Badger beat down: Why can’t Iowa football have nice things?

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It was Bill, sitting next to me in a chilly but raucous Camp Randall full of beer-fueled and neck-bearded Badger fans, who pointed out the weird parallel.

Like a similarly cold November night seven years ago in Minneapolis, it was only the guy wearing #15 in black and gold who appeared to have any clue about how to play football or bothered to show up for a big road game.

For those that don’t remember, that was the night DJK returned a kickoff 88 yards for a touchdown and added a receiving touchdown in a dispiriting 27-24 loss to a 2-9 Minnesota team where no one else really did much of anything.

This past Saturday it was Josh Jackson, also sporting 15, who continued his amazing November by snagging two pick-sixes and forcing a fumble on his way to a second consecutive Big 10 Defensive Player of the Week award.

Normally, this would be cause for great celebration. But considering the rest of the team played like 21 of the worst players in the conference on the same night, it’s kind of hard to get real excited.

Like in 2010, Iowa was coming off a very emotional game against Ohio State.

But unlike 2010, Iowa hadn’t just lost a heartbreaker to a perennial tormenter. Instead, it had rolled what many believe is one of the most talented teams in the country, setting up the exciting prospect of a late autumn surge into relevancy and the rankings.

Psssssssssssssssssssshhhhhhhhhhhhh. That’s the sound of the black and gold balloon deflating.

I’m not sure why it’s the Iowa fan’s lot in life, but apparently we are destined to not have nice things. Perhaps it is considered untoward or putting on airs in Iowa City to build on a good thing and make it great. Perhaps Iowa football is simply allergic to success. Whatever it is, it sucks.

It’s also maddeningly repetitive.

Earlier this season Iowa followed up a 45-16 dismantling of Illinois with its worst (until Madison) outing of the season in a putrid overtime loss to Northwestern. Last year, after blitzkrieging Iowa State 42-3, the Hawks stumbled and bumbled to a loss against FCS foe North Dakota State. Remember hammering the Wildcats 48-7 in 2014 and then immediately following that up with a 51-14 drubbing at the hands of Minnesota?

The only thing Iowa is consistent at is wild swings of inconsistency.

Of course there will be the usual dissections and disgruntlement of the Hawkeye coaches’ game plan for the Badger game. Some will say the offense should have passed more. Or ran to the outside. Or had better play calling in general.

I say poppycock.

Sitting in row 42 at about the 30, it was painfully, embarrassingly obvious that Iowa’s offensive linemen had zero answers for Wisconsin’s attacking 3-4 defense. If linemen weren’t missing assignments altogether out of confusion and blocking no one, they were either whiffing on blocks or getting blasted three yards into the backfield. Nile Kinnick throwing to Marv Cook and Danan Hughes behind last Saturday’s offensive line would have looked terrible.

Until Iowa figures out how to deal with the Badger 3-4 defense, it’s hard to imagine them winning a West Division title over the scarlet and white menace. This needs to be a major focus of the off-season strategy sessions.

Things were a bit better, at least for much of the first half, on the other side of the ball. Wisconsin’s horrible quarterback (seriously, I don’t think I’ve seen a legitimate Top 10 team with a worse signal caller in recent memory) tried very, very hard to give the game away to Iowa.

I knew the Hawkeye goose was cooked when Jackson forced a fumble inside Badger territory, giving Iowa its first decent field position (by the way, at some point someone should really tell Iowa punt returners that you are allowed to CATCH THE BALL IN THE AIR) and the offense went three-and-out in about 30 seconds.

When you look up at the scoreboard and you are losing 10-7 despite having three takeaways to zero, you know it’s not going to be your day. Predictably, with the offense in morass mode, the D wilted in the fourth quarter in the face of the Badgers’ devastating rushing attack.

So as we find ourselves asking too often lately, where does Iowa go from here?

Personally, given Iowa’s sizeable budget, outstanding training and practice facilities, rabid fan base and robust institutional support, an 8-4 season should really be the floor for Hawkeye football. The good news is if Iowa wins its remaining two games, in which it is favored, it will have finished 12-0, 8-4 and 8-4 in its last three regular seasons. That is definitely within the realm of acceptability.

