Game Day Coaching

[WinOneThisCentury]

I watched the first half again and I'm just shocked with Iowa's inability to recognize what it needed to do to win that game, or at least make it competitive. All they needed to do was watch what Nebraska was doing. Pounding the football against a defense that has trouble stopping the run or at least holding up against it.

If you watch that game again...check out the push our offensive line was getting. It was unbelievable in most cases. Certainly, there were lapses at times, but there is no doubt in my mind that if we would have run the ball more and had the mentality that were are going to pound the rock on three consecutive plays, that we would done exactly what Nebraska did to us. Coker should have run 38 times yesterday.

We get so focused on being BALANCED that we fail to recognize all we needed to do against that defense is pound the ball. That's what Michigan did. Their corners were playing press coverage, so essentially they were out of the running game all together. It was there.

The other thing, and this will cause dismay from some, but Coker is an average back. If a top tier running back was running yesterday, he would have housed a couple of those holes. He also made bad cut back decisions a number of times. I know he had 1350 yards or whatever, but he played behind a very good o-line and a suspect schedule of defensive teams.

 

[BSpringsteen]

I watched the first half again and I'm just shocked with Iowa's inability to recognize what it needed to do to win that game, or at least make it competitive. All they needed to do was watch what Nebraska was doing. Pounding the football against a defense that has trouble stopping the run or at least holding up against it.

If you watch that game again...check out the push our offensive line was getting. It was unbelievable in most cases. Certainly, there were lapses at times, but there is no doubt in my mind that if we would have run the ball more and had the mentality that were are going to pound the rock on three consecutive plays, that we would done exactly what Nebraska did to us. Coker should have run 38 times yesterday.

We get so focused on being BALANCED that we fail to recognize all we needed to do against that defense is pound the ball. That's what Michigan did. Their corners were playing press coverage, so essentially they were out of the running game all together. It was there.

The other thing, and this will cause dismay from some, but Coker is an average back. If a top tier running back was running yesterday, he would have housed a couple of those holes. He also made bad cut back decisions a number of times. I know he had 1350 yards or whatever, but he played behind a very good o-line and a suspect schedule of defensive teams.

great post - 100% agree on everything.

Coker is fine or even great as your workhorse, but you need a HR threat.

 

[GhostofBTT]

I wish you two were coaching the games.

 

[MoseSchrute]

Patty Fitz's team ran it on them pretty good, and yes, Coker looked about half as fast as Neb's backs.

 

[Elwood]

I agree 100%. Really bad game plan. Run right at them, this is a winnable game.

 

[seepig]

I wish you two were coaching the games.

Only those with glaring case of Homerism would disagree withwinone. Go watch girls field hockey you obviously have more knowledge of that sport.

 

[GhostofBTT]

Only those with glaring case of Homerism would disagree withwinone. Go watch girls field hockey you obviously have more knowledge of that sport.

I guess I am an expert on girl's field hockey. I mean, if I watch it on TV, then obviously I am just as qualified to coach the team as anyone.

 

[WinOneThisCentury]

I love that argument. You obviously don't know enough about football to make a critic of a coaching staff that has spent their life teaching and coaching. You know what, there are ton of people who have played the sport at high levels, and have watched the sport closely over their lives. They understand the game and how it's played at the college level. I've been very impressed with the insight of people on this board and what they saw in the game...not everyone, mind you, but I respect that certain posters understand the game.

Go watch the game again, and tell me I'm wrong about what's in the OP. Focus on our offensive line, especially in the first half. We didn't take advantage of the fact that they were controlling the line of scrimmage. I would argue that this is a similar situation, albeit against a better team, as what happened in Minnesota. We didn't do anything/enough with the opportunities when we were controlling the line of scrimmage in the first half.

 

[GhostofBTT]

I love that argument. You obviously don't know enough about football to make a critic of a coaching staff that has spent their life teaching and coaching. You know what, there are ton of people who have played the sport at high levels, and have watched the sport closely over their lives. They understand the game and how it's played at the college level. I've been very impressed with the insight of people on this board and what they saw in the game...not everyone, mind you, but I respect that certain posters understand the game.

Go watch the game again, and tell me I'm wrong about what's in the OP. Focus on our offensive line, especially in the first half. We didn't take advantage of the fact that they were controlling the line of scrimmage. I would argue that this is a similar situation, albeit against a better team, as what happened in Minnesota. We didn't do anything/enough with the opportunities when we were controlling the line of scrimmage in the first half.

