Do KF and KOK "work on" clock management in the offseason?

[scourt]

Sarcasm noted, but there has been no appreciable development in this staff's ability to manage the clock from the time they first stepped on campus up through last year. Not necessarily success in a 2 minute drill, but the ability to actually manage the clock through time outs, spiking the ball, and being cognizant of temporary clock stoppages and the resulting winding of the clock...

I guess I look at it this way. When we hold the ball longer than our opponents,we are managing the clock. This has been a trait of the Hawks ever since the Farentz era started.

To state that the coaching staff doesn't work on every aspect of the game is ludicrous. Have they made mistakes? Of course. Will they make mistakes in the future? You bet. My bet is they will keep the mistakes to a minimum like they already have. They have more knowledge about the game than I, or dare I say most of us will ever have. I trust them.

 

[hawkfan2679]

I guess I look at it this way. When we hold the ball longer than our opponents,we are managing the clock. This has been a trait of the Hawks ever since the Farentz era started.

To state that the coaching staff doesn't work on every aspect of the game is ludicrous. Have they made mistakes? Of course. Will they make mistakes in the future? You bet. My bet is they will keep the mistakes to a minimum like they already have. They have more knowledge about the game than I, or dare I say most of us will ever have. I trust them.

I hear what you are saying. I certainly don't think they got where they are by being football idiots. I am only going to speak for myself here, but I don't mind holding the ball and trying to limit the opposing teams' possessions, thus shortening the game and managing the clock in that manner. But I don't think that is what the OP is getting at.

It's very difficult to "work on" time management in the final 2-4 minutes of half/game sense because each situation provides a unique set of circumstances. You can try to have contingency plans available, but with so many variables, it just makes it difficult to prepare for. So when broached with the situation during the game, they need to be able to act and react to the situation accordingly. That's one thing they haven't really done well.

 

[coonhawk]

All I can say is they have looked panicked at the end of many games aside from the Capitol One Bowl where they truly had no idea what was going on. If coaches panic so do their players example Stanzi last years two minute drill.

 

[thefizz]

I think some of the reasons the Hawks struggle with the 2 minute drill is because the Hawks have a slow paced offense. Coaches and personnel are used to taking their time throughout the game so when it comes to time speed things up they struggle to execute when they have to speed things up.
As one poster mentioned before it could also be true that the coaches do work more on what they consider to be the bigger parts of the game in the first 58 minutes of the game. John Calipari in basketball has said that he doesn't have his team put a whole lot of work into free throws because he feels there are bigger more important parts of the game. I'm not saying I agree with such a philosophy 100%, but I can at least see the theory behind it.
I wish they made more aggressive attempts at scoring before halftime with limited time because it would give them some reps in a real game situation, but I'm not a coach and it's easy to second guess. I'm sure the coaching staff does plenty of things that help the team that I wouldn't even dream of.

 

[scourt]

I hear what you are saying. I certainly don't think they got where they are by being football idiots. I am only going to speak for myself here, but I don't mind holding the ball and trying to limit the opposing teams' possessions, thus shortening the game and managing the clock in that manner. But I don't think that is what the OP is getting at.

It's very difficult to "work on" time management in the final 2-4 minutes of half/game sense because each situation provides a unique set of circumstances. You can try to have contingency plans available, but with so many variables, it just makes it difficult to prepare for. So when broached with the situation during the game, they need to be able to act and react to the situation accordingly. That's one thing they haven't really done well.

I was trying to make the point, that you picked up on, about the game plan of the Hawks is time or ball management.

They definitely need to look at their management of the last minutes of the half/game and I'm sure they have. Captn even said as much after one of the games (that I can't remember who it was we played). But like I said, you have got to believe that they have worked hard at improving on this particular issue.
At least I hope to God they have!

 

[alexzelada]

OK so let's compare elite programs:

OSU
USC
Oregon
Auburn
Florida
Alabama
TCU
Boise ST

How many BCS games have those teams played in in the past 10 years? Iowa has played in two, with a 1-1 record, and those were 8 years apart. Beating the middle tier SEC teams in the Outback bowl year after year isn't worth comparing to Florida or even OSU competing for the National Championship each year.