The offense is young and a work-in-progress with a new coordinator, new quarterback, two freshmen tackles and a bunch of young guys at tight end and receiver. We can and should expect them to grow and improve.

I fully expect this team to win out, hopefully put an end to a brutal bowl losing streak, and then come into 2018 as a legitimate contender for the West Division title. Anything short of that – especially if accompanied by another embarrassing outing against the bullying Badger – and one really has to wonder if a long-term Ferentzian dynasty is in the best interest of this program.

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Grandpa, tell me about the Great Buckeye Massacre

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Reember this one, because you’ll be talking about it for years. Iowa dazzled, dominated, and ultimately overwhelmed the hapless Buckeyes from “The” Ohio State, The superlatives pile on like Jackson INTs and Stanley TDS to TEs:  Biggest lost in Urban Meyer’s career, most points scored against OSU, biggest OSU loss since 1994, only the 4th Iowa win in (most) living memory.

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The bullied become the bully and man does it feel fantastic

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Saturday’s out-of-the-blue triumph – nay, demolition – of the mighty Ohio State Buckeyes seems like a surreal fever dream.

Now I know how the Munchkins felt when Dorothy dropped that house on the green hag from the East. Or the Ewoks after some helpful Jedi blasted dastardly Stormtroopers off of Endor.

The Buckeyes are the big, bad bully of the Big 10, even though we called our Hawks that for a few years in the early 2000s. I’m talking from a historical and national perspective here.

Pick your metaphor: Death Star, the Borg, the New York Yankees. Ohio State is the stronger, better looking guy your ex-girlfriend dates. The Buckeyes are the rich yuppie jerk from every 80s romantic comedy. Ohio State is the freaking Cobra Kai dojo and Urban Meyer is its smirking sensei.

And our boys just crane-kicked their candy asses back to Columbus.

As a fan, is there anything sweeter, anything more fulfilling, than finally seeing your team get its licks in on a longtime tormentor? Sure, this game lacked the heart-stopping thrill of last season’s walk off winning kick over Michigan. And the Hawks didn’t clinch a Big 10 championship before its fans stormed the field like in 2004 against Wisconsin. But in terms of sheer, unbridled joy and surprise, I’m not sure last Saturday doesn’t take the cake. I can’t remember walking out of Kinnick with a bigger smile on my face in some time.

Ironically, this is the same week of the season as last year’s absolute mauling at the hands of Penn State.

I wrote this that depressing week:

Keep believing, and someday you will earn respect and be on top.

The Hawkeyes may be effectively out-of-the-running for a Big 10 championship this year, but they were certainly on top of the college football world mountain Saturday night. Josh Jackson’s acrobatic interception was the SportsCenter #1 play of the day. The amazing hospital wave garnered positive air time and headlines yet again. The state of Iowa was roundly recognized as being the place Blue Blood title hopes go to die.

I’d call that respect, earned.

And now Iowa turns back to a longtime, familiar foe in Wisconsin. Once again, the Hawkeyes are in the role of spoiler, which fortunately for them, is a position in which it excels.

I think the Hawkeyes and Badgers are quite comparable from an athleticism and skill level standpoint. Wisconsin might have a slight edge at running back (this is no swipe at Akrum Wadley, the Badger kid is just that dynamic). But I think Nate Stanley is going to make Badger fans livid that ex-coach Gary Anderson didn’t recruit him and Paul Chryst came in too late to flip him.

I also believe it’s fair to say Iowa will be the biggest, fastest, strongest team the Badgers have played this season. Northwestern is their best win (at home no less) and while they are solidly above average, they aren’t quite as talented across-the-board as Iowa. I feel like these factors, and the fact the home team inexplicably seems to struggle in this series, give the Hawks an edge.

