VIDEO: 1981 Iowa at Michigan Highlights

[asolsma]

From an old VHS, so the quality is not the best:
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vD0y9UCuzJ8]YouTube - 1981 #12 Iowa at #5 Michigan Highlights[/ame]

 

[PawkHawk1]

That was great!! Thanks for posting.

 

[unkydave]

That was one happy day! Thanks for posting this. Brought tears to my eyes.

 

[SDK46]

Iowa opened up the rec center and had a wide screen (projector) set up. Charged $3 a head (you could bring in liquor believe it or not) and there were probably 1000 of us in there...folding chairs....classic.

 

[Hawkeye85]

yes indeed. i was one of them - freshman year. what a season!

 

[c75hawk]

Thank you, Thank you, Thank you! It is hard to describe how big those wins were in 1981. Nebraska, UCLA, and Michigan were all unbelievable. There have been some huge wins since, but none meant as much to this program as these.

 

[HawkeyeNTexas]

I like the Pro set.

 

[Liq]

I was born in 1981.

all i can say after watch that is god bless high definition.

Go hawks

 

[ChosenChildren]

One of the most exciting days in Iowa football history.

We watched with about 5,000 people at the Five Seasons Center in Cedar Rapids. I never heard so much noise from a crowd in my life. People were just hysterical - hugging, screaming, jumping on each other, it was just chaos. It was absolutely impossible to believe that Iowa could actually beat mighty Michigan in Ann Arbor (Michigan had absolutely owned Iowa during the Bo era).

My best memory was there was no sound at all, no play by play. And the people televising the game never showed the scoreboard to tell the time or the score. And then, late in the game, they

flashed the old Michigan scoreboard......2:34 to play and Iowa had the ball. At that point

you realized for the first time that Iowa actually could win the

game!. It was one of the greatest days ever for an Iowa fan, and the beginning of the Fry/Ferentz era. I will never forget it. I would rank this one right up there with the all-time Iowa wins.

 

[ChosenChildren]

I really do think, without reservation, that 1981 was the most magical, fun season in Iowa football history. To go from 20 losing seasons to the Rose Bowl was an absolute miracle ride.

 

[SDK46]

I really do think, without reservation, that 1981 was the most magical, fun season in Iowa football history. To go from 20 losing seasons to the Rose Bowl was an absolute miracle ride.

+1

Our parents who remembered the 1958/1959 successes were reenergized.

For those of us, kids of those parents, who grew up listening to Iowa getting throttled week in and week out on WHO, it was like getting laid for the first time...never quite the same afterwards

 

[ChosenChildren]

Yes, exactly. I was 26 years old that year and had never seen a winning season at Iowa, even though I had started attending games with my Dad when I was 7 years old.

It really didn't seem real. Highlights:

Iowa 10 #6 Nebraska 7 (yes, we can beat Nebraska)

Iowa 20 #6 UCLA 7

Iowa 9 #6 Michigan 7

Iowa 33 Purdue 7 (Purdue had defeated us 20 straight times)

Iowa 17 #16 Wisconsin 7 (at Madison, to take the Rose Bowl away from them!!)

Iowa 36 Mich St 7 (clinched Rose Bowl after Ohio defeated Mich that morning in a close game).

To beat 3 Top 10 teams and 4 Top 20 teams in one season was unbelievable.

Bobby Stoops was the captain of that team. Ever heard of him? What a player he was......

We laid an egg in the Rose Bowl, but nobody cared at that point. To see Iowa come out of the tunnel in Pasadena was surreal.

We expect to win now (30 years later), but back then it was all a new experience.

 

[asolsma]

I love hearing all the stories about how everybody watched the game.