IOWA CITY - Norm Parker just coined the term this week, but Pat Angerer said he thinks he probably heard Iowa's defensive coordinator say it about 100 times already.

If the Hawkeyes keep playing defense the way they did Saturday against Arizona, we're probably going to hear it a lot more.

"Six seconds of hell."

The Hawkeyes gave a previously unbeaten Arizona team about 60 minutes of it Saturday. They just did it in six-second increments, which is the whole point. Most plays in football only last about 6 seconds.

"The premise is that you're only out there for 6 seconds so you might as well bust your butt the whole time," said Angerer, a senior linebacker from Bettendorf.

"The idea is just to fight ... fight for six seconds."

The Hawkeyes did it all day, allowing only one meaningless offensive touchdown against a team that entered the game averaging 500 yards a game. When it was all over, Arizona had just 253 yards Saturday, including only 10 in a decisive third quarter.

"I thought certainly today we looked a little bit more like what we hoped to see out of an Iowa defense," Iowa coach Kirk Ferentz said.

"It starts up front. When our guys are playing well up front, that really helps us."

It's not as though the defense played badly in the first two games. Iowa gave up only 20 points in victories over Northern Iowa and Iowa State. The defense has been much more stable and consistent than the offense, which has had its share of sputters and missteps.

But the defense clearly took things to a higher level Saturday.

Arizona coach Mike Stoops, who once played on the defensive side of the ball for the Hawkeyes, wasn't the least bit surprised.

"We knew they were going to be as good as any defense we'll play, (USC) included," he said. "They're bigger and faster than people want to give them credit for.

"I think they look even better when you play them in person."

Not just bigger and faster, but smarter, too.

Consider, for example, Arizona's final series of the first half. It trailed 14-10 and put together a modest drive with Matt Scott completing back-to-back passes for 44 yards. (He had only 50 yards passing for the entire game.) The Wildcats got down to the Iowa 23-yard line before the drive stalled and they lined up for a field goal.

As they did so, Iowa safety Brett Greenwood noticed that the Wildcats had a couple of different players on the field who had not been in on previous field goal and extra-point tries. The starting fullback and tight end had been inserted.

"I knew something was up," Greenwood said. "The coaches always tell us that if you see something different like that to be alert."

When Arizona ran a fake field goal, Greenwood surged forward and nailed Keenyn Crier for no gain, sending Arizona away without any points.

"Brett's a lot smarter than I am," Angerer said. "I don't think it's necessarily that we're smart, but we're experienced. We've seen about everything you can see by now."

On the previous series, the Hawkeyes showed not only smarts but determination. They held down Arizona's Nic Grigsby - the nation's No. 2 rusher coming in - for most of the day, but Grigsby got away from them one time. He picked up 58 yards with a dazzling bit of open-field running before Amari Spievey tackled him at the 1-yard line.

But they nailed Grigsby for a 2-yard loss on the next play, and two incomplete passes later, the Wildcats found themselves settling for a field goal.

"I think that was pretty big," said defensive end Adrian Clayborn, who spearheaded a much-improved pass rush. "We always try to make everybody work for their points.

"It was just six seconds of hell."