Locked On Hawkeyes - Daily Podcast On Iowa Hawkeyes Football & Basketball - Hawks lose one more to the transfer portal | Who's getting Ihmir Smith-Marsette's reps | Kirk Ferentz press conference takeaways

Episode Date: November 4, 2020

The Hawks lost another young player to the transfer portal. We analyze the decision and why now before touching on a sensitive subject in the Big Ten community. Wisconsin is missing their second game in a row. What does that mean for the standings, and how could it impact who plays in the Big Ten Championship Game. We break that down before reviewing all of the takeaways from Kirk Ferentz's press conference including his feelings on the three recent transfers, Ihmir Smith-Marsette's absence, and what the current offensive tackle rotation is.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors! Built BarBuilt Bar is a protein bar that tastes like a candy bar. Go to builtbar.com and use promo code “LOCKEDON,” and you’ll get 20% off your next order.BuiltGoVisit BuiltGO.com and use promo code “LOCKED,” and you’ll get 20% off your next order. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You are Locked On Hawkeyes, your daily podcast on the Iowa Hawkeyes. Part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. Welcome back for a Wednesday morning edition of the Locked On Hawkeyes Podcast, your daily podcast covering your Iowa Hawkeyes on the Locked On Sports Network. As always, I am your host, Andrew Wade,ited to be back for another episode of the show today. And on today's show, we're going to be breaking down the press conference from Kirk Ferens. Gave us a lot of good takeaways there. We're also going to talk about the schedule in the Big Ten

and how Wisconsin's cancellation of the game against Purdue impacts that. What does it mean from the standings perspective? And can Iowa make a run? We're also going to talk about the three matchups to watch out for between Iowa and Michigan State. Before we get into any of those, though, there were a couple things I wanted to bring up. Some news that popped up from yesterday. First and foremost, Calvin Lockett has entered the transfer portal. He's the third player to enter the transfer portal in the last couple weeks.

We're going to talk more about what that means from Kirk Ferentz's perspective, but for me, Calvin Lockett leaving is more of an indication that the wide receiver group is incredibly deep. So it always sucks to see a young guy leave, but again, this group is deep. And when you look at who's getting playing time, it makes sense why he's gone. So Amir Smith-Marset, Brandon Smith are both leaving after this year, more than likely. I would be shocked if they returned because this year technically does not count from an eligibility perspective, but they are both leaving. After that is Tyrone Tracy and Nico Reganey. After that though, it seems to be Charlie Jones. He's been getting a lot of playing time from a punt return perspective. He's going to be a guy who gets in the game this weekend with Amir Smith-Marset out.

He's the next guy off the bench. We've also seen Desmond Hudson get some playing time. Deontay Vines and Quavon Matthews are also freshmen who have seemingly done well in camp. And then next year, Keegan Johnson, Brody Breck, and Arlen Bruce are all going to be joining the program. That's a lot of wide receiver depth. It seems like the riding was kind of on the wall. Calvin Lockett, a redshirt sophomore, has not gotten to a game yet. It makes sense why he's leaving. And I touched on this a little bit on Twitter, but we typically see guys leave after spring practice because they get a better idea of where they fit into the team's plans. And unfortunately, we did not get a spring

game, a spring session of practices this year to give these young guys an opportunity to see how do they fit into this team. We're now two games in. We're a lot more practices in. I feel like these guys are starting to get a little bit more understanding and familiarity with where they are on the depth chart. So that makes sense to me. It's unfortunate to see that happen, but Calvin Lockett is leaving the program.

Also, Fran McCaffrey did comment and said that Iowa is playing Iowa State this year. Or maybe that wasn't confirmed by Fran, but it was confirmed that Iowa is playing Iowa State this year. In basketball, that is going to be a lot of fun to watch that as well. And Joe Wieskamp was named to the Jerry West Award watch list. Just like he was last year, this watch list recognizes the best shooting guard in the nation.

