MILLER: Iowa football suddenly feels quite different

Iowa’s 32-20 loss to Michigan State felt a bit different.

Iowa’s struggling offense, with a quarterback who can’t stretch the field or do much beyond five yards and completing fewer than 50 percent of his passes, is not all that different from what we have seen the past year and a half…or longer.

In this game, we saw what becomes of Iowa when the defense isn’t All Big Ten caliber.

This isn’t going to be a missive about how Iowa’s defense suddenly became trash or that they don’t have what it takes to keep Iowa in football games; everyone has a bad game.

Make no mistakes about it: this was a very bad game by Iowa’s defense. Michigan State came into this game as a very uninspiring team with a floundering offense, a defense without an identity, and a program that has been struggling for relevance ever since Kenneth Walker moved on.

But we can’t possibly expect Phil Parker’s defense to perform at an elite level nationally year after year, even if that’s exactly what has been happening since the start of the 2020 season.

Here is where Iowa has ranked in scoring defense since the start of the 2020 season:

2020: 6th
2021: 9th
2022: 2nd
2023: 4th

That is an incredible stretch of excellence.  It also coincides with the four-worst consecutive seasons of quarterback play at Iowa since at least the 1970s if not before then.  Or in other words, since before the Big Ten fully embraced the passing offense and moved on from the ‘two yards and a cloud of dust’ days. Or is it three yards?  It doesn’t matter.

At a time when Iowa’s defense was on par with what we were consistently seeing from Alabama and Georgia over that stretch of time, the offense did this as it relates to scoring:

2020: 40th
2021: 87th
2022: 122nd
2023: 129th

Iowa’s total offensive rankings in 2022 and 2023 was 130th.  Iowa’s passing offense was no better than 110th in 2021, 2022 and 2023.

Kirk Ferentz has bristled a bit at times when being questioned about Iowa’s lack of offensive success in recent years, often pivoting to the fact that Iowa has won ten games in two of those four years.   

We all know, as does Ferentz, that Iowa won ten games in spite of its offense.   They won ten games last year with the worst offensive in college football, not just in 2023, but one of the worst in a quarter century.

This led most of us to wonder what things would look like if Iowa’s defense wasn’t elite.

It looks like a 4-3 team after three games.  It looks like a 2-2 team in Big Ten play after four games, where Iowa has scored 98 points and allowed 97.  

Iowa’s defense has allowed over 30 points in a conference game in two of its last three outings.  When was the last time Iowa allowed two Big Ten opponents to score more than 30 points in the same regular season?  That would be 2018, so it’s been a minute.

One can look at this commentary thus far and be reminded of just how outstanding Iowa’s defense has been this decade, and one probably should do that.  Again, I will not take this as an opportunity to take shots at Iowa’s defense; a regression to the mean was bound to happen, and by mean, I mean from an elite defense to a still good to very good defense.  

As always, Iowa’s struggles lie at the feet of its offense, but more specifically, its quarterback play.

Whatever Cade McNamara once was, he is no longer that and I don’t believe he is going to get there.  However, I don’t make those decisions.  Let’s read what Kirk Ferentz had to say at yesterday’s press conference:

Q. You've said not only throughout the season but throughout your career that practice determines playing time and how you evaluate these guys. What have you been seeing from Cade McNamara in practice that maybe you aren't seeing from Brendan Sullivan yet? Where is the opportunity for growth for Sullivan as you evaluate that position week to week?

KIRK FERENTZ: Yeah, I think they're both doing a good job in practice. Game competition factors in. The guys that are playing, obviously you have concrete examples, and then guys that aren't out there, you're projecting a little bit, and that's part of the deal. There's never 100 percent answer typically at least. But I think they're both doing a good job, and Cade has to play better, certainly the first half in particular. Really nothing on offense was good enough for us to be -- we dug a hole that was too deep, quite frankly, and everybody had a hand in it, but offense certainly has responsibility. Cade is going to have to throw the ball a little bit more accurately. I mentioned about the makeables, whether it's him or anybody else, if he's got a chance to give us better production, that's what we need. We'll keep pushing forward here and see what happens.

When asked directly if McNamara would be the starter this coming week, Ferentz said, ‘As of right now, yeah’.

Some fan bases might read that as there being a chance for change. The Iowa fanbase would not be one of those.  We have seen this movie before.  2001.  2008.  2014.

Ferentz would also say that ‘We have seen enough good things out of Cade to feel like he gives us our best chance out there.”

As I have written before, I can play this game. I can give Kirk the benefit of the doubt and take him at his word that McNamara is the best quarterback on the roster. As such, that means that Iowa is just really, really bad at identifying and developing quarterback talent and has been for a long, long time.

Ultimately, that is where the program is.  They might not have a quarterback that would start for any other team in the league.  And before you say "Northwestern," remember that their coaches encouraged Brendan Sullivan to enter the transfer portal. It’s probably the reason why Iowa is offering JUCO QB’s as recently as last week.  

So Iowa sits at 4-3 overall, 2-2 in Big Ten play and on pace for a bowl game that no one will remember because that’s how things will work in this day and age of college football and an expanded playoff.  

I am not angry about it, as I no longer feel that way about Iowa football; this is just how things are. 

But I am no longer entertained, and there isn’t a Beathard, Stanzi or Banks on the roster to take things in a different direction this year…or next.