Defense on the field 48 minutes; unheard of but still missing some pieces

[uihawk82]

I have never seen that time of possession disparity in sixty years. Really all on the offense but the defense is missing Shannon, Van Ness, (Campbell was going), missing Merriweather. Those players are very hard to replace.

I still think I Iowa defense can be very stout but hard under these circumstances.

 

[83Hawk]

I have never seen that time of possession disparity in sixty years. Really all on the offense but the defense is missing Shannon, Van Ness, (Campbell was going), missing Merriweather. Those players are very hard to replace.

I still think I Iowa defense can be very stout but hard under these circumstances.

The defense is still good, just not as good as last year. They need an offense that can sustain drives. Unfortunately Iowa does not have that.

I hate to say it, but the offense could very well be worse this year. We'll see what happens next week.

 

[mlb1399]

No defenses are built to be on the field that long. They were holding their own but they’re going to gas if the offense can’t put together some drives. I’d like to see a better pass rush but this defense is good enough to win 10-11 games. As it always is, our offense is a detriment to this team.

 

[jberesford]

I looked into this one a little bit. I started paying attention to yards and points PER PLAY last year. With an offense so unbelievably shitty I didn't think per game stats were an accurate representation of overall defense since it lead to having defend so many more possessions than other teams due to so many 3 and outs and always defending short fields.

Iowa led the country in that stat last year at 4.0. (Also led in points per play) Even AFTER last night they are ranked #11 with 4.2 yards this year.

For comparison sake the offense is ranked 117th in that stat and was 126th last year. No other team that actually won games or even participating in a major conference is anywhere near them.

So bottom line is the Ferentzi can shove that complementary football bullshit up their ass because one unit MORE than covers the other while getting zero 'complementary' help from the other. Even without scoring but simply eating up some clock Penn State doesn't have time to get to 31. Its like the defense literally had to defend 6 or 7 quarters worth of possessions last night, not just 4.

 

[rfgiowa]

It's criminal how long the D was out on the field. Most teams would have put 50 points up minimum with that type of time possession.

 

[bourbon n blues]

It's criminal how long the D was out on the field. Most teams would have put 50 points up minimum with that type of time possession.

Psu was close to that however Iowa was trying and yes they were gassed but they never folded.

Most teams wouldn’t have sustained drives against Iowa enough to tire them out.

 

[PSU Mike]

It's criminal how long the D was out on the field. Most teams would have put 50 points up minimum with that type of time possession.

Hawks played the game they wanted on D. 97 plays is usually good for 2-3 turnovers. 4.1 per play is great D in the abstract.

 

[RoundRock620]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, ... not an excuse if you claim you are an elite defense. A football game is played for 12 minutes anyway. The rest is scratching balls around.

 

[im4hawks50595]

D is still needs to rotate some young guys in their to keep players fresh, Brian Allen D end and Thompson at D tackle to start especially when your offemse is crap and you know t.o.p is going to be lopsided.