That's elite, not coasting to 7 wins and barely beating Mizzu in a middle range bowl.

But I do see your point and yes Iowa has done very well compared to most programs in Div 1 and we are lucky cause we could be Iowa State

Read this and tell me what you think?

 

[DBAHawkFan]

I think you're missing my point and the point of this thread. I'm not saying the coaching staff has done a poor OVERALL job.

We're talking about can the coaching staff make offseason improvements to get Iowa over the hump most years.

KF has consistently gotten Iowa to 8 wins, and when compared to other programs over a long stretch of time, that's a good stat. Almost like the tortiose running the race.

I'll say my point again, for Iowa to get over the hump, to be with OSU (how about you compare how many Big10 titles they have to Iowa in the same span), everything needs to be perfect. You cannot control injuries, so I take that out of the equation for this discussion....

So to get over the hump we need sound coaching. Not wasting timeouts, learning when to spike the ball, making minor adjustments on both offense and defense.

This is something that staff has struggled with since the beginning, and honestly it puts a lot of our wins into the luck category (Indiana this year would be prime example).

But yes, Iowa has performed very well record wise compared to other schools, but I'm not one to always throw that argument or stat out there any time someone critizes the staff's shortcomings.

Iowa is a 7-8 win school a year with the easy non conference. Now think about how good our record could be if we could actually consistently beat the Indiana and Northwesterns!!!!

 

[SDK46]

They haven't fixed it yet since they started here, so don't expect much improvement.

There's only been a few changes or improvements we've seen out of them

1. Better preperation for bowl games
2. Willing to play more underclassmen
3. Soup hiring has brought stability to WR group, i.e catching the freaking ball

That's not to say they're doing a bad job at everything else, and more of a statement that doing things their way has produced some pretty good results. I do believe clock management and on field awareness (FAKE #%#% PUNT!!!!) are two areas if improved upon, could generate at least one more win a year.

And I should mention that most of us want Iowa to become a top program in the country, or elite if possible. Most of us would agree that Iowa right now is a typical 7-8 win a year program on average. Some years we get the bounce and we get 10 wins, and other years we are unlucky or we have bone headed decisions and we get our 7-8 wins.

It's almost like golf. You start out at say a 25 handicap, get a lot of practice in and now you're hitting the ball better, so you immediately notice a improvement in score, so you're a 10-12 handicap now. The effort to reduce your handicap from a 10-12 handicap to single digits is a lot harder than it was from shooting 95 to 83. Now you've got to shore up the small details, reading the greens better, or knowing the angles to the green for your approach shot, any advantage that you can get will increase your chances of a lower/better score.

Same thing with the Iowa team. When you're now on a more even playing field with your opponent, doing the small things, i.e special team play, clock management, substitutions to keep players fresh, and defense/offense adjustments.....those can keep you from having a spectacular season, to an average one like we just experienced.

Excellent post.

 

[alexzelada]

I think you're missing my point and the point of this thread. I'm not saying the coaching staff has done a poor OVERALL job.

We're talking about can the coaching staff make offseason improvements to get Iowa over the hump most years.

KF has consistently gotten Iowa to 8 wins, and when compared to other programs over a long stretch of time, that's a good stat. Almost like the tortiose running the race.

I'll say my point again, for Iowa to get over the hump, to be with OSU (how about you compare how many Big10 titles they have to Iowa in the same span), everything needs to be perfect. You cannot control injuries, so I take that out of the equation for this discussion....

So to get over the hump we need sound coaching. Not wasting timeouts, learning when to spike the ball, making minor adjustments on both offense and defense.

This is something that staff has struggled with since the beginning, and honestly it puts a lot of our wins into the luck category (Indiana this year would be prime example).

But yes, Iowa has performed very well record wise compared to other schools, but I'm not one to always throw that argument or stat out there any time someone critizes the staff's shortcomings.

Iowa is a 7-8 win school a year with the easy non conference. Now think about how good our record could be if we could actually consistently beat the Indiana and Northwesterns!!!!

