Iowa punter Boston Everitt lands on Ray Guy Award midseason watch list

Iowa has a punter in the national award conversation again. Second-year punter Boston Everitt was named to the 2026 Ray Guy Award Midseason Watch List on Thursday, the Augusta Sports Council announced. The award goes to the nation's top college punter, and Hawkeyes Wire noted that the list comes out as the Hawkeyes head into the last month of the regular season.

Everitt, from New Hope, Australia, is averaging 43.7 yards on 36 punts in his first eight games at Iowa. Iowa's athletics department reports that his average ranks 37th nationally and sixth in the Big Ten. His case rests less on distance than on where the ball ends up. He has dropped 21 punts inside the 20, including four against Iowa State, and has forced 13 fair catches. Seven of his punts have gone 50 yards or more, and his longest was a 60-yarder at Minnesota.

Iowa has a track record with this award. Tory Taylor won the Ray Guy in 2023, and Ryan Donahue was a finalist in 2010, as Hawkeyes Wire pointed out. Hawk Fanatic also covered the announcement. The next cut comes on Nov. 22. A voting body of FBS sports information directors, media members and past winners will name three finalists that day, then vote again to choose the winner.

The watch-list spot reflects how Iowa has won this fall. The Hawkeyes are 6-2 and have scored 226 points while allowing 100. They have three shutouts, most recently a 30-0 win over No. 25 Wisconsin. Three of their games were decided by three points or fewer: a 16-13 win over Iowa State, a 20-19 win at No. 18 Michigan and a 13-10 loss at Minnesota. In games that tight, a defense that keeps opponents pinned deep makes a real difference, and Everitt's punts have helped set that up.

What it means at Northwestern

Iowa plays at Northwestern on Saturday, Nov. 7, on Fox. The Hawkeyes are coming off the Wisconsin shutout and are 2-1 on the road, with wins at Michigan and Washington and the loss at Minnesota. The offense has been uneven. It scored 55 against Northern Iowa and 41 at Washington, but only 10 at Minnesota and 14 against No. 5 Ohio State. Field position could matter more than usual in a game this close.

The board on this site's game page agrees that it should be close. Twelve venues have it listed, and Northwestern is a slight favorite at home. On Novig, one of the venues, Northwestern is favored at -125 on the moneyline, and Iowa pays +120. Northwestern is favored by 2.5 points on the spread, priced at -104, with Iowa +2.5 at -102. The total is 45.5, with the over at +102 and the under at -108. Novig's two moneyline prices carry a margin of about 1%. The sportsbooks' hold on the moneyline runs from 3.0% to 6.3%, so where a reader looks makes a difference. Holds on the spread range from 3.4% to 6.8%, and on the total from 3.9% to 6.7%.

A total in the mid-40s with a field-goal spread points to the kind of low-scoring game Iowa has played several times this season. The Hawkeyes enter at 6-2 with a punter now on the Ray Guy watch list, and the finalists will be named two weeks after the trip to Northwestern.