Hawley was hired by the University of Iowa as its tenth head football coach in 1910. Iowa had not won the conference title in a decade, and Hawkeye fans were hoping Hawley could turn Iowa's fortunes around. School officials also hired Nelson A. Kellogg in 1910 to be Iowa's athletic director. Supervision of intercollegiate athletics at Iowa had, since 1900, also been the responsibility of the head coach. Hawley, however, could focus solely on coaching the football team.