Another potential factor is this year, Iowa is in the role Wisconsin was in 2010. That is, they are the road dog who can play loose. The Badgers have an undefeated season and potential College Football Playoff appearance in the balance. Maybe this year they’ll be the team playing not to lose, which we know all-too-well is the kiss of death.

Whatever the outcome in Madison, this is already a season to remember. The thrilling come-from-behind victory in Ames, the oh-so-close battle against Penn State and the inexplicable dismantling of a high-powered, highly ranked Ohio State will live in the memory banks for a long time.

It’s not every week the eyes of the entire college football world are focused on Iowa City. Let’s remember to enjoy it while we can.

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Even in victory worries about the “E” word abound

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“We have met the enemy and he is us.”– Pogo

If shooting yourself in the foot was an Olympic sport, the Iowa Hawkeyes football team would be solidly in medal contention.

It feels much, much better to write that sentence after a victory in which it never really felt like the Hawks might lose, but it is just as true this week as it was after the dismal outing in Evanston the week prior.

Between the dropped passes, untimely penalties and crippling turnovers, the fact Iowa managed a more-comfortable-than-the-score-indicates victory over the Minnesota Golden Boat Rowers is a minor miracle.

I hate to parrot the head Hawk, especially when this particular mantra of his is so unpopular, but simple execution errors continue to plague this team. There has been some renewed grumbling about Iowa’s play calling and schemes, particularly on the offensively offensive side of the ball, but I don’t see it. If Iowa had held onto the dropped passes or not held Gopher defenders, this probably would have been a 28-7 laugher and we’d all be somewhat cautiously optimistic with the dreaded Buckeyes coming to town.

Instead, it’s hard to imagine how the Hawks can possibly score enough to keep up with Ohio State.

I also want to note, for the record, that saying play calling and scheme aren’t too blame is not the same as absolving coaches from all responsibility. While I feel youth and inexperience are pretty valid excuses for many of the miscues, we are halfway through the 2017 season and some of the basic mistakes are inexcusable. That is the type of sloppiness you’d like to see get cleaned up in practice, and I’m sure it will be hammered home inside the performance facility this week.

On a more optimistic note, I’m not so sure this wasn’t Nate Stanley’s best day throwing the ball, the drops notwithstanding. His long touchdown pass on play action to Noah Fant was a beauty of a bomb, but a play with a negative outcome may have been the best of the day.

Backed up at his own six yard line with a first and ten, Stanley drops back, pump fakes once, then unleashes a perfect throw that hits a streaking Ihmir Smith-Marsette in full stride sprinting down the sideline. Somehow, Smith-Marsette has the ball bounce off his hands and directly into the arms of a badly beaten Gopher defender for an interception. Make that catch, and Iowa is up 14-0, has a 94-yard passing touchdown in the stat book and no one is grumbling about the “boring” and “predictable” offense.

But that’s football. (Snort)

While we are thinking happy thoughts, let’s think about this Iowa defense. If you would have told me the Hawk D would be holding Big 10 opponents to 17.4 ppg after its first five conference game, I would have assumed the West Division record would be 5-0 or 4-1 at worst. Lost in the nail-biting of one-possession games has been a pretty impressive performance on that side of the ball.

Critics will gripe about allowing big plays and teams to move between the 20s, but at the end of the day, if you keep the opponent out of the end zone, you will win a lot more than you lose. I also think the pass rush has finally gotten on track the past two games and raised quite a bit of havoc with the opponent’s passing game.

The bad news is Iowa still has to play the #1 and #5 scoring offenses in the next two weeks, so it will be imperative that Iowa defenders ramp up their play even more, if possible.

As for the big picture, it’s not going to be easy for Iowa to hit my predicted 8-4 record, but it’s hardly impossible. To me, the key will be to split the next two games against the #3 and #4 teams in the country. Piece of cake, right!?

History says a win over a Top 10 Ohio State team is a virtual impossibility, and I’m afraid I have to agree. I’m in my mid 40s and I’ve only seen Iowa beat the Buckeyes four times and they were only ranked in the Top 10 once, in 1983. Of course, Iowa itself was a Top 10 team that year, coming in at #7.

