catch he made against Ohio State nearly 40 years ago.

But Cook said it certainly deserves consideration because of the circumstances and because of the difficulty in making that particular throw and the catch.

Iowa was trailing 19-14 when quarterback Hank Brown took the snap with two seconds remaining.

Vander Zee was on about the 8-yard line when Brown threw the ball to the front corner of the end zone. Vander Zee then turned as he crossed the goal line, saw the ball coming and made the catch while dragging both feet in the end zone before falling out of bounds.

The ball couldn’t have been thrown much better and the catch was equally as impressive.

For Cook, who was watching the game on television, it brought back memories of his 28-yard touchdown catch in the final seconds on 4th-and-23 that defeated Ohio State, 29-27, 0n Nov. 14, 1987 in Columbus, Ohio.

On that play, Cook made the catch near the far sideline on a trail route in which he stopped running down field and then turned to his inside before catching the pass thrown by then Iowa quarterback Chuck Hartlieb. Cook made the catch at the Ohio State nine-yard line and then just seconds later the West Branch native made history by blasting between two Buckeye defenders, including a defensive back named Bo Pelini – yes, that Bo Pelini – before diving into the end zone.

“It’s ironic, they (Michigan) were actually in two-man (coverage) with man coverage underneath with two high safeties, and honestly, it was a similar deal where he (Vander Zee) just took off and then looked back, he adjusted, but the corner wasn’t able to adjust in time,” Cook said Wednesday in a telephone interview. “And it was a perfect throw, and a perfect catch. If he bobbles that catch at all, it doesn’t count.

“And so that was so well-executed, and under that setting and under that environment, my hats off too them, incredible.”

Iowa faces No. 5 Ohio State on Saturday at Kinnick Stadium as a 13.5-point underdog, and if the 14th-ranked Hawkeyes are in a position to make a game-winning catch at the end, that means they would have held their own against the mighty Buckeyes.

Cook started to say that Vander Zee’s catch might even be more impressive than his catch in 1987, but then he hesitated and thought about all the blood, sweat and sacrifices that his teammates made along the way.

“I don’t want to short change my teammates that put all the time into making that play happen,” Cook said. “It wasn’t just Chuck and I. It was the whole team, because that happens in practice. Those types of game-winning events are rehearsed and practiced and simulated over and over.

“It becomes muscle memory and you don’t do it until you get it right. You do it until you get it right every single time. And then that helps you go out there and execute it on Saturday.”

Though he wishes Iowa would avoided having to win on a miracle catch, Vander Zee said the offense was prepared for the situation, which in this case was driving 91 yard for a touchdown in less than two minutes.

“It is something that we practice every week, and to see it kind of push through on that drive was special,” he said. “But we’ve got to to do a lot better things to not be in that position.

“We have a lot of things to improve on, but that’s the good part of it. That’s what you want to see is when we go into those types of games and we don’t have our best stuff.”

It could be argued that there are four catches in program history, including the catches by Cook and Vander Zee, that really standout because of the circumstances, though Cook has a list of about 10, a list that not surprisingly, features catches mostly by tight ends, including Dallas Clark, Noah Fant and TJ Hockenson.

Rounding out the big four, though, would be Drew Tate’s 56-yard touchdown pass to Warren Holloway that beat Louisiana State 30-25 as time expired in the 2005 Capital One Bowl, and Ricky Stanzi’s seven-yard scoring strike to Marvin McNutt that defeated Michigan State 15-13 in 2009 in East Lansing, Michigan.

Cook said a strong case could be made for Tate-to-Holloway being the most spectacular of all the catches due to such factors as the distance of the play, that Nick Saban was in his final season as the LSU head coach and that it was a Jan. 1 bowl game.

But when asked if Vander Zee’s touchdown deserves to be held in the same regard as his catch and with Tate-to-Holloway, and with McNutt’s catch, Cook said:

“One-hundred percent. That was two top-20 teams in the Big House, on Saturday and in September. To me, there’s no more iconic stadiums in the world, than maybe, selfishly, some of the other Big Ten stadiums.

“To me, that (catch) is definitely up there. It’s amazing. That was so perfectly executed.”

So many little things had to work for Cook’s catch to be successful, and the same with Vander Zee’s catch, and with the catches by Holloway and McNutt.

Timing, anticipation, accuracy, poise, precision, and even some courage all contributed to those game-winning catches in which the margin for error was razor thin, while the tension was thick.

Cook, who played in the NFL for seven seasons before coaching at Iowa City Regina where he won seven state titles, said it also helped having the 6-foot-4, 220-pound Vander Zee as the target on the play.

Vander Zee also scored Iowa’s other touchdown against Michigan on another 16-yard catch early in the fourth quarter.

“He’s a tough matchup,” Cook said. “He’s big. He’s physical. He’s elusive. I mean he is a tough matchup.

“He’s so big and strong and physical that he can be covered and you can still complete a pass to him. He’s got the length and the catch radius and the ability to go up and get the ball. He attacks the ball when it’s in the air.”

Asked what was more impressive; Brown’s pass or Vander Zee’s catch, Cook took the high road.

“Both. I mean they both had to be perfect. If that balls up field a foot, the corner is going to be in it. And if it’s back too low or too high, it’s a harder adjustment.”

Hank Brown completed 13-of-19 passes for 142 yards and two scores in the fourth quarter against Michigan.

He struggled at times in the first three quarters, but with the game on line, Brown rose to the occasion in what was his first start on the road.

“Hats off to Hank to just keep playing, next play,” Cook said. “There was a lot of stuff that went wrong on Saturday, and to stay after it and to keep his head up, I love his demeanor. I never saw him drop his head. He just keeps playing.”

Iowa caught a break on the game-winning play in Cook’s opinion when Michigan used press coverage, meaning its cornerbacks were lined up close to the line of scrimmage instead of being back at least five or 10 yards.

Cook said Ohio State also used press coverage on his catch in 1987.

“Imagine if the cornerback is sitting on the goal line and Vander Zee is on the eight when he throws it, the corner is going to see the throw and he’s going to bust up the throw” Cook said. “It’s like what Iowa does. They keep the ball in front of them. They see the ball, they see the receiver and then they see the quarterback and they see the ball en route to the receiver and they can make a break on it.”

“And a lot like Saturday is the receiver is able to pick up the ball first because he’s looking back and then that’s usually when the defender will look back. But by the time he looks back and understands whether it’s a short throw or an over-the-top throw, the receiver has already made the adjustment.”

Cook said timing was everything on the two plays in which he and Vander Zee both scored historic touchdowns nearly 40 years a part. Even just one half-second can be the difference between success and failure.

“It’s huge,” Cook said “Because he keeps running and I’m stopping, and we’re running at a good clip, so he’s going to end up being two or three yards passed me at that point, which was just enough for me to catch the ball, move back inside and try to find a crease to get into the end zone.”