Glenn Mason Territory

ChosenChildren said:
Springsteen, anyone who thinks 5-3 is the minimum expectation for a record in the Big Ten should give up his HN Doctorate.

You are living in fantasy land. I know you are extremely intelligent, but you have no perspective about where Iowa has been and how the world of football and potential football recruits actually views us.

You did study the trends, and you noticed that Ferentz is 21-20 in the Big Ten recently, for a winning percentage of 53%. Your argument, apparently, is that 53% is not acceptable. Your implication (clearly) is that things need to change.

Iowa played 76 seasons of Big Ten football before Fry/Ferentz came along. What do you think the total winning percentage in Big Ten games was for our beloved Hawkeyes?

36%

We were the laughingstocks of the Big Ten for 76 years. The bottom feeders. The cellar dwellers. Irrelevant, just like Iowa basketball has been for the past 6 seasons.

I'll take a 53% winning percentage every year. I'm sorry, but you cannot convince me otherwise. The good news is that Ferentz has had numerous seasons where he won 5 or 6 (or more) Big Ten games. It will happen again.

It is absolutely incredible to me that you express dissatisfaction with this coach. If you don't believe that we can return to 36% or less, carefully study what has happened to our basketball program. Everyone thought Lickliter would take us to another level. He did it all right - the bottom level. It can happen in football as well.
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I'm not saying he is right, but why is it wrong to expect 5-3? Is it better to expect 3-5 since that is what Iowa did in 76 years before HF/KF? No, we expect KF to be better than that. He has been 5-3 over the last 8 or 9 years or whatever. That is what we should expect.
And you would be happy with 4-4 every year. That's not good in my opinion, why settle for mediocrity cause we're Iowa. "we are iowa so 4-4 is great". That is a horrible attitude.
 


I don't think people aren't saying KF should be fired because we lose some games. I'm not saying we should fire KF, but I do get upset because the games we do lose... We should win(with a few exceptions).

It's more about who we lose to and how we lose. We lost to an absolutely awful Gopher team. We lose to NW almost every year. We had to block 2 field goals to beat UNI. Almost all of our games are close... Because of in-game decisions and/or poor preparation/lack of ability or willingness to adapt during the game and clock management. That is what is frustrating. That we can and do beat teams like florida, LSU, SC, and Mizz... But lose to NW every year? Get beat by MN? Have to pull off amazing comebacks against lesser teams like indiana?
We should be stomping these teams, but we don't. That isn't because we can't... It's because the coaches aren't doing something right. The players aren't calling the plays and coming up with the gamelan, the coaches are. In very few cases we lose games due to player's not executing.

If everyone on the field and in the stands knows it is going to be a run up the middle...and you still call a run up the middle... It is very hard to be successful.

That is why I get frustrated. It isn't that we lose games... It's that we lose games that we shouldn't be losing. We lose games when we are clearly the better team and the game has no business even being close.

Like I said, I don't want to fire KF, but there are definitely areas where the staff needs to step it up or change.

We can't keep playing to our opponent's level. We need to play to win.
 


No, here is what I am saying (you can interpret it any way you want; that is the beauty of this board):

1. People love to cite historical trends and records to support their argument. I am fine with that.
2. But if you are going to do that, then look at the TOTAL HISTORY of Iowa football.
3. Based on that total history, here is what I come up with:

A 3-5 Big Ten record is average for Iowa.
4-4 is above average.
5-3 is a great season.
6-2 is fabulous and hardly ever happens.
Better than 6-2? One for the ages.

That is what history teaches us about Iowa football. Ferentz has been winning at far above the average.

Here is another way of looking at it: Before Fry and Ferentz, Iowa was winning about 48% of their total games.

Fry and Ferentz are winning at about a 60% clip. Way above average. Enjoy the ride.
 


Yeah Chosen Children - if you want to look at numbers from half a century ago...

I mean, the United States once had 49 states. Does that mean Alaska doesn't count now?
 






ChosenChildren said:
Springsteen:

Well, let's throw out everything that happened before 1980. That seems to be your argument.

Lame, dude:(
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Yes, that is my argument. After 31 years of being a respectable football program, the ntion that we can just slip back into an afterthought is as unrealistic as me saying my expectations are to play in a BCS bowl game every year.
 


