Technical Abstract: Searching for environmental friendly nitrogen management practices in the Midwestern US is an on-going task in the agricultural community. Many practices have shown promise in reducing N in tile drainage that may contribute to hypoxia in the Gulf of Mexico. In this study, an agricultural system in central Iowa, managed using a corn-soybean rotation, were evaluated with the Root Zone Water Quality Model (RZWQM)-DSSAT4.0 for crop yield, grain N, annual N loss in tile drainage flow, and residual soil nitrate-N under a high (H, 199 kg N/ha), medium (M, 138 kg N/ha), and low (L, 69 kg N/ha) N application rate shortly after planting, and a split (S, 69 kg N/ha shortly after planting and at midseason) N treatment. The model adequately simulated the responses of yield and N loss to H, M, and L treatments, but it failed to simulate the lower corn yield and higher N loss under the S treatment than under the M treatment, where both received the same amount of N applications. Experimental differences in yield between the two treatments were statistically significant, whereas the differences in N loss were not significant experimentally. Further improvement on model responses to late fertilizer application in terms of yield and N leaching was needed before it could be applied to simulate other N scheduling, such as the late spring N test (LSNT). The study also showed that, with a constant soil microbial population implemented in RZWQM, the model produced very similar simulation results for crop production and soil N balances compared to a dynamic soil microbial population in RZWQM.