We have to think bigger than ISU, UNI, and Drake

HaydenHawk56

HaydenHawk56

Well-Known Member
Reading the article about the series could end with these schools and what Fran has to say.....I think he is right on the money.

Come on, if the best we can come up with in continuing to play these schools because of the atmosphere was so good back in the day we can just as easily accomplish that with playing more nationally renowned schools.

Yes we are down in basketball and realistic fans will admit that. But, in the top 2 sports in the state (football and basketball) historically speaking, Iowa is the top dog in this state. All of these schools want to be Iowa....the top dog. They can never really be it, so the next best thing is to keep playing us and get some wins here and there. Unfortunately for us, the basketball team is still trying to battle out of the major funk Bowlsby, Alford, and Lickliter put us in, which has come at the benefit of the other state schools. And with Ferentz coaching, ISU has been typically getting a win once every three years, usually in Ames.

We gain nothing by playing these schools. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. They have everything to gain by beating us and we have nothing to gain by beating them.

Of course they don't want to lose us on their schedule, we keep them relevant for a few nights each sports season.

We are the traditional top dog and we need to start acting like it. I don't blame Fran one bit by trying to upgrade the schedule. Drop little brother and little cousin. Let them have it while we aspire to play teams that will get us much more exposure for our program (like Duke, Kansas, and North Carolina).
 
Last edited:
What do we gain by beating Illinois Chicago or Campbell (who kicked our a$$)? Iowa wouldn't drop ISU, UNI and Drake to schedule up...they'd do it to get more guaranteed wins by scheduling down...keep the in-state rivalries...I don't know why it's even a question...
 
Screw the other state schools. As for as the soup Campbells on the schedule, every major team has them. They are tune-up games for the bigger schools yet to be played on the schedule.....and we make them play at our house with no emotional ties like the state schools have with playing us. We have more to gain playing Illinois Chicago than playing ISU.

ISU, UNI, and Drake are a no win situation for Iowa. We would gain more by filling them with teams of more national prominence.
 
Last edited:
HaydenHawk56 said:
Screw the other state schools. As for as the soup Campbells on the schedule, every major team has them. They are tune-up games for the bigger schools yet to be played on the schedule.....and we make them play at our house with no emotional ties like the state schools have with playing us.

ISU, UNI, and Drake are a no win situation for Iowa.
Click to expand...

Considering they all have a higher RPI than Iowa, I'd say you're incorrect...besides, they're the perfect non-conference opponent...hostile environments, rivalry...it's what competition is supposed to be about and win or lose, going through those games does nothing but help you get ready for the Big10 season and beyond.
 
Like I said, Iowa is down so of course they have higher RPIs now. But we are the traditional top dog and when we are back, I want to play better teams.....not the traditional 2nd and 3rd fiddle in the state. We can play in other great atmospheres like Coach K Court. We don't need to play in Hilton or Cedar Falls to get that experience to prepare for Big Ten play.

We have to think bigger than them.
 
We need to start beating these schools the majority of the time before 'upgrading the schedule'. Good teams are going to wipe us off the floor even worse than mediocre ones (Campbell, for instance) have.
 
HaydenHawk56 said:
Like I said, Iowa is down so of course they have higher RPIs now. But we are the traditional top dog and when we are back, I want to play better teams.....not the traditional 2nd and 3rd fiddle in the state. We can play in other great atmospheres like Coach K Court. We don't need to play in Hilton or Cedar Falls to get that experience to prepare for Big Ten play.

We have to think bigger than them.
Click to expand...

As Iowa gets better they'll draw better opponents in the Big10-ACC Challenge and Barta hinted that another conference "challenge" is in the works as well...so they can have their cake and eat it too.
 
Hayden, you are undeniably 100% chicken sh!t scared silly of stronger in-state programs during Iowa's woeful years. Nothing more, nothing less. I'm sure you were not calling for these games to end 10 or 15 years ago.
 
Okay lets get real here. Yeah were losing to crappy teams now, UNI is having the most success, blah, blah, blah. What happens when were good again? Because, hell, it might be in 2 years, who knows. Do we still wanna be stuck in the state IF down the road were able to compete on national TV against Kansas or Duke? The same could be said for ISU. Because eventually..... were going to need to get some exposure, and even if were beating the crap out of drake and UNI.... No one can watch it. It might be fun for you and your weird little co-worker to go back and forth b/c he went to drake but that's honestly all that's holding it together. Does nothing more.
 
HawkeyeShane said:
What do we gain by beating Illinois Chicago or Campbell (who kicked our a$$)? Iowa wouldn't drop ISU, UNI and Drake to schedule up...they'd do it to get more guaranteed wins by scheduling down...keep the in-state rivalries... I don't know why it's even a question...
Click to expand...