So that is fun, obviously, seeing him get some of that recognition. Would be awesome to see him kind of reach his potential this year, especially with such a big season for the Iowa Hawkeyes with so much expectations coming into the season. Let's hop into, though, we're actually going to go and start with the Big Ten schedule breakdown. Wisconsin did cancel the game versus Purdue. So they've had three games on their schedule. Two of them have been canceled. The maximum amount of games they can play this season is six at this point. What makes that interesting is the minimum amount of games a team must play before they are eligible for the Big Ten championship game is six. Wisconsin, after destroying Illinois, looked like the frontrunner for the Big Ten West title. They've now missed two games. Who knows what can happen over the course

of the next couple of weeks. Maybe they missed another game, and in that case, they wouldn't be eligible for the Big Ten Championship game. Now, where this gets very interesting, though, is that they could play six games and go 6-0, and they will make the Big Ten Championship game, and if they play, let's say, for example, they beat a Northwestern squad. Northwestern goes 7-1, Wisconsin goes 5-1, maybe they lose to Purdue or to Iowa, but they beat Northwestern. So now Wisconsin's 5-1. Northwestern's 7-1, played two extra games,

and Wisconsin is still going to go to the Big Ten Championship game. So it still works just like normal conference standings as long as you played six games. So that to me is quite interesting, especially when you look at the fact that Wisconsin kind of canceled these games relatively prematurely. They definitely surpassed those red guidelines, but this is going to be tough for the Big Ten. It's going to be tough, a decision, especially if you have two teams with one losses in the Big Ten. What if Purdue has one loss and Wisconsin has one loss?

It's going to be just like normal Big Ten standing rules. So we could see a Purdue team go 7-1, play eight games, not actually play Wisconsin, and not get into the Big Ten championship game. That's how this kind of makes things interesting. Now, from an Iowa perspective, it also makes this tough. You were hoping that Wisconsin could lose a game against Nebraska or lose a game against Purdue. Maybe Iowa actually wins their first two games. Now Iowa sits 0-2. To win the Big Ten West, they definitely have to go undefeated. They also have to have Purdue lose three games. They also

need Northwestern to also lose three games. So Purdue needs to lose three of their next five games. That is a lot to ask for my Purdue program that looks relatively solid this season. And then just to touch on Iowa as a whole, I know we've touched on a lot of the fact that they are 0-2 this year and how disappointing that is, but before the season actually began, I projected Iowa at 6-2. Now that being said, I did not expect the losses to come in the first two weeks. I definitely expected wins over Purdue and wins over Northwestern. I anticipated losses to Penn State and or Wisconsin and Minnesota. So what's interesting about that is those teams aren't looking as good.

Wisconsin definitely still scares me, but as we saw with the Big Ten in Week 2, we didn't really learn a lot from Big Ten Week 1. How good are these teams actually going to play? Graham Mertz looked fantastic. Was that an indication that Graham Mertz is going to be a future stud, or was that an indication that Illinois wasn't ready to play that game? Who knows at this point because we haven't seen Wisconsin play since then. Now, Minnesota does not look very good, missing two offensive linemen.

They're missing, obviously, Antoine Winfield Jr. and Carter Coughlin from last year. That is proving to be pretty big losses for that defensive side of the ball. Penn State, although they kept it kind of close late against Ohio State, did not look like they are in the realm to compete with Ohio State. They are a team that I feel like is definitely beatable this year, especially with a lackluster round game. So Iowa could still go 6-2, And if that happens, even if they don't finish as the leader of the big 10 West, that is still a good season. In my opinion, there's a lot to still earn and to work for with this season, maybe get a two seed, maybe get a three seed, play a Penn state or Michigan again, or maybe even an Indiana who looks like they are shooting for

that number two seed in the Big Ten East. Going to be a lot of fun, though, and I think just from my standpoint, just don't give up on this team. They still have a lot to play for. Kirk Ferentz even talked about as much as they are very positive coming into this week. There's still a lot to go. They still have six more games in the regular season. They have the Big Ten crossover games.

