Northern Illinois at Iowa

[Aaronhawkeye44]

Anyone who thinks this isn't a good Iowa football team didn't watch the game. Iowa has a ton of talent this season. This team will continue to improve. Hoops, You are an idiot! weren't you the one that said our linebackers were slow???????? The team made as many explosive plays as last year, were more aggressive, etc. and you guys still bitch!!! A couple of yrs ago against OSU we ran the ball at the end of the game and everyone was pissed, make up your effing minds!!!

 

[Aaronhawkeye44]

MM,

I agree completely! The 3rd and 1 call was tough, but if we hit that one (which was inches from happening) it would have been huge.

 

[Aaronhawkeye44]

Hoops, I apologize about the idiot comment, uncalled for, but we argued for months about our linebackers speed. As I watched them fly all over the field, they are fast!

 

[iowajerms]

I'm still optimistic about Iowa's chances of getting 8-9 wins. They contained Lynch pretty good and they didn't do too bad at stopping the run. I agree that the DL's pass rush is the weakest part of the D. They have a very strong LB corps. One of the best in CFB. They are young and they can improve so a lot in the next 5 games.

Also, the play calling the 1st 2 Iowa drives sucked. Iowa gave them 10 points in the 1st quarter off of errors that gave great field position. The final offensive play was a rookie mistake. Those are things that can be avoidable.

They should win the rest of the OOC games and go into conference 3-1.
Minnesota does not have an offense and I don't see Iowa having a special teams meltdown that UNLV had, also UNLV was able to pass pretty good on them 4-1.
Michigan State's offense didn't do anything either. If the OL blocks well, I can see Iowa's offense winning this one 5-1.
I haven't seen and would not have thought Iowa would beat Ohio State 5-2.
Iowa did a good job at stopping NIU's rushing attack. Maybe they can stop Northwestern's. If they do, I think Iowa can win 6-2.
Wisconsin didn't look that impressive against UMass until 2nd half (NIU way better than UMass). Big question will be if the DL had improved enough by this game. I think a win is possible if they can get pressure on the QB and stop the run, at this point, I will say they won't get both so I will put it down as a loss 6-3.
Iowa should be able to beat Purdue 7-3.
Iowa has a LB corp to contain scrambling QBs and rushing attack and their offense could be light-years better. I can see Iowa winning this one 7-3.
Nebraska didn't look that impressive against Wyoming. They have a scrambling QB that Iowa should be able to contain. 8-3

I'm not predicting that nor am I saying it will happen. I'm just saying that if Iowa plays like they did minus a few turnovers and a sideways punt, and improve like some Ferentz's teams have, 8 wins is not out of reach.

 

[wingsauce7]

I still think we're an 8-9 win team. I saw lots of good yesterday (after finally finding an internet feed in 2nd quarter). I thought our d line did a good job. They held lynch to 56 yds rushing and got a couple sacks, we blitzed numerous times too. Our secondary was roughed up a bit and we got beat on a fake punt.

hoopalot25, the reasons NIU "didn't look great" was because Iowa didn't let them.

 

[Aaronhawkeye44]

Shanked punt = 7 pts, fake punt = 7pts. Take the special teams errors away and the win 27-16 & everyone is happy.

 

[RobBase]

As a casual fan of Iowa (just not vs. MI) forever, what the hell happened to you guys? You used to be a NFL rookie monster factory, and at worst, the 3rd or 4th best team every year in the B1G. I don't follow enough to know. Is it coaching? Scouting? I saw the box score and couldn't believe it. And last year that L vs. Central? The B1G needs the old Iowa back ASAP for the sake of the conference as a whole.

 

[HawkeyesRuleURFace]

If Ferentz would have taken JVBs dick out of his ass last year and get Rudock a few snaps he doesn't throw that late pick...our secondary is a bit of concern, everything else seems ok...

