Ok. Kirk Fence has been suspended one game due to a recruiting violation that occurred in 2022 but the Hawkeyes are preparing for the season opener like normal local vi's Jake brand has more. Saturday will be the first game of the Kirk Fence era where he's not on the sidelines. And while that will certainly be weird for most fans for the players, they're just focused on a one in a week. I think we'll just lean on each other and, um, just, you know, worry about, you know, Illinois State. Uh, that's the biggest thing and, um, you know, I think, I think at the end of the day it's gonna be all good this year and especially for this week, you know, this team loves coach fence and, you know, we're gonna rally for him at the end of the day. It's gonna be us 11 guys on the field that had to get the job done. So, uh, I mean, yeah, he, he did make it a point, like, don't focus too much on him and, uh, I mean, he doesn't want to be out there but, you know, just do the job and just do it with our brothers. We're focused on trying to go out there and get a win. I mean, if you overthink it too much, it could turn into a distraction and I mean, I know that nobody in the building wants to go out there and start off the season with a loss. The prep is all the same leading up to Saturday. The biggest change will be assistant head coach, Seth Wallace's game day duties. We talk about a lot of things on Thursdays about what we do, you know, fourth down, four down territory, all those kinds of things, the situation, that situation, but the, the only missing part is, uh, you know, when you get in the game, sometimes there's a fuel that flies in the face of maybe what you decide on Thursday and sometimes you just got to make a call and go with a gut instinct. So, um, you know, if that, that'd be the case, Seth will do a great job with that. Seth Wallace will make his head coaching debut in the Black and Gold Saturday at 11 a.m. against the Redbirds from Kinnock Stadium. Jake brand, local five sports.