My incredible Iowa game recap!

How did I not know about ESPN360.com, where a bunch of college games can be watched online, including after the game has finished?! Watching the second half that I missed yesterday starting from midway through the 3rd quarter.

+ Ricky Stanzi owes the defense, big time. He also owes Indiana for not being good enough to capitalize on all those picks.

+ So much less anxiety watching afterward and knowing what the score is and who's going to win :-)

+ Wegher's pretty impressive for a white, true freshman. You don't see many starting white halfbacks these days. Of course, a lot of his yards were after the blowout began...

+ Ferentz says he never considered benching Stanzi? How can that be? Obviously the right call, but the worst quarter of football of his life.

+ Heard Hawks will drop in the polls, but haven't read anything on that yet. What should really happen is that USC should drop a good bit and Oregon should not leap us. We'll still be fine with the computers, but who far will the voters drop us for losing to IU for three quarters?

+ Ricky is obviously a gunslinger. He can keep throwing with no remorse.

+ I found Bob Davies very annoying, but it's probably because of my own partiality. And I applied my famous 'if he knew so much about [insert sport] he'd still be coaching'. But here are some things Bob Davies said that I agreed with:

1. Hidden yardage. This is the way the Hawks win with such a modest (though clutch) offense (86th in the nation). Scoring Defense: 14th, Turnover Margin: 6th, Net Punting: 12th, Kickoff Coverage: 18th, Penalty Yards: 3rd. So the knock on the Hawks is that they don't have enough offense to beat a really good team (like those ranked above them in the AP. But look at all of these other ways they add up to beat you. Of course, it didn't apply yesterday...
2. The Iowa way: base defense and the next man in line steps up and plays. That's what you get with a good, strong basic system, offense and defense.
   
3. Iowa has reaped the success of sticking with Ferentz through some sub-par years (especially given the size of his contract!). Patience has paid off.
4. The Iowa strength and conditioning coach gets props for Iowa's total and complete 4th quarter dominance.
5. The wind really did make a big difference to the QBs. What was it, six picks against the wind?
   
6. Where should Iowa be in the polls?

+ Commentary on the Iowa RB injury succession. Maybe it's kind of like the Denver Broncos have been: the O-line is so good, you can plug in any reasonably decent RB.

+ Great job just riding Wegher at the end of the game. Wish the Vikes would have ridden Peterson last week against Pittsburgh :-(

+ Really didn't like seeing Ricky run and dive head-first a couple times at the end of the game.

+ At the end of the game, Davies says 'We've seen the worst Iowa football can be.' Not true. Ricki Stanzi was horrible in the third quarter. The rest of the team was pretty good the whole game, especially the defense. If the defense hadn't shut them down so many times, Iowa would have lost.

Ok, obviously the AP and USA Today rankings are out by now and the AP is a total rip off. You rank a one-loss Oregon team above an undefeated Iowa team with a stronger strength of schedule? Asinine.

A little more commentary for you: It's more than chemistry in Iowa's and Oregon's winning formula (furthermore, he's picking them to play each other in the Rose Bowl).

At least at this point, I'm not feeling greedy. I don't need Iowa to be in the national championship game or to win it. Like Kirk Ferentz said, our team doesn't look like world-beaters right now, but they keep winning games. Heck, I don't even need them to go undefeated. I'd like Iowa to win the Big Ten outright and the Rose Bowl. That's all I ask. Pretty modest, aye? ;-)

People I want to read this post and add to it (tagging in Facebook): Tyler Luebke, Phil Luebke, David Rodnitzky, Jason Streed, Andy Knox, Suzy Swenka and anyone else who loves to follow and analyze the Hawks.