Locked On Hawkeyes - Daily Podcast On Iowa Hawkeyes Football & Basketball - How do you leave Kirk Ferentz off the top-150? | Will Jordan Bohannon redshirt? | Can Carver-Hawkeye Arena get better?

Episode Date: December 11, 2019

ESPN dropped a list of the top-150 coaches of all-time and there was no Kirk Ferentz. We break down why that list is wrong before discussing whether Jordan Bohannon will redshirt. The show wraps up with a discussion of Carver Hawkeye Arena, and what could be done to make it a better atmosphere. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I thank God I was born on the good arms of the Midwest, and not on the battlefields of the U.S. It's a time of panic, and it's intercepted! It's picked off right away! Intercepted by Marty Hooker! Pick six! Eight seconds into the game! Buffen sets up deep in the pocket, goes down the field for Smith!

Oh! He's got it! Smith! Touchdown. 85 yards. High on. Touchdown, 10. Taking a shot in the end zone.

It is caught. No offense. Touchdown. That's either one or you have it. Go ahead and three. Yes. Two-point lead for the Hawkeyes podcast, your daily podcast covering your Iowa Hawkeyes on the Locked On Sports Network.

As always, I'm your host, Andrew Wade. Excited to be bringing you their third episode of the week today. And we have a lot of stuff to cover on today's episode. We're going to be breaking down, you know, Jordan Bohannon and his decision to redshirt or not redshirt. I'm talking a little bit more in depth about that and kind of what he alluded to in his postgame press conference after the Iowa Minnesota game. We're also going to be talking about the news that Kirk Ferentz was left off the top 150 coaches of all time list, which I think is absolute bullcrap.

We're going to be giving some of the guest posts from Twitter that people kind of voice their opinion on this and also be giving some of my information, kind of what my thoughts are on that on today's episode of the Lockdown Hawkeyes podcast. And then finally, we're going to be covering just the Carver-Hawkeye Arena news, right? So if anyone saw the Monday night game, there was a lot of concerns about how few people

were actually in the arena. So I want to get some thoughts on that and kind of touch on what I think could make it a better atmosphere for the Iowa Hawkeyes. Before that, we do have some roundup stuff that we want to make sure we're covering on today's episode of Lockdown Hawkeyes podcast. Just a quick reminder that tonight, the women's we're covering on today's episode of Locked On Hawkeyes podcast. Just a quick reminder that tonight the women's basketball team takes on Iowa State in that Cy Hawks series. Want to notch another win for the Iowa Hawkeyes in that in-state series.

The women are attempting to make it four in a row. So catch it tonight on FS1. Really good opportunity to watch the women's basketball team. They're off to a relatively good start. Obviously, losing Megan Gustafson is never going to be super easy, right? But they're trying to make it back to the NCAA tournament again, so be sure to watch them tonight. Also, Luka Garza was named the Oscar Robertson National Player of the Week

after some fantastic performances against Syracuse and Michigan. So another great honor going out to him. And he's actually, according to Ken Palm, in the running for National Player of the Year, according to Ken Palm, in that top 10. So again, I've been talking about this a lot on our Twitter accounts. Just I am so impressed with Luka Garza's development over the past year. Last year, I thought, you know, you could tell, you could see the potential in him. You could see that he has the opportunity. He has some chances to do some really big things.

He just needed to get a little bit more forceful down low, needed to be a little bit more confident and, you know, taking those shots. And he's done that this year with Tyler Cook gone. He's really stepped up and taken that leadership role on. And he's a really big reason why I think this basketball team, this men's basketball team has an opportunity to go back to the NCAA tournament despite all the losses and issues they've had throughout the season. You lose Isaiah Moss. You lose Tyler Cook. You lose Macy Daly.

You lose Nicholas Bayer. You lose Jack Nunn's injury. We might be losing Jordan Bohannon, which we'll talk about here in a little bit. But just really impressive all around from Luka Garza with a hot start this year. And just a reminder, on tomorrow's show, we're going to be covering the Iowa-Iowa State matchup. Again, trying to break down a little bit of the Iowa-Minnesota game, let you know kind of what I thought, give some updates on how the Iowa-Iowa State women's basketball game went,

and then also talk a little bit about recruiting. There is some news with recruiting going on. As I alluded to yesterday, Theo Johnson has decided to commit to Penn State. I want to talk about why that isn't that big of a deal for Iowa this year and obviously ongoing. And also talk about some news that Iowa is attempting to get a four-star recruit out of Largo, Florida to commit to Iowa after originally committing to Florida State. Again, tapping into that Largo pipeline, seeing if Iowa can't do it again and bring in another guy from the area to the Iowa Hawkeye football program. But I do want to jump into, you know, let's go right into it and let's talk about this Kirk Ferentz news, right? So there was a list made by ESPN basically announcing the top 150 coaches of all time.