I certainly didn't mean that you don't have the right to criticise the coaches because you're not a coach. I certainly have my issues with the coaches at times.

However, I think fans, including you, tend to simplify things through the benefit of hindsight, and then delcare with absolute certainty that YOU were right and THEY were wrong.

For instance, you claim that we were too worried about balance and didn't focus on running Coker enough. Now please don't excuse this as an excuse for the coaching staff, but here is some rationale:

Iowa's best player is a WR, so they are not going to completely ditch the passing game in favor of running 40 times because they need to get the ball to their best playmaker. Also, our first and second backup RBs were not available for the game yesterday, so the coaches probably prepared a game plan this week to have more balance between run and pass.

Simply put, I don't think coaching failed us yesterday. It wasn't perfect, but I think a failure of execution by both the QB and his recievers were a much bigger issue than the coaches. I place more blame on the loss for Marvin McNutt than Kirk Ferentz.

 

[BSpringsteen]

I agree that kf wasn't the problem yesterday - it was KOK. I'm good with balance but you also have to play the hot hand.

 

[Cory]

I agree with everything you said. You get balance after you continue to pound the ball for the first half then go to play action, exactly like Nebraska did to us. This balance idea has lost all it's legs. "Scratch where it itches." When are we going to do whatever it takes to win?

 

[Cory]

I certainly didn't mean that you don't have the right to criticise the coaches because you're not a coach. I certainly have my issues with the coaches at times.

However, I think fans, including you, tend to simplify things through the benefit of hindsight, and then delcare with absolute certainty that YOU were right and THEY were wrong.

For instance, you claim that we were too worried about balance and didn't focus on running Coker enough. Now please don't excuse this as an excuse for the coaching staff, but here is some rationale:

Iowa's best player is a WR, so they are not going to completely ditch the passing game in favor of running 40 times because they need to get the ball to their best playmaker. Also, our first and second backup RBs were not available for the game yesterday, so the coaches probably prepared a game plan this week to have more balance between run and pass.

Simply put, I don't think coaching failed us yesterday. It wasn't perfect, but I think a failure of execution by both the QB and his recievers were a much bigger issue than the coaches. I place more blame on the loss for Marvin McNutt than Kirk Ferentz.

GBTT,

It makes it sound like you are fine with the gameplan and it's our QB and WRs fault that Nebby has two pro corners who can cover man to man. What ever happened going with what works to win? If you are having success running the ball then you keep doing it until they can stop it and then you play action them to death.

I disagree that we had to have balance to save Coker. If that is the case then our coaches truly don't gameplan to win games. If that is true then the people who are calling for change are correct and it should happen now.

 

[hawkeye2011]

We were whipping them up front yesterday. Problem is Coker is good for 4 yards when he should get 15, or 10 yards when it should be a big gain.

I thought Coker had improved as the year went on, but yesterday he seemed tentative again.

Several times it came down to a one on one situation with a safety coming down late in run support. At this level It helps if you have a guy who can make a play in space one on one. He wasn't able to do that yesterday. Consequently we ended up with 4 yards instead of a big gain.

Outside of McNutt there isn't much explosion on this offense. And even McNutt struggled to get open yesterday.

Bottom line is you have to be able to run the ball consistently a against a seven man front. It sure helps if you can get an explosive play every now and then.

That being said there were a few times kok had me scratching my head yesterday when we were in Nebraska territory in particular.

 

[archfiend]

Coker was exhausted. The fault did not lay with Coker, but with Iowa never establishing a backup running back.

 

[GhostofBTT]

GBTT,

It makes it sound like you are fine with the gameplan and it's our QB and WRs fault that Nebby has two pro corners who can cover man to man. What ever happened going with what works to win? If you are having success running the ball then you keep doing it until they can stop it and then you play action them to death.

I disagree that we had to have balance to save Coker. If that is the case then our coaches truly don't gameplan to win games. If that is true then the people who are calling for change are correct and it should happen now.

My guess is that the game plan was, as it is for every game, to get Marvin McNutt as many touches as possible. I think that is a smart strategy, but the execution by both Marvin and Jamie were very poor.

I agree with you though, that we probably should have run more in the 1st half, just to keep the defense off the field. I think Nebraska made some good adjustments to our running game at half time, but we could have had more success during the first half.