Just want to shed some of my thoughts on the last 3 years and how we got to this low point. Three years ago we lost our first two games to Purdue and Northwestern. Both were winnable games, turnovers, penalties, inability to control the ball late were contributing factors to those losses. I was disappointed because we had waited so long for the season to begin and looked very average at best. But I didn’t put a lot of blame on our new QB. I really felt he needed some time to settle in. Anyway, we ran the table. Only two teams really played us competitively (Illinois and Nebraska). Illinois took it to us in the first half and we were fortunate to be down only 14-13 at half. (Remember when we could actually score 13 in a half? Lol). Anyway, Spencer lit it up in the 2nd half with 3 touchdowns. IMO he was by far the best player on the field. I thought, well we finally have our QB for the future. That season ended on a downer with Michigan cancelling, as well as Missouri. Hard to swallow, but looking forward to the following year. We opened with Indiana and Iowa State. Man, we could be 0-2 again. But we were lights against Indiana and played well against the Clones. Everyone was praising our D and figuring the offense would soon catch up. Well, we had Kent State and Colorado State to get the offense going. Petras hadn’t looked terrible, but it was hard to see any improvement. So, we get the two wins, but it was like this team had a lot of question marks on offense. Penn State comes to town and Kinnick was rockin. Defense was solid and knock their QB out of the game. Still, it wasn’t looking great at half, then Tory Taylor did his thing and we won’t the game due to field position. Petras did throw a nice touchdown to Ragaini, but for the most part, our offense looked pretty stale. With 3 minutes to go in the game, I think we intercept and have the ball on about their 35. The first play we run an end around and pickup about 5. The next two plays we take a knee. And this is what I feel is the beginning of all our offensive problems. Who does that? Who just says we are going to punt he ball and give you a chance to score? In his post game comments Kirk said, “I felt better with the defense out there”. We win the game….we are ranked number 2. All is good in Hawkeye land. (For one week) Purdue smothers us. Petras was bad….our defense was bad. Purdue threw the ball at will. And maybe the worst outcome: Charlie Jones liked Purdue’s passing game. No way were we deserving of a number 2 ranking. As it turned out, we really hadn’t beaten anyone. All of our wins were against mediocre teams at best. We get a bye week and then a trip to Madison. We should have just turned the bus around. We did run a QB twice in a row and couldn’t pick up a yard. But credit that Hawkeye team; we win out and “limp” our way into the championship. I say “limp” because Wisconsin payed an egg vs. the Gophers. Wisconsin was clearly better than we were. (Actually the west was so bad it didn’t matter who we sent).
No comment vs Michigan other than we left some points on the field in the first half. In the Kentucky game, we are up 17-13. About 3 minutes to go. Fourth and maybe a foot on the 50. And we frickin punt! I get it….we ran two QB sneaks in a row against Wisconsin and fail….lol. We punt….ball goes into the end zone….for a net of 25 yards. They march down the field and win the game. The point of all this is our offense has been poor the last couple of years. Our coaches don’t have any confidence in it. And now it’s come to this. We are not poor. We are beyond poor. It’s on everyone. Spencer has regressed to the point that he does need to sit….he is mentally broken. Very sad to see this. He’s not the first QB under Ferentz to regress, but none of the others have been this poor. Of course, none of the others had this poor of a line. Everybody on that staff has to own this dismal display of offense. I’ve never seen an offense with so many negative yardage plays. And now we are getting penalized. This is truly broken but I think we all saw this coming last year…..but this bad? This is hard to swallow. I don’t have the answers. And, unfortunately, I don’t think the coaches do either. For the first time in Kirk’s tenure, I have lost confidence in his decision making. But again, I have no answers.
No comment vs Michigan other than we left some points on the field in the first half. In the Kentucky game, we are up 17-13. About 3 minutes to go. Fourth and maybe a foot on the 50. And we frickin punt! I get it….we ran two QB sneaks in a row against Wisconsin and fail….lol. We punt….ball goes into the end zone….for a net of 25 yards. They march down the field and win the game. The point of all this is our offense has been poor the last couple of years. Our coaches don’t have any confidence in it. And now it’s come to this. We are not poor. We are beyond poor. It’s on everyone. Spencer has regressed to the point that he does need to sit….he is mentally broken. Very sad to see this. He’s not the first QB under Ferentz to regress, but none of the others have been this poor. Of course, none of the others had this poor of a line. Everybody on that staff has to own this dismal display of offense. I’ve never seen an offense with so many negative yardage plays. And now we are getting penalized. This is truly broken but I think we all saw this coming last year…..but this bad? This is hard to swallow. I don’t have the answers. And, unfortunately, I don’t think the coaches do either. For the first time in Kirk’s tenure, I have lost confidence in his decision making. But again, I have no answers.
