Growing up in Pittsburgh’s South Hills and starring in football at Upper St. Clair High School in the 1970s, it was only natural that Kirk Ferentz would be a fan of the Steelers.
“I mean, how could you not be?” Ferentz said, referencing the burgeoning Steel Curtain dynasty.
These days, Ferentz might be following the Steelers almost as closely as he did back then. That’s because he’s intimately familiar with an inordinately high percentage of the roster.
No college program is more represented on the Steelers than Iowa, the program at which Ferentz is the nation’s longest-tenured coach. Seven former Hawkeyes dot the roster, including five draft picks over the past three years.
Guard Gennings Dunker and return specialist Kaden Wetjen were selected by the Steelers out of Iowa with consecutive picks in the third and fourth rounds, respectively, this past weekend.
Steelers draft pick Gennings Dunker made name for himself as hay-bale tossing champ in Iowa
https://t.co/PXrAH7rfoK— Chris Harlan (@CHarlan_Trib) April 29, 2026
Reached by phone as he was taking a late-afternoon walk earlier this week in Iowa City, Ferentz noted that until this three-draft flurry of the Iowa-to-Pittsburgh pipeline that over his first 25 seasons as Hawkeyes coach the Steelers had drafted only one player — linebacker Mike Humpal in 2008.
“I knew (former Steelers general manager) Kevin Colbert really well through however many years — but he never drafted any of our guys,” Ferentz said with a laugh. “So, I don’t know. It’s probably more about the (attributes of those individual drafted) players (than them targeting Iowa prospects).
“Humpal was a great guy who had an injury that basically (ended his career), but other than that, nobody (drafted by the Steelers). So, it’s interesting. Now there’s just been a plethora of guys. It’s kind of wild.”
In addition to Dunker and Wetjen, holdovers from Iowa on the roster include three returning rookies from last season — third-round running back Kaleb Johnson, fifth-round defensive tackle Yahya Black and undrafted safety Sebastian Castro. They joined 2024 sixth-round defensive lineman Logan Lee and wide receiver Brandon Smith, who was added on a reserve/future contract in January, as other ex-Hawkeyes who traded the black-and-gold of the Big Ten for the black-and-gold of the AFC North.
“They’re so well coached at Iowa,” Steelers offensive line coach James Campen said after the selection of Dunker. “They come out, they have established pad level and footwork.”
Campen was speaking specifically about Iowa offensive linemen, but he might as well have been describing the DNA of the program in regards to its emphasis on fundamentals, team-first attitude and work ethic.
“I’ve got a lot of respect for that football program,” Campen said, “and the people who run it.”
Campen and the Steelers weren’t the only ones who felt that way, judging by the results of this year’s draft.
Seven players were selected out of Iowa, a new program record. The haul bumped up to 101 the number of players drafted in the Ferentz era.
“That just means I’ve been here a while,” quipped Ferentz, 70.
“I’m proud of our guys getting drafted — I’m prouder of how our guys typically don’t flame out. They normally go where they go, and even if they get cut, like they make it hard on the team cutting them. And the guys that do play tend to play longer. They just don’t do stupid stuff at all. They know how to work and show up every day, all the basic stuff that sounds so easy, but that a lot of people struggle with. That’s good.”
This season, Dunker could compete to start at left guard, Wetjen is the heavy favorite to handle kick and punt returns and Black is a significant part of the d-line rotation with Lee also expected to contribute. Johnson is still only 22 and has the talent to take advantage of an opportunity to show he can be the featured running back of the future, and Castro has already established himself — at very least — as an NFL-caliber special teamer.
One of Ferentz’s favorite stories to tell is how Iowa’s uniforms came to so closely resemble the Steelers’.
It happened two years before Ferentz joined the program’s staff for the first time (as offensive line coach) in 1981. When Hayden Fry took over as coach, the Hawkeyes hadn’t finished with a winning record or been ranked for 18 years.
That was 1979, which happened to be when the Steelers were on their way to a fourth Super Bowl win in a six-year span.
Ferentz wasn’t associated with Iowa at that point, and he didn’t know Fry. But he did remember a Fry quote from the era that appeared in Sports Illustrated.
“He said, ‘We may not win a game, we may not be any good — but we’re going to look like a championship-level team,’” Ferentz said.
“The best part, I’ve heard (Fry) tell the story, he said he called the Steelers (equipment department) and they said, ‘Sure, yeah, we’ll send you a new uniform.’ They sent it out here. Got it in the mail. (Fry) called back and said, ‘Hey, would you guys be OK if we just copied this?’ And they said, ‘Yeah, keep the uniform and feel free.’
“I laugh about that because can you imagine how many lawyers that would take to do that today? There’s no way it’d be that simple. No way. But that’s how business was done, and that just sounds like something Steelers would do.”
Not unlike how they draft Iowa players.