BSpringsteen
Well-Known Member
Having just completed a lengthy discussion with another HN.com poster, I think there is a lot more than having a great team, or even being lucky to winning a national title, or even playing in the game.
I am going to use Ohio State as my example. Every year this decade, Ohio State has been expected to contend for the national title at the START of the season. They played in the championship game 3 times out of 10 years.
Perhaps no team was as dominant during the decade as USC. They played in the game twice in ten years.
These are teams that are in contention year after year.
My point is that in the last ten years, no team came out of nowhere to play in the national title game, and the team that played in the championship is a team that has always started the year with those aspirations
For Iowa, we have a team that is in that discussion twice in that period. 2002 doesn't count as we came out of nowhere. 2006 we pooped in the bed, and now this year the jury is still out. But at Ohio State, from the time a player is a freshman, to the time they are a senior, they are used to starting the year with those expectations, and STILL, the team with the most appearances is only 3 times out of 10.
Last year Iowa came out of nowhere, but this year was the first year they had national title aspirations. That is difficult to manage.
My friend contends that KF will never be considered a great coach until he wins the games that he is supposed to win with the national spotlight on him. It's not enough to go into Happy Valley as an underdog and win that game, you have to host Ohio State as a favorite and win that game with the Big 10 title hanging in the balance. With this, I agree.
Where I disagree though is that looking objectively at who has played for the national title in the past ten years, that we had a realistic shot at it. Teams can come out of nowhere to win their conference, because by the time you realize this team is really good, its November and its too late. The team has the advantage of flying under the radar for 2/3 of the season.
But to play for the national title, you have to live in the spotlight for 12 weeks and win each week.
Which leads me to point 2.
My friend believes that a bowl game is a meaningless game unless it is the national championship game. With this I also agree. It's not that the games aren't fun or that we don't want to win, it's just that you're not really playing for anything.
Which leads me to the final point, of how Iowa can ACTUALLY play for a national title.
Iowa needs to first become a program where 8-4/9-3 is a blip on the radar, rather than the norm. The way to do this is to continue to go play in high profile BCS games that raises the profile of your program and pays huge dividends in recruiting. That is why the Rose Bowl matters. Win the Rose Bowl, and what does our recruiting look like next year? Two straight BCS wins?
Iowa will never play for a national title, so long as they are only in that conversation once every 4-5 years. They need to be in that conversation year in and year out for that to happen.
The bottom line is this. No team has played for the national title has been a team the rebuilds rather than reloads, and even for the teams that reload, they are not playing in that game very often.
Iowa is quietly becoming a program that can reload, but it will take a no less than 4 straight years of this for them to seriously be able to make that kind of magical run.
I am going to use Ohio State as my example. Every year this decade, Ohio State has been expected to contend for the national title at the START of the season. They played in the championship game 3 times out of 10 years.
Perhaps no team was as dominant during the decade as USC. They played in the game twice in ten years.
These are teams that are in contention year after year.
My point is that in the last ten years, no team came out of nowhere to play in the national title game, and the team that played in the championship is a team that has always started the year with those aspirations
For Iowa, we have a team that is in that discussion twice in that period. 2002 doesn't count as we came out of nowhere. 2006 we pooped in the bed, and now this year the jury is still out. But at Ohio State, from the time a player is a freshman, to the time they are a senior, they are used to starting the year with those expectations, and STILL, the team with the most appearances is only 3 times out of 10.
Last year Iowa came out of nowhere, but this year was the first year they had national title aspirations. That is difficult to manage.
My friend contends that KF will never be considered a great coach until he wins the games that he is supposed to win with the national spotlight on him. It's not enough to go into Happy Valley as an underdog and win that game, you have to host Ohio State as a favorite and win that game with the Big 10 title hanging in the balance. With this, I agree.
Where I disagree though is that looking objectively at who has played for the national title in the past ten years, that we had a realistic shot at it. Teams can come out of nowhere to win their conference, because by the time you realize this team is really good, its November and its too late. The team has the advantage of flying under the radar for 2/3 of the season.
But to play for the national title, you have to live in the spotlight for 12 weeks and win each week.
Which leads me to point 2.
My friend believes that a bowl game is a meaningless game unless it is the national championship game. With this I also agree. It's not that the games aren't fun or that we don't want to win, it's just that you're not really playing for anything.
Which leads me to the final point, of how Iowa can ACTUALLY play for a national title.
Iowa needs to first become a program where 8-4/9-3 is a blip on the radar, rather than the norm. The way to do this is to continue to go play in high profile BCS games that raises the profile of your program and pays huge dividends in recruiting. That is why the Rose Bowl matters. Win the Rose Bowl, and what does our recruiting look like next year? Two straight BCS wins?
Iowa will never play for a national title, so long as they are only in that conversation once every 4-5 years. They need to be in that conversation year in and year out for that to happen.
The bottom line is this. No team has played for the national title has been a team the rebuilds rather than reloads, and even for the teams that reload, they are not playing in that game very often.
Iowa is quietly becoming a program that can reload, but it will take a no less than 4 straight years of this for them to seriously be able to make that kind of magical run.