Wussiness.
 
The point is not now (of course we are not the best team in the state right now in basketball).....the point is looking toward the future. We are the traditional top dog. Really think about it if we are bad or good, we gain nothing by playing them.

No, I have been watching Iowa basketball and football for a LONG TIME.......I have always been saying this is a no win situation. Nothing chicken **** about it. It has to do with the fact we gain nothing by playing them.

What is fun about blowing these teams out year in and year out when we are good? Or certainly losing to them and hurting or national image.

We can do better than ISU, UNI, and Drake.
 
Last edited:
Benddontbreak said:
Okay lets get real here. Yeah were losing to crappy teams now, UNI is having the most success, blah, blah, blah. What happens when were good again? Because, hell, it might be in 2 years, who knows. Do we still wanna be stuck in the state IF down the road were able to compete on national TV against Kansas or Duke? The same could be said for ISU. Because eventually..... were going to need to get some exposure, and even if were beating the crap out of drake and UNI.... No one can watch it. It might be fun for you and your weird little co-worker to go back and forth b/c he went to drake but that's honestly all that's holding it together. Does nothing more.
Click to expand...

Spin it however you want.
 
HaydenHawk56 said:
The point is not now (of course we are not the best team in the state right now in basketball).....the point is looking toward the future. We are the traditional top dog. Really think about it if we are bad or good, we gain nothing by playing them.

No, I have been watching Iowa basketball and football for a LONG TIME.......I have always been saying this is a no win situation. Nothing chicken **** about it. It has to do with the fact we gain nothing by playing them.

What is fun about blowing these teams out year in and year out when we are good? Or certainly losing to them and hurting or national image.

We can do better than ISU, UNI, and Drake.
Click to expand...

Is Iowa willing to play at Duke, North Carolina, and Kansas? I have no idea why any of these schools would be interested in playing a home and home with Iowa. Just like you try to say ISU, UNI and Drake offer Iowa nothing the same can be said for what Iowa offers these top teams. Iowa has EVERYTHING to gain by playing these teams and Iowa offers them nothing especially if they have to play at Carver.

I understand the argument of not playing Drake each year. Maybe play Drake in a home and home every three to four years or something like that. Drake offers Iowa nothing at this time. It’s a bad win and a bad loss.

Iowa SHOULD NOT drop ISU. If both programs actually get back to being respectable then maybe a ranked Iowa and ranked ISU would be able to play a game on a Saturday afternoon on ESPN and get BOTH programs some more exposure. This is a Big 10 vs. Big 12 (two BCS conferences) playing each other. Why in the heck would you drop ISU? It cost’s nothing to travel to ISU in terms of time and money and it’s a BCS school. Hopefully ISU gets really good again so a win against ISU means something. ISU if they are smart are thinking the same thing about Iowa getting good. It helps having both teams really good as there is more basketball buzz in the state. It is completely STUPID to not play ISU in a home and home rotation each year.

UNI has turned into a solid program and as long as they keep up the good RPI, are a constant top three team in a very good MVC (conference has gained a ton of national recognition the last few years), and are at least an every other year type NCAA team I see no reason to drop them at this time. It does not cost any money/time for the University to travel to Cedar Falls. Just keep playing a rotating home and home with them.

So if Iowa fans are so concerned about playing a better program. Here is what you do. Iowa has 30 games on the schedule not counting the exhibition game. That would make 31 games. Iowa can play in a tournament like the Phillips 76 tournament in Anaheim over Thanksgiving and that is a 3 game guarantee tournament. They could face teams like Boston College, West Virginia, Oklahoma, St. Louis, Stanford, Depaul, Oklahoma State…. You get the point BCS teams some good and some bad. You also get a few non BCS conference teams that you have a chance to beat. You can play this tournament by dropping Drake, Campbell, and North Carolina A &T. You lose 2 home games for sure but since Drake is currently home and home you don’t always play them at home. This is a neutral site tournament so you have that going for you I guess. You can face better teams on a Neutral court which can help prepare for NIT/NCAA play. If you are lucky enough to con Duke, North Carolina, Kansas, UConn, Syracuse type teams into playing you you make room in your schedule by dropping Creighton.
So there you have it you can still play UNI and ISU each year then play a good neutral site tournament and you still get to play some absolutely terrible teams at home.
 
Nice post ICHawk, but to simplify it, no just drop the state schools. Just to take the high road and find better schools to play. We are from the Big Ten Conference. We would be an attractive opponent for other National Programs to play.

Look at it this way. Does Ohio St in football try to make it absolutely necessary to play Ohio or all of the other state schools year in and year out?

Why does Iowa have to be stuck to tradition of playing them? Heck Ohio St in basketball does not even play Ohio this year.

We don't need them and we could do fine without them.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Share this page

Top