Then they have a bowl game. So there's still eight games left in the season, barring anything happening with COVID. A lot of room to make improvements, a lot of opportunities to get back on track. Coming up, though, on segment number two, we're going to break down the three matchups to watch out for when Iowa takes on Michigan State. Before we get into that, though, if you're anything like me, you're constantly on the go. It's just go, go, go, go, go. For example, I'm recording this Tuesday afternoon. I've already worked eight hours. I've worked out for an hour. And then I recorded the Locked On College Bowl podcast where you can find me with Josh Ward, host of Locked On Vols every single Wednesday.

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My favorite thing about Coors Light is when I hike to the top of Fourteener. You're looking at all these beautiful mountains. You crack open an ice cold refreshing Coors Light. There is no better moment than that. Than taking in the scenery with an ice cold refreshing Coors Light. As you take a second to chill on top of the mountaintop. Coors Light is the one I choose and I need to unwind. And so when you need to hit reset, I highly recommend you reach for the beer that is made to chill. Now you can also get Coors Light in the new look delivered straight to your door at get.coorslight.com. That's right. When you

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Use promo code LOCKEDON for 20% off at BiltBar.com. All right, we are back for segment number two of the Locked On Hawkeyes podcast, your daily podcast covering your Iowa Hawkeyes. And I wanted to break down the three matchups to watch out for in Iowa versus Michigan State when they take place or they play this Saturday morning at 11 a.m. Central Time. And just a quick reminder, a quick plug, that we are going to be doing a crossover episode with one of the hosts

of Locked On Spartans, our sister podcast covering the Michigan State Spartans. We're going to be talking with them about what to expect from this game. That'll be dropping tomorrow, so make sure to check that out as well. If you want a little bit more behind-enemy-lines talk to get a better understanding of Michigan State if you have not had the opportunity to watch them play this season. But when I look at the matchups, there's three that really stick out to me that Iowa needs to win. The first one is Iowa's offensive line versus Michigan State's defensive line.

Against Michigan, Michigan State looked pretty darn good. They had one sack, six tackles for loss, and a couple quarterback hurries against a Michigan team that put on an offensive showing against Minnesota the week before. With that being said, one thing I want to quickly get out of the way when I'm talking about this matchup is that I'm not talking about it from a rushing defense perspective whereas Michigan State has had a pretty strong rushing defense under Mike D'Antonio that is not necessarily the case at least so far in the season I'm talking about the passing attack and making sure the offensive line can pass block against this Michigan State defensive line that appeared to be pretty solid against Michigan

last week and we've seen these struggles for this Iowa offensive line. Coy Cronk was benched last week because he struggled so much against Northwestern when they were rushing just three pass rushers against five offensive line. They got one sack, six tackles for loss, and one quarterback hurry. Honestly, I think it was a little bit more than that though. Spencer Petras, we talked about this last year with Nate Stanley. We need to give these quarterbacks time if they want to go through their progression. I talked a lot about it on Monday's show with Matt. Spencer Petras appeared to be going through just one read and chucking the ball. He wasn't able to go through all of his reads. Part of that might have been the fact that he was kind of speeding up the game

mentally, but part of it was probably the pressure that he was constantly getting. So it's very important that Iowa can stop this Michigan State defensive line that appears to be on the rise and pretty solid. If they can do that, that'll be huge for Spencer Petras and this passing attack. Matchup number two that I'm very interested to watch is Ricky White, the true freshman, versus the Iowa secondary. Against Michigan, this dude torched them. Eight catches, 196 yards. We've seen Iowa struggle with speedy wide receivers in the past. David Bell, not necessarily a speedy wide receiver, but he torched Iowa when they played Purdue. We've seen other teams do this. K.J. Hamler was always a thorn in our side. Rondell Moore, despite the fact that he didn't put up gaudy statistics, was always a thorn in Iowa's. Rondell Moore, despite the fact that he didn't put up gaudy statistics,

was always a thorn in Iowa's side as well when they played him in his true freshman season. That's why this is a very important matchup to handle Ricky White and shut him down. I do believe the Iowa secondary can do that, but it's going to be a little bit tough. Ricky White is a good player. Rocky Lombardi looked a lot better last week than he has in previous spot starts or spot playing time. Now, that being said, Michigan didn't have both their corners from last year. They lost both their corners coming into the season. So this to say maybe their secondary isn't that strong. I do think Iowa secondary is very strong, despite what we saw against Purdue, despite the fact that Peyton Ramsey was able to at least dink and dunk all over the field. I do believe very heavily in this Iowa secondary. They are a strong secondary, but they need to shut down Ricky White and force Rocky Lombardi