It’s hard not to expect next week’s blackout game to be a case of “too big, too fast, too strong.” But I do think the Hawks can keep it relatively respectable.

That brings us to our old friend Bucky Badger.

Now, I got sick of everyone badmouthing Iowa’s 2015 schedule while the Hawkeyes were on their way to a perfect 12-0 regular season. So I’m not so much calling Wisconsin a fraud as wondering why they get a free pass when 2015 Iowa didn’t.

The Badgers have played only 1 team with a winning record to date and that is the decidedly mediocre Northwestern team that managed to take advantage of Iowa mistakes to beat the Hawks in overtime. The Badgers didn’t exactly blast them, either, eeking out a one-possession victory at home. In the Badgers’ only other game against a common opponent, Bucky slept-walk through a 24-10 victory over an Illini team Iowa dispatched 45-16.

Does this mean Iowa is sure to win their third-in-a-row at Camp Randall? Nope.

But I think they have more than a fighting chance – especially if they clean up that dreaded execution.

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Growing frustrations

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Iowa trips over its own miscues and hands Northwestern an overtime victory in Evanston.  With the West now out of reach, what does success look like for the 2017 Hawkeyes?

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Marching toward mediocrity? Iowa football is all close, but no cigar

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Well at least we don’t have to worry about arguing with AP voters not placing Iowa in their Top 25 poll this week.

The Hawkeyes managed to fritter away any chance at rankings, relevance or redemption from last year’s narrow loss to Northwestern by repeatedly, mind-numbingly, ridiculously shooting itself in the foot over and over in a dispiriting overtime loss to the Wildcats in Evanston on Saturday.

As anyone who regularly reads this column knows, I often advocate for giving credit to the opponent and not just focusing on the mistakes of your own team. But for the third time in a loss this season, it was primarily Iowa miscues and basic execution errors that prevented the black and gold from winning.

Failing to catch a punt led to bad field position that resulted in Northwestern’s go-ahead touchdown. A ridiculous false start on fourth-and-less than one late made Iowa kick a tying field goal instead of likely getting a go-ahead touchdown. A blown backfield assignment led to the long run in overtime setting up the Wildcat’s winning score. Dropped passes, a missed field goal and a litany of other errors large and small conspired to prevent what looked like a better Iowa team taking advantage of a pesky (and less error-prone) foe.

This brings me to my other sore spot of the weekend. While I share in the collective angst over this loss, I am a bit perplexed why it has manifested itself in so much vitriolic rage aimed at the Iowa coaches from Iowa fans.

I’ve always believed that a coaching staff’s primary job was to put its team in position to win, and Iowa’s has done that every week. Saturday’s game was there for the taking. But again – just like in the Michigan State game – it was lack of consistency, untimely errors and general screw ups by players that led directly to the loss.

Now, I don’t absolve the staff from all blame. Indeed, it is their job to coach the players up so such errors are few and far between and not seemingly always happening at critical times. But I’m not sure that is a legitimate criticism this season. (People who call me a coaching apologist will call these excuses, but I believe they are objective reasons.)

The biggest one is that 2017 was always going to be a rebuilding year of sorts.

No one wanted the Greg Davis offense to be retired more than me, but adding a new coordinator and other new coaches is always going to result in some growing pains. Throw in the fact Iowa is breaking in a new starting quarterback, virtually all new receiving corps and is playing more true freshman than ever in the Ferentz era and it really isn’t surprising things look hinky and out-of-sorts on the offensive side of the ball.

The critical thing now is for this current crop of Iowa players – and the coaches in new positions – learn from their failures and excel in the future. I am currently reading a biography of Henry Ford, and America’s pre-eminent industrialist frequently talked about failure being the only sure way to eventual improvement. My favorite of his (numerous) quotes on the subject follows:

“Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently.”

This must be the mantra of every Iowa player and coach going forward for the rest of this season.

In addition, it should also be noted that thus far, Iowa has won every game it was favored in and lost every one in which it was an underdog.