And Kirk Ferentz wasn't on it. And I think that is flabbergasting. I think it's complete bullcrap. It's not okay that he's consistently underrated and overlooked. And I think a lot of that has to go with his longevity, right? He's not a flashy guy. He's not a rah-rah guy. He hasn't won a national title.

But what he's done with the Iowa football program, making them a consistent contender year in and year out, making them a team that every team has to worry about on their schedule no matter what. Outside of his first two seasons, he's only had one season with less than six wins, and that was that disappointing 2012 season, I believe, where they went 4-8 with James Vandenberg under center. So outside of that, I mean, how consistent do you have to be? He has five 10-win seasons. He could even have six 10-win seasons after the bowl game this year.

And some of the guys that made this list, it really kind of shook me or made me question how they made this list just it really kind of shook me or made me question how they made this list kind of what is the criteria they are evaluating this list on and evaluating these coaches on and how the hell does Kirk Ferenc not make that list right so let's just kind of read off a few guys I was kind of curious about we have Frank Beamer 280 wins 144 losses four ties over at his time at Murray State and Virginia Tech. And I will say his time at Virginia Tech was absolutely fantastic. It was a lot of fun to watch those teams, but they didn't win a national title. He did get 13 10-win seasons.

They did win four ACC titles. So I have no problem with him being on this list at 45. My point is, if we're not looking at national titles, then what are we looking at, right? So what's to say, why isn't Kirk Ferentz on this list? I mean, Frank Beamer had the Vic brothers on his teams, had a devastating defense. Again, I don't think Kirk Ferentz is necessarily better than Frank Beamer, but just one of the guys that kind of stood out to me. Another guy, Bill Snyder.

One of the things they kind of focused on was the fact that he rebuilt the Kansas State program, made them at least a contender, right? But not exactly all that impressive. I mean, he went to 11 straight bowl games, had a winning record after his third year, but nothing really that impressive in my book that made Spill Snyder necessarily a better coach than Kirk Ferentz. And he has that longevity factor.

And again, they focus on the fact that Kansas State isn't a good program or wasn't a good program historically. And Iowa, prior to Hayden Fry, also wasn't that good of a program for about 20 years. There were some good years here and there, but perennially they weren't as strong as they have been the last 40 years under the guidance of Hayden Fry and Kirk Ferentz. So let's keep going down this list. Obviously, a couple other guys I want to touch on. Gary Patterson at TCU.

He's done a really good job at TCU, but he hasn't won a national title. He's had a couple top ten finishes. Lance Leopold, Wisconsin Whitewater, and Buffalo. Impressive what he did at Wisconsin Whitewater, but I'm sorry. That isn't doing it at a high level. That is D3 football in Wisconsin. You can get a couple transfer guys from UW and build a pretty solid program there. Not impressive.

Now we're starting to get into that list of guys, though, that really I don't think Kirk Ferren should even be considered below. Brian Kelly. Cool, man. You won a D2 national championship. You won some titles with some small schools. Don't care. Your fighting Irish team perennially sucks, right?

Like they're a nine-win team, a 10-win team that gets blown out whenever they actually get some sort of respect, which they don't typically deserve. Barry Alvarez, highly, you know, definitely respect what he did at Wisconsin, but 119 wins, 74 losses. I feel like that's just more of a legacy award with how he turned around the Wisconsin program and built it into what it is. But again, not overly impressive. Hayden Frye, I love seeing Hayden Frye on this list. I don't disagree with

Hayden Frye being on this list, but I'm a believer that I think Kirk Ferentz is better than Hayden Frye in terms of what he's built over the last 20 years. So I do think if Hayden Frye is on this list, you definitely have to include Kirk Ferentz. Jimbo Fisher, if we want to talk about integrity, this guy has none, right? He built a terrible program at Florida State where everyone could just do basically whatever the hell they wanted to. You had Jameis Winston who led him to a national championship. Jameis Winston is a dirt ball, and I have no problem saying that. So just not impressive at all, from my opinion. I do have a couple other guys to come up on and obviously want to get to some of our tweets

that we got from some of the fans listening to the Locked on Hawkeyes podcast. That'll be coming up here in just a few moments. Before we do that, though, just a quick reminder that if you're a Spotify listener, use Spotify wrapped to show us your top locked on podcast for the year. Take a screenshot and tag us at locked on live and tag whatever show that you love from the locked on podcast network on Twitter. And we will share and retweet.