First off I have no problem if you want to attack the coaches on specific shortcomings. My problem is that you think Iowa is less of a program than BSU and TCU. Your all or nothing approach when viewing Iowa's excellence (you're either elite or don't bother coming to the field) reeks of (pardon the pun) elitism.

You're missing the point by doing a different kind of cherry-picking. Do you realize the number of programs that AVG 8 wins over the life of their program?

Out of close to 120 FBS schools would you care to tell the board what that number is?

If you clicked on the link I provided you'd be shocked who Iowa has outperformed since 2000.

 

[ColumbusHawk]

Obviously, the staff never works on clock management. The Michigan State game in 2009 & the Penn State game in 2008 are wonderful examples that the coaching staff doesn't know what they are doing.

You can always cherry pick the games you want to make your point. Stupid question.

How about this one. Does Iowa's coaching staff "work on" extra points in the off season. Iowa's extra points in critical games was atrocious. The missed extra point in the Wisconsin game was just as important as the "two minute" drill. I really wonder if Iowa worked on extra points in the off season.

 

[seepig]

We don't want to cornfuse kids you know this new fangled 2 min. offense is a fad just like the Wing T and other high falootin nonsense. We know who we are and we are going to stick with that no matter what! Much like we hear about our D...college QBs aren't patient enough to throw the ball 70 times a game for 5-7 yds a play. Can you say NW, Wisc., lets see Mizzou.

 

[hawkfan2679]

Obviously, the staff never works on clock management. The Michigan State game in 2009 & the Penn State game in 2008 are wonderful examples that the coaching staff doesn't know what they are doing.

You can always cherry pick the games you want to make your point. Stupid question.

So, for our clock management to be successful, all we need to do is hope the other team gives us 15 yard DPI penalties (happened in both of the games you mentioned) and maybe blows a coverage here or there (happened in the MSU game on Stross's long catch and run). And not to mention the PSU game wasn't exactly perfect...as mentioned earlier, we called a timeout too soon, leaving time for a kickoff which COULD have been critical given we had a excessive celebration penalty called against us.

You don't have to cherry pick games to make the point that we're not very good at time management. Look at all the times we're breaking the huddle with very little time on the clock...burning timeouts. Worse yet, there will be stoppages in play of some sort, the refs re-wind the clock, and for some reason we still don't have a play in and we either rush to get it off or take a delay penalty. Those situations happen with stunning regularity. The inexcusable Wisconsin game this year just reinforced that we aren't great at that facet of coaching.

 

[hawkIhoops]

If KOK can't figure out how to move the ball against the big ten's worst defenses, I think he should work on his resume, not clock management. If the offense lays an egg again this year, KOK needs to move on. The defense can't pitch shutouts year after year and regardless of who we have at QB, RB, WR, TE, our offense, even to the casual fan, is extremely predictable and vanilla.

 

[KnightHawk9]

Look at all the times we're breaking the huddle with very little time on the clock...burning timeouts. Worse yet, there will be stoppages in play of some sort, the refs re-wind the clock, and for some reason we still don't have a play in and we either rush to get it off or take a delay penalty. Those situations happen with stunning regularity. The inexcusable Wisconsin game this year just reinforced that we aren't great at that facet of coaching.

I've noticed that too. The thing that really gets my goat: at the beginning of the game, we seem to be snapping the ball with 1 or 2 secs on the clock; at the end of the game when we're nursing a 7 point lead, we sprint up to the line and snap it with 15 secs left. Mind-boggling!

 

[Billso]

Coach Ferentz has often made the point that Iowa's margin for error is much less than many other schools. And that you have to focus on things you can control, rather than complaining about things you can't control (like the state's relatively small output of D1 players)

I strongly agree. So... why would you not make every possible effort to fix this aspect of the game, which you fully control?

A coach with D1 experience elsewhere observed Iowa's game sideline closely in some games the last few years, and described it to a mutual friend as "panicked" in game-end situations, relative to what he's seen elsewhere. Not good. The first step to fixing a problem is recognizing you have a problem.