to go to other guys on this Michigan State team because none of these other guys really scare me a ton from a passing game perspective. Matchup number three is Sam Laporta versus the Michigan State linebackers, a young and experienced group of Michigan State linebackers with Amir Smith-Marset out. We have Tyrone Tracy and Nico Reganey. They're going to be featured a little bit more. I still believe Brandon Smith is the best wide receiver. He's going to get a lot of catches as well, a lot of looks, but Sam Laporta is clearly the favorite here for Spencer Petras. On Saturday at 13 targets, that's a ton of targets for a tight end, especially a true sophomore tight end.

Michigan State's linebackers have had a relative amount of success against tight ends this year. They've allowed only four catches to tight ends this year. But I believe that will change. That is going to be a huge matchup. Can Sam Laporta get open against these Michigan State linebackers? Can he make a little bit more consistent of catches? Michigan State linebackers. Can he make a little bit more consistent of catches? I think a lot of that has to do with the seams that Spencer Petras is trying to fit, the windows I should say, that Spencer Petras was trying to fit those balls in, and also with the speed that he was throwing on

them. But Sam Laporta, a couple of those balls hit his hands. Matt Vandenberg and I disagree a little bit. I think if it hits your hands, you should be able to come down with it to an extent. disagree a little bit. I think if it hits your hands, you should be able to come down with it to an extent. I think we're going to see him have a better game and clearly get more targets, get a lot of targets against this Michigan State linebacker crew, but that's going to be a matchup I'm watching out for. We need to see Sam Laporta win that, get those catches, get those targets, and I think that will help Iowa sustain drives going forward. Even with Amir Smith-Marset out, we're going to see Sam Laporta be a bigger focal point of this offense.

That's my three matchups that Iowa needs to win and that we should be watching out for coming into this game. Coming up on segment number three, I'm going to be breaking down what Kirk Barron said in his press conference. He talked a lot about the transfers, talked about Amir Smith-Marset, talked about the playing time behind him, and what the expectations are at the tackle position. That'll be coming up in just a few short seconds. All right, we are back for our third and our final segment of the Locked on Hawkeyes podcast,

your daily podcast covering your Iowa Hawkeyes. And Kirk Ferentz talked to the media just as he does every single Tuesday, and he gave a lot of good insights. From an injury perspective, he said, we had a couple guys banged up a little bit on Saturday, but everyone seems to have a chance to go this week. They've only been on the field for one practice so far. They weren't able to practice yesterday because of the elections

and making sure that all their players could get out and vote. But we'll know more about that as we get further into the week. But it sounds like most of these guys are healthy and ready to go. The big news, though, that people wanted to touch on was the transfers. The fact that Calvin Lockett transferred, Shadrick Bird transferred, Yavi Judy, oh man, I've definitely butchered his name, he is also transferring as well. Here's what Kirk Ferentz had to say about that, and I'll give my breakdown of what I believe that means.

He said, I look at them all separately, basically two categories. You have three guys that have decided to transfer. Me, personally, not totally shocked. I'm disappointed. Was hoping all three would stay with the team. I think there are two commonalities with all three of those players, though. They are all from a distance, far from home. I guess maybe another commonality, they are all fairly young players.

Locke's a little bit older than the other two, but they are a distance from home, so that's part of it. I think the other similarity is that all three weren't in the two deep either of the first two, but they are a distance from home, so that's part of it. I think the other similarity is that all three weren't in the two deep either the first two weeks, but all that being said, it's disappointing because all three of them were doing well. All three are good people and good players. I think they had good potential. Shadrick Bird played on our kickoff team in the first game, so that came as a little bit of a surprise, but not totally. And again, we've talked about this. People who are not close to the program, who are ignorant to what is going on within the Iowa football program, they want to say, oh my gosh, three young players, they're transferring because of all the racial issues that happened within the Iowa football program

earlier on in this year. Yes, those did happen, and Iowa is working through that. I don't believe that these three players are leaving because of that, though. As Kirk said, they just aren't getting a lot of playing time. We talked about Calvin Lockett earlier on in the show not getting a lot of playing time. Shadrick Bird wasn't going to get a lot of playing time for quite some time. Judy could look at it and say, you know, this team is moving more to a 4-2-5. There's not a lot of linebacker spots, and some of the younger guys are really stepping up over him. So that was to be expected.

