Did Iowa and Nebraska Trade Positions? (and some offensive analysis)

[Danny Bateman]

I live in Western Iowa, and usually there is a pretty even split of Iowa State and Iowa fans, with a good amount of Nebraska fans scattered in. Well, with their success this season, no surprise, the Iowa fans are coming out of the woodwork. Anyway, it is a tough life right now, dealing with the bumbling ISU fans who have a newfound sense of "We are better than NU and have always been" ... I let them believe whatever makes them happy.

 

Anyway, now I am wondering something concerning us and Iowa. It seems to me the bragging rights for best team in this neck of the woods is between us and Iowa. The past few seasons (since '04, when Iowa beat LSU in the Capital One Bowl), we have, IMO, held the upper hand, with Iowa being the lesser of the two teams. At least between my buddies and I, Iowa was seemngly a decent team, nothing special, and my buddies and Iowa fans just wished for NU (the better of the two) to get knocked off so as to narrow the gap. We always seemed just a notch above Iowa. Possible homerism, yes, but that's just how I saw it.

 

Personally, I think NU is not as bad as everyone thinks offersively, and our problems could be aided if we could accomplish three things:

 

1) Bo, or Wats, or whoever else has a problem with it, swallowed down their "he's not ready yet" pride and plugged in Cody @ QB. No, perhaps he's not ready, but Lee does not give the offense any spark or swagger, something perhaps Cody could bring, even if he makes rookie mistakes.

 

2) Wats learned to go to WHAT IS WORKING (i.e., the power running game saturday) and stop trying to force the issue by calling unnecessary passes, especially that godforsaken bubble screen. Three goshdarn games that's started things off horribly: The Tech Game, the OU game last year, and the B12 Championship Game with OU. It's garbage. At least throw it to one of our faster receivers (NOT HOLT, PAUL).

 

3) Paul could get over his mental block... and catch the dang ball before trying to run with it. Drops on screens, hitches are killing this team.

 

Now, Iowa is undefeated and we just fumbled a game to Iowa State. We need to pull our heads out offensively or we may not even be bowl eligible, much less win the B12 North. Have these two teams traded places, with us just hoping they get knocked off?