Do you trust this offense to score 24?

[Tfunkhawkeye]

I wasn't only thinking about the next game(ISU)- just that the first game didn't (and the weather was the major factor) adjust my preseason concerns.

One positive take away from first game, and this coming from a fan with not high expectations of JVB, he was outstanding in a hurricane.

I learned nothing from the D in this game.

 

[kEvanson]

I am very confident that the offense can accomplish that. McNutt is such a deadly weapon against opposing defenses. Coker will recover from his fumbling woes, and start trucking foes. Vandy has a nice arm, and when he starts developing better chemistry with the tight ends is when we are going to see greatness.

As far as defense goes, I am a little more pessimistic. The defensive line did well at pursuing the quarterback and forcing him out of the pocket, but we cannot let mobile quarterbacks run around and avoid sacks. We all know what happens when our defense does that (Dan Persa). We are lucky that Tre Lamb runs a 5 second 40, because he could have made our defense look silly. It's about pursuit of the defensive line to bring pressure, but they need to get him down when we have the opportunity.

 

[storminspank]

Yep.

Yep.

 

[homerHAWKeye777]

I learned nothing from the D in this game.

I'd say that you weren't paying much attention then. I personally thought that several things could be gleaned from the game ....

- Tenn Tech's big-play WR ... a guy who has been getting NFL looks ... had 5 receptions for only 40 yards against Iowa's starting D. That is a statement that Iowa's secondary was doing its job!

- Bernstine PROVED that he's come to play this season. That's definitely something that I personally learned from the game. It's terrific news too! I'm very happy for the guy!

- Alvis displayed that he can, in fact, be pretty darn disruptive. He got a lot penetration ... and could be a real danger if he also proves that he can finish plays.

- Daniel was possibly one of the bigger surprises in my eyes. I thought that he played really solidly. He did a pretty good job of executing his responsibilities. He really could be good for us this year.

- Overall, I was pretty darn pleased with Kirksey's tackling. I think that Nielsen and Morris were already pretty "known" commodities ... but, for a first game, I was pretty pleased with Kirksey's play. He's going to be good.

- Overall, I think that Iowa's back 7 on D tackled better than I would have expected for a first game. There were still missed tackles ... and plenty of things for guys to clean up ... but I think that there were plenty of positives too.

- While I was disappointed that our 2nd and 3rd teamers ended up giving a score ... I at least liked the fact that Tenn Tech was forced to work for their score. The Tenn Tech O had to execute pretty well in order to earn that score. While ideally you'd like to see our lower teamers being a bit more dominant and/or disruptive ... at least the guys weren't making catastrophic mistakes.


As for a few "negatives" ....

- There still was a blown assignment or two in coverage. That's going to need to get corrected. Fortunately, Tenn Tech wasn't able to exploit it.

- We were clearly still a bit too "soft" up the middle. They had a bit too much success on some of their interior runs.

- When a guy gets freed up in the backfield ... you need to finish the play. Our guys know that ... but they need to do it too.


All in all, I thought that the D surpassed my expectation.

 

[NewMexHawk]

"I think that ISU is going to play a lot better against Iowa than they did against UNI."

That would take a lot...