 

[wingsauce7]

As a casual fan of Iowa (just not vs. MI) forever, what the hell happened to you guys? You used to be a NFL rookie monster factory, and at worst, the 3rd or 4th best team every year in the B1G. I don't follow enough to know. Is it coaching? Scouting? I saw the box score and couldn't believe it. And last year that L vs. Central? The B1G needs the old Iowa back ASAP for the sake of the conference as a whole.

All of the above, plus recruiting. KF has been so vanilla and conservative the last handful of years it's not even funny. Most Hawkeye fans have been waiting to see how this team would change with the 2 new coordinators that are in their second year. Coach Fry in his heyday lived by the big play-but at smart times. He also developed the players he got. Like someone here said, last year we should have been looking to this year and getting playing time for current players. JVB last season was el busto at QB. Why did KF continue to play him every snap in games we had no shot to win?

This year's team will be fine.

As far as your "for the good of the conference" statement, tell me what in the fu@# Michigan has done for the B1G the last 1/2 dozen years?? The UM is one of the most under-achieving teams in the nation. How many 4 and 5 star recruits has your team wasted?

See you in October Michigan.

 

[iowajerms]

I think NIU was a great season opener for a rebuilding team. The Huskies are good enough to expose Iowa's weaknesses but not great enough to stop all of Iowa's strengths.

Iowa's LBs is definitely the real deal. I love their blitzes. Great OLs will be able to stop them because they can focus on them.

Rudock is very accurate but is still a rookie. His last pass was a rookie mistake. Early on, receivers didn't do a good job catching the ball but Rudock did hit them in the hands. He will need to work on throwing power.

Iowa has a thunder/lightning RB duo. I think a 2 RB offense would work. At least, for a few plays a drive.

OL, DL, and DB are the one that really need work. Especially the DL.

 

[Hawkeye]

Wing, on his behalf though, Michigan is Michigan, they are going to get exposure good or bad. Next week's prime time game is Michigan vs Notre Dame...when folks think Big10, they think Michigan and Ohio State. You need the next tier of Iowa, Wisconsin, Penn State and Nebraska to uphold the conference, but Iowa has dropped out of that and been replaced by Northwestern.

When I travel, I have seen folks wear Iowa stuff and a few Penn State, but I never have seen a NW shirt wearing person, nor others...Wisconsin and NE folks love their teams and travel, but for the good of the conference overall, Iowa does need to pick it up...

If you think about it, the one team that seems to be able to beat the SEC consistently in the B10 is Iowa, so when we have teams that consistently lose, that is how the B10 loses respect. And next year we get watered down even more with Rutgers and Maryland.

 

[hoopsalot25]

Aaron,

I agree, Iowa's LBs looked real good yesterday. However, the injury bug hits these guys too much (and that's unfortunate!). These guys need to get off of the field on 3rd down early and often. Otherwise, facing so many plays every week takes its toll...and the injury bug hits during conference games when we really need these guys on the field. I also believe that Iowa should be pounding our opponents with the running game. I'd love to see a 'heavy package' line up - extra TEs and Gs or Ts - and just pound people. NIU was undersized up front by a lot and Iowa only gets 200 rushing yards. Especially Saturday...keep the defense off the field in the 3rd & 4th quarter with the "heavy package" formations.

I really think Rudock will put up good offensive production this season, but the defense has to be better. If the defense doesn't improve real fast, it will be another bad year for Hawk Nation!

Bottom line, Iowa should not have lost this game!!!

 

[mm03]

As a casual fan of Iowa (just not vs. MI) forever, what the hell happened to you guys? You used to be a NFL rookie monster factory, and at worst, the 3rd or 4th best team every year in the B1G. I don't follow enough to know. Is it coaching? Scouting? I saw the box score and couldn't believe it. And last year that L vs. Central? The B1G needs the old Iowa back ASAP for the sake of the conference as a whole.

The biggest is restocking the shelves after we lose that NFL talent. I would say the last 5 or 6 years have been solely on recruiting.