I'm not going to post anymore on this topic, so everyone else can have the last word.

I will add one last thought: One day you will get your wish and Ferentz will either retire, or move to the NFL, or, God forbid, he will be fired. One of those outcomes is inevitable and it will probably happen sooner than you think.

And then all of the amateur, lame brain experts on this board who are nothing more than Monday Morning Quarterbacks (myself included) will get to see how his successor does.

I humbly predict the following outcome: Not as good as Ferentz. Same outcome we have experienced in basketball post Davis.

Oh, and by the way, Ferentz is a hall of fame coach and will be in College Hall of Fame someday, next to Fry. You can book that one.
 


I hope we are both posting on this board after Ferentz is gone. It will be real interesting. I think you are in for a big shock. The Big Ten has changed since Fry was the coach (Nebraska and Penn State were not in the league during most of his tenure). It will be a 14 or 16 league and Iowa will have a very hard time competing. The implication of everything you are saying is that somehow Iowa should be a big-time program like Ohio State. My argument is that it is very difficult for Iowa to sustain any type of success, and that there will be peaks and valleys.

One of us will be proven correct over time.
 


I don't think that Ferentz is a bad coach at all. I don't blame his coaching decisions for losses, nor do I blame his scheme.

I blame his recruiting, ability to keep players on campus and inability to coach up 4 star recruits to the same degree he coaches up walk ons.

I think as a face, ambassador, teacher and Sunday-Friday coach, he is tops. I do think he deserves some criticism for his in game coaching but not enough to be fired over.

Bottom line, we don't have the talent to compete. We once did, not so long ago. That is because of three things... not landing enough targets, missing on too many of the targets you do get, and relying too heavily on coaching up the guys no one else wants.

That has given us some incredible stories over the year but it is coming home to roost right now.

I want to be clear about that... I like KF and don't want him fired. I do think he needs to overhaul his recruiting though.
 


Well, bingo. I agree with you 100%. It is all about recruiting to get to the level that you desire. Of course, I want it as well. There was nothing more exciting than the 2002 and 2009 seasons when we were ranked near the top of the polls.

You nailed it: It is extremely difficult to recruit players to Iowa. My point, in a nutshell, is that I'm not sure anyone can do it consistently. That is the tragedy of being an Iowa fan in FB and BB: We are always competing against teams at the top who have better talent. It's tough to compete year in and year out for championships when you just can't get the horses!
 


ChosenChildren said:
Well, bingo. I agree with you 100%. It is all about recruiting to get to the level that you desire. Of course, I want it as well. There was nothing more exciting than the 2002 and 2009 seasons when we were ranked near the top of the polls.

You nailed it: It is extremely difficult to recruit players to Iowa. My point, in a nutshell, is that I'm not sure anyone can do it consistently. That is the tragedy of being an Iowa fan in FB and BB: We are always competing against teams at the top who have better talent. It's tough to compete year in and year out for championships when you just can't get the horses!
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And my point is that using Iowa as a crutch is ********.

Kids LOVE Iowa City, they LOVE IT. We have great facilities, send kids to the NFL routinely, play in a great conference and are on tv every week.

There is no reason why Iowa City is hard to recruit to and Nebraska is easy. There is no reason why Iowa City is hard to recruit to and Madison is easy.
There is no reason why Iowa City is hard to recruit to and Morgantown is easy.
 


Well, you may feel that way, but we seem to have a hard time recruiting the top talent in both sports.

I spent 4 hours with Hayden Fry in a golf cart once (many years ago), and that was the topic. Basically, Hayden said that the challenge is to get the top prospect to "visit" Iowa City. Once they made the visit and saw the facilities and the game day atmosphere, Iowa had a chance. But the challenge was to get the prospect to make the visit. It is extremely difficult, and many of the top prospects don't even give us a good look by making the visit.

Also, please remember one thing: Unlike Nebraska, we have to share the State with the Cyclones. They recruit many of the same prospects we are recruiting. Get rid of Iowa State as a competing football institution, and we are Nebraska with a little more population.

You have certainly nailed it: It is all about recruiting. Where we differ is that you believe we should be able to raise the talent level; I respectfully submit that it will never happen (why should the next 50 years be different than the last 50?).