Now, moving on to Amir, obviously a big incident with him getting the OWI. He said, Amir's incident is a separate incident. We haven't had many of those over the last however many years. It's very disappointing. Amir is very remorseful. I don't think he fully realizes just the potential danger of the situation first and foremost, not only to himself, but to other people. And it's a regrettable decision that he made. So he'll deal with it. I've known Amir for

four plus years now. He's a tremendous person and a great team member. For me personally, this is very uncharacteristic of him and surprising. It's something he did and it's a bad decision. It's like all of us in life. You make a bad decision. You have to live with it. I think he'll push forward. That's my sense right now, but we'll see how things pan out. Now, to me, that's a pretty positive and not glowing endorsement of Amir, but an endorsement of Amir that he is not having other issues on the scene. We talked about it yesterday where I really felt like there are some cases to be made. The Amir has not always been the most reliable player on this team, the best team

member of these folks. You know, Kirk Ferentz talking glowingly, in my opinion, glowingly of Amir and what he's done and how he is a team player. Obviously disappointed in what he did, but that does bode well. Kirk knows best. Seems like he is not as concerned about Amir growing from this situation and being a member of the team going forward. As far as what to expect from Amir being out, we touched on this a little bit,

but Tyrone Tracy is going to get the reps out there. Charlie Jones is also a guy to watch out for, doing a fantastic job on the punt return team. He's going to be taking the reps at kick return. Also is listed on the two deeps. Or excuse me, he was not listed on the two deeps, but we can expect him to be that fourth wide receiver in. A junior who I expect to get more playing listed on the two deeps, but we can expect him to be that fourth wide receiver in a sophomore who I, or a junior who I expect to get more playing time as the season goes on.

And especially next year after a mere Smith, Marcelle and Brandon Smith leave, that'll be a lot of fun to see what he can bring to the team after transferring to us from Buffalo. And then he talked a little bit about the tackle position. Koi Kronk got benched last week. What is to come from that tackle position, especially with a former walk onon, Nick DeJong,

who's showing up on the two deeps? He said, Mark is our next tackle in for the record there. We've got Nick. We've got Jack Plum. Those would be our five guys that are playing tackle right now. And Iowa does a really good job of rotating guys in and out of the offensive line. And Mark is that next guy. So if Coy Cronk struggles or continues to struggle, and Kirk Ferens talked a little

bit about this over his press conference as well, said he just didn't feel right. Didn't feel like Coy Cronk was comfortable out there. And he keeps reminding people, this is the guy who hasn't played football in 13 months. He's struggling, you know, he's coming back from a serious ankle injury. So I think we do need to be a little bit patient with him, but you still expect more from a form or from a three-year starter in the Big Ten, a guy who's going into his fourth year of starting. That being said, Kirk does feel comfortable with the guys who can rotate in and out of there at that tackle position. So hopefully we'll see improved offensive line play.

As I mentioned in segment number two, that's a huge matchup I'm watching, the Iowa offensive line versus the Michigan State defensive line. Hopefully Coy Cron can play better and we can get Spencer Petras a little bit more protection back there, get that passing in going, even though Amir Smith-Marset is not going to be there. But that is the end of our show. That is the end of the press conference and what I wanted to cover from Kirk Ferentz and what that means for the Iowa football program.

I appreciate you all tuning in today. Hope you all have a fantastic Wednesday. Please make sure to like, review, and subscribe wherever you downloaded this podcast at give us that 5 star review and follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram as always Hawkeye Nation have a fantastic Wednesday

and let's go Hawks