It's not that Iowa doesn't do an ok job bringing in talent (we see a few guys every year that are excellent players). The easiest way I can say this I guess -- Iowa will have strong players in 3 of the 5 key positions. The next year it'll be 3 out of 5 again, but different positions because of the talent loss and being unable to replace it. It's just kind of a repeating cycle that I HOPE starts to get better with the switch to Texas recruiting. There's also the whole instate talent thing going against the program.

As far as urface's comment -- Jake getting PT last year to avoid that mistake is just bullshit sorry. If Jake played last year he would of been a worse player this year. Last year the WR's didn't know what the hell they were doing, and the o-line was in shambles. He would of developed so many bad habits playing in an offense that couldn't do anything productive to develop him as a player.

As far as how many games I think we win? It's a toss up. I think Iowa will be in every game on the big10 schedule this year.. It all depends if the Hawks continues to improve, which if history tells us anything, they will. The big one though, is whether or not they can actually close out a damn game. Hopefully the Hawks can buck the recent trend on that one this year.

 

[63bears40]

FUCK

Weren't you the same asshole who posted a BS thread on the NU site?
You couldn't beat a Mac team . How the hell do you think you're going to compete in big ten.
Can't wait for Your bullshit ass team to face a quality opponent.
Love the way your freshman QB threw pick after pick . You got alot too look forward too. Again
My apologies to the Iowa fans who've read this. But this jerkoff deserved it.

 

[HawkeyesRuleURFace]

Weren't you the same asshole who posted a BS thread on the NU site?
You couldn't beat a Mac team . How the hell do you think you're going to compete in big ten.
Can't wait for Your bullshit ass team to face a quality opponent.
Love the way your freshman QB threw pick after pick . You got alot too look forward too. Again
My apologies to the Iowa fans who've read this. But this jerkoff deserved it.

Yeah...I complimented the amount of talent you have on Nebraskas team and said that if Pelini didn't get his shit together he'd be looking for a job come Thanksgiving...go fuck your faggot self if you can't handle an honest opinion dick bag

 

[HawkeyesRuleURFace]

Furthermore I don't go trolling on other peoples team boards like you have just done...NIU is not a quality opponent??? They have a Heisman candidate at QB, went to the Orange bowl this year and will most likely get another BCS bid if they run the table...you clearly have no clue what the fuck you're talking about...do you even watch football?

 

[Hawkeye]

I had not checked out the stats...Iowa actually won most battles so when I see this, it really annoys me now even more that we lost:

Team Stats NIU IOWA
First Downs 20 24
Third Down Efficiency 7-20 7-17
Fourth Down Efficiency 2-3 0-1
Plays-Net Yards 83-438 80-458
Rushes-Yds 42-163 43-202
Passing Yds 275 256
Kick Return Yds 20 80
Punt Return Yds 6 24
Passes 25-41-0 21-37-2
Punts 8-341 7-257
Fumbles-Lost 2-1 1-1
Penalties-Yds 8-64 6-35
Time of Poss. 29:20 30:40

 

[HawkeyesRuleURFace]

I like that 458 total yards number....our secondary needs to tighten up, if they do I think we have a successful season

I had not checked out the stats...Iowa actually won most battles so when I see this, it really annoys me now even more that we lost:

Team Stats NIU IOWA
First Downs 20 24
Third Down Efficiency 7-20 7-17
Fourth Down Efficiency 2-3 0-1
Plays-Net Yards 83-438 80-458
Rushes-Yds 42-163 43-202
Passing Yds 275 256
Kick Return Yds 20 80
Punt Return Yds 6 24
Passes 25-41-0 21-37-2
Punts 8-341 7-257
Fumbles-Lost 2-1 1-1
Penalties-Yds 8-64 6-35
Time of Poss. 29:20 30:40

 

[hoopsalot25]

HRUF,

The 458 yards of offense does look good! However, Iowa had 302 yards of offense in the first half.

That fact puts things into perspective quickly!