While Kirk Ferentz has earned a reputation for slipping up against underdogs, that is not a fair disparagement to throw his way this season, no matter how badly many Hawkeye fans want to believe Northwestern is still the abject failure of a program it was in the 1980s when Hayden Fry routinely hung 50 or more points on them. Being mad that Ferentz doesn’t do the same is just not being very smart about the current landscape of college football or Big 10 history.

One slice of light in the gray cloud of the Northwestern loss is that once again, the game was there for the taking. Unlike last year – when Iowa was run off the field by Penn State and manhandled by Wisconsin – the team hasn’t once looked like it didn’t belong on the same field as its opponent.

Now, this could still happen in a couple weeks when the vaunted Buckeyes come to town, but I think this team – despite its warts and propensity for ill-timed gaffes – has enough raw talent, heart and grit to hang with anyone they play.

And as fans, is there really anything more we are owed?

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Torbee puts the Big 10 media on blast for “disrespect”

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Imagine, if you will, that you are an ink-stained sports scribe for the Toledo Blade, or the Fort Wayne Gazette or the Peoria Journal. Your assignment is to predict which Big 10 basketball teams will finish where in what is likely to be the best conference in college basketball.

It’s a tough job, requiring you to weigh previous results, exiting and incoming personnel, recruiting rankings, coaching history and many other factors. But it’s a required exercise, and now the sorting begins.

Here is Team A’s blind resume to consider:

  • · Previous year’s team finished tied for 4th in the conference race
  • · Four of five starters return, though the lone exit was 1st team All-Big 10
  • · Two of the returners were on the conference All-Freshman team
  • · Team returns conference’s 6th Man of the Year
  • · One of only 3 conference teams to post winning conference record each of past 5 seasons
  • · Starting point guard was 1 of 2 freshman in college basketball with 175 assists and 84 3-pointers
  • · Team returns 77.6 percent of its scoring

Hmmmmm.

Sounds pretty good. This team is predicted to finish ……………………….

EIGHTH?

If you are an Iowa fan, you know that Team A is your beloved Hawkeyes. And if you have been following the preseason college basketball news, you will know that eighth is exactly where the Big 10 media predicted Iowa to finish the 2016-17 conference season.

If this doesn’t put a Rodney Dangerfield-sized chip of disrespect on every Hawkeye player’s shoulder, I can’t imagine what will.

I will go on record right now (seriously, print and save this column) saying if Iowa indeed finishes eighth or lower I will attend Iowa’s last home game in Carver Arena in a Nebraska cheerleader uniform and let Tom Kakert post a pic of it on this webpage. If Nebraska cheerleader uniforms come in that small of a size, that is.

Now I’m not saying that Iowa is a Final Four caliber juggernaut poised to rampage through a very deep, very talented Big 10. But with what it has coming back – and a relatively soft unbalanced conference schedule – it is extremely difficult for me to see any possible way they don’t crack the top five or six at worst.

Add in some eye-opening and unusually optimistic insider rumblings about the elevation of Tyler Cook’s game, Jordan Bohannon’s growth at the point and two big-bodied, big time freshman and the Hype Train might be taking on passengers early and often.

I write this with the full disclosure that I have done next to zero research on Iowa’s conference opponents. I am way too invested in this year’s football season to waste time perusing Wisconsin’s roster or Illinois’ incoming recruits. But I know a good basketball team when I see it, and Iowa is going to have a good basketball team this season.

And while we are feeding coal into the aforementioned Hype Train’s boiler, how can any Iowa basketball fan not be super stoked about Fran McCaffery’s recruiting? Two of his 2017 recruits – Connor McCaffery and Luka Garza are four star recruits and they will be combing with four star, #40 nationally ranked Joe Wieskamp in 2018. After that, more four star, Top 100 types are either committed or in the pipeline, giving Iowa fans more hope for the hoops future than they’ve seen in ages.

So I tell you Mr. Chicago Tribune, Mr. Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel and Ms. Columbus Post-Dispatch know-it-alls: Don’t eat too much at your post-game spreads this season. Because Iowa is going to be serving a huge, heaping pile of crow to you come March.