Finally, you talk about NFL prospects. Ferentz historically has taken lightly recruited players and turned many of them into NFL prospects. The national prospect isn't coming to Iowa to make it to the NFL; he can go to Ohio State or Alabama (or, frankly, Michigan) and make the NFL that way.
 


Nebraska is #6 alltime in college football wins....sorry but that means something in the recruiting wars.
Nebraska has far more college football tradition than Iowa. It is a fact.
Their stadium is being upgraded to 100k, Iowa is at 70k because ISU drains away 40k.
Madison is a quarter of a million city vs Iowa City being 60,000...big difference,like 4 times larger.
Iowa is a boutique school, stuck in farmland country, 5 hours away from an urban setting. It hurts Iowa in recruiting african american bb and football players. Denial is no way to understand the challenge.
 


JH Hawk, thank you so much. Fantastic points. You nailed it 100 times better than I could!!! You just summarized the challenge of Iowa FB and BB. It will never change. That is why we need to keep good coaches like Lute Olson, Tom Davis and Kirk Ferentz, and not drive them away with our unrealistic expectations and view of the sports world through "rose colored glasses."

The challenge, and I hate to say it, is how to recruit the elite bb and fb players. We really struggle to get them to visit Iowa and to seriously consider Iowa. They are usually from an urban setting, and just freak out about the prospect of attending a rural, snow belt school.
 


BSpringsteen said:
THAT IS WHAT I AM LOOKING AT!!!

THAT IS WHY I SAID THAT MY EXPECTATION WAS 5-3 IN THE BIG TEN WITH 4-0 OR 3-1 OUT OF CONFERENCE TO GET TO 8-4 AS AN EXPECTATION.

IN THE LAST 5 YEARS KF'S BIG TEN RECORD:

2-6
4-4
5-3
6-2
4-4

THAT IS A TOTAL OF 21-19. MY EXPECTATION WOULD BE FOR 25-15. HE IS BASICALLY ONE GAME OFF OF IT.

Anyone who thinks the Bowl Game is the most important game of the season is living in 1965.
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I think it's pretty funny that you are trying to count the non-conference as 3-1 or 4-0 when we usually play at least 2 ****** teams. You think those games count more than a bowl game against a quality opponent?
 


UW doesn't always get into the top 15 nationally in recruiting, for what it's worth.

Madison is well over 200k, is in a state that has more population than Iowa, is even closer to Chicago (less than 150 miles)...

It is also routinely rated as one of the best cities in the US, the campus is really attractive, the athletic facilities are top notch, and has a good gameday atmosphere.

I despise the Badgers, but I would think this town wouldn't be a tough sell.
 


BSpringsteen said:
And my point is that using Iowa as a crutch is ********.

Kids LOVE Iowa City, they LOVE IT. We have great facilities, send kids to the NFL routinely, play in a great conference and are on tv every week.

There is no reason why Iowa City is hard to recruit to and Nebraska is easy. There is no reason why Iowa City is hard to recruit to and Madison is easy.
There is no reason why Iowa City is hard to recruit to and Morgantown is easy.
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I loved my time at Iowa, and I love Iowa City.

However, you have to realize that those outside of Iowa have a very different image of Iowa than you and I have. If they get to visit Iowa City for a weekend, that can change, but many never come to Iowa because of their pre-conceived notions about it.
 


Morgantown, WV. First, I wonder if WV plays by the rules, but they are in fairly close proximity to a lot of people:

Pittsburgh-75miles
Cleveland-203miles
DC-------209miles
Philly-----307miles
NYC------381miles
 


ChosenChildren said:
I'm not going to post anymore on this topic, so everyone else can have the last word.

I will add one last thought: One day you will get your wish and Ferentz will either retire, or move to the NFL, or, God forbid, he will be fired. One of those outcomes is inevitable and it will probably happen sooner than you think.

And then all of the amateur, lame brain experts on this board who are nothing more than Monday Morning Quarterbacks (myself included) will get to see how his successor does.

I humbly predict the following outcome: Not as good as Ferentz. Same outcome we have experienced in basketball post Davis.

Oh, and by the way, Ferentz is a hall of fame coach and will be in College Hall of Fame someday, next to Fry. You can book that one.
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Are there people in this thread calling for his head?
 


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