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Tuesdays With Torbee: Rainy days and Lovie can’t get me down

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To paraphrase one of my favorite comic strips, the underrated Jim’s Journal:

I went to the Iowa-Illinois game Saturday. It was OK.

It seems churlish to call a 45-16 victory over a border rival underwhelming, but there it is. All-in-all, it was one of those days where nothing was terrible but nothing was particularly great, either.

The weather was spotty, with rain dampening the tailgate, but staying dry and warm for the game. Decent, not great.

It was a ho-hum 11 a.m. start on Big Ten Network, not the bright lights and excitement of national television and a night game. Decent, not great.

Iowa’s offense got things going in the second half, after Nate Stanley shook off a late second quarter interception and another pretty bad series right after. Decent, not great.

The run game found life again, with Toren Young acting as thunder to Akrum Wadley’s lightning, but a few too many rushes were still blown up at or behind the line of scrimmage. Decent, not great.

The defense gave up a big handful of giant “chunk” plays, but the bend-but-don’t-break didn’t break, holding Illinois to field goals on three critical drives. Decent, not great.

The crowd was mostly full, and got loud a few times at key points in the game. The band’s Beatles-themed halftime show was boring-as-usual, but the wave formation was neat. Decent, not great.

Special teams unleashed a couple of successful trick plays and Miguel Recinos remains locked in, but the punt game is still a work-in progress. Decent, not great.

I don’t mean for this to come across as complaining or that I didn’t enjoy the eventual dismantling of Lovie Smith’s Illini. I had a blast tailgating with friends as usual and outside of a few anxious moments in the first half, was never worried Iowa was going to deliver a clunker to a bad team.

It’s just that between Illinois being the shadow of a competitive program, a bye week on the horizon, and a couple Big 10 losses already on the books, the stakes just didn’t feel high enough to justify a lot of intensity. Thank goodness the Iowa players didn’t show that same level of apathy.

Much has already been written about the items on the weekly Ferentzian “clean up” list: picking up run blitzes, ball security, wrapping up on one-on-one tackles and other areas of minor concern. But one gigantic positive that I haven’t seen talked about much, but is a harbinger of better things to come (perhaps even yet this season, but definitely in the longer term) is that the only thing that seems to hold this team back at times is simple consistency.

I just don’t see any glaring holes in talent or scheme. And that’s a pretty big change from the past, including as recently as last season.

In 2016, Iowa didn’t look like it belonged on the same field as Penn State and barely was able to keep up with Wisconsin. That was from both a talent side and a scheme side. Those teams looked like they were playing a better, different form of football than Iowa.

Flash-forward to this season, and the only thing holding Iowa back is itself. Both the Penn State and Michigan State games were there for the taking, if only Iowa could have avoided some self-inflicted disasters.

Perhaps the best example of this is the signal caller, sophomore Nate Stanley. Yes, he still has a tendency to overthrow open receivers (hey, OPEN receivers, that’s a new one!). And he can get a little antsy-pantsy handling the ball (maybe one reason the coaches seem loathe to run sneaks with him?) But the dude stands tall in the pocket and absolutely rifles the ball. He also seems to never get rattled or let a screw up linger and cause him to lose confidence.

Like the rest of the team, all Stanley is missing is a bit more consistency.

If Iowa can harness that consistency and put together 60 minutes of football with the offense, defense and special teams all humming at full capacity in each of its remaining games, this can be a team that rises above decency and approaches greatness.

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Sloppy Hangover

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A deflated rushing game leads to Iowa’s second conference loss in East Lansing.  In this episode, we discuss the offense, bouncing back against the Illini at home, and the future of NCAA transfer rules.

 

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Oh so close…

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Barkley was a Superman, but Iowa brought the kryptonite on Defense and nearly pulled off another prime time upset. We pick up the pieces of Saturday’s heartbreak with Tom Kakert of HawkeyeReport.com, and look ahead to a road date with the Spartans.

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