And I hope to see some locked on Hawkeyes on there as well. All right, we are back and I want to wrap this up because I do want to get to some of the tweets that some of you awesome listeners did send me about your thoughts on Kirk Ferentz. But the last guy I want to cover is Mark Richt at Georgia, Miami. Obviously put together a good Georgia program, good coach, but again, nothing that really strikes me as impressive overall, especially given the talent pool down in Georgia.

And like I said, you know, Kirk Ferentz, his statistics speak for themselves. He's 19th overall in bowl games, 24th overall in career bowl wins, 53rd overall in career wins, four-time Big Ten coach of the year, 2002 AP coach of the year. One of the biggest things I think, you know, he's so successful in sending talent to the NFL. He has an Orange Bowl win. And Like I said, five 10-win seasons, possibly six. But let's jump in and let's take a quick look at what some of you fans said about Kirk Barron, starting with Jared Starkweather. Yes, Kirk is moving up all-time win chart for Big Ten Conference,

has two conference championships and an Orange Bowl win. Also remember that stat where like 85%, give or take, of players are drafted or signed to an nfl roster absolutely again i would love to see what the criteria is of this ranking because you know what's the ultimate goal of college football yes it'd be great to win national championships but the big thing is to develop men leaders and get them to the professionals where they can make money and be stewards of the program. So couldn't agree more, man. Another person, Drew, parentheses, Keith Duncan, Stan, parentheses, Lance Leopold.

Completely agree, man. What the hell? Another guy, Larry King at Hawkeye Heritage. Let's see. He's the fifth winningest coach in Big Ten histories. His players love him even after they've been out of the program for many years. He's the most ethical coach in the profession. When Bill Parcells says you're the best coach in CFB, it means something I could go on.

I think he probably meant Bill Belichick, but the point still stands. I couldn't agree more, man. And then I love this one from Kevin D at KVD1222. He said, what has Brian Kelly done that Kirk hasn't? I actually read this while I was recording. So I got a kick out of that, that I was literally talking about how I thought Brian Kelly was terrible as you said that. So fantastic. Love that. Another guy, Nick at Hawkeye, Nick one said KF and Iowa beat Saban in the capital one bowl. KF is better than Saban. KF number one, all time.

I like your thinking, man. Maybe not number one, but 100% like the thinking. Another guy, Stevens Perel. Honestly, I'm not going to go into saying your at Twitter handle. It's just a little bit difficult, but definitely should have made it one of the longest tenured coaches in the era where that isn't common and one of the toughest leagues to play in. 100% agree. The Big Ten is just, it's a tough conference. I don't think people give much credit to it, which I think is ridiculous.

And then finally, T. Leibs, at T. Leibs. Yes, the guy turns walk-ons and two-stars in NFL players. He out-coaches teams with better overall talent every year, not to mention how classy he is. Top 150 shouldn't be strictly how many championships you win, and I could not agree more, man. So that's my thoughts. I do think Kirk Ferentz should be in the you know 100 top 150 I think he should be somewhere between 70 and 100 to be perfectly honest that's kind of where I see him fitting right just above Hayden Frye in my personal opinion let's kind of switch gears let's cover some basketball Jordan Bohannon is still it sounds

like we're not sure what he's doing right He hasn't given us any inclination whether he's going to be redshirting or not. He does have his final game of eligibility for this year if he does want to redshirt, and that is tomorrow night against Iowa State. Interestingly enough, he did say, I saw somewhere that he said that he has already made a decision what he's going to do. And if that is the case, that really gets me thinking that he's going to be going towards redshirting, right? Because if he wants to stay, then why isn't he just, if he wants to play this year, why isn't he just coming out and saying it? I think he doesn't want to make a big fanfare out of it. But honestly, at this point, we're just wondering what is he going to do? Because he's actually put together a pretty solid season so far. I mean, I've been pretty impressed with his

play. Obviously, there's been a couple of where he doesn't look as, you know, as healthy as you would love to see him be. But he definitely looks like, you know, Jordan Mohanan of last year still can shoot the ball relatively well, not hitting it as good of a clip as he has in the past. We saw that early last year as well, got off to a rough start and really picked it up throughout the year. Right now, though, averaging 3.3 assists per game, 0.7 steals per game, and 8.4 points per game. And again, I think he's going to keep getting better if he were to keep playing this year, but not really sure kind of where he's leaning. We will find out after the Iowa State game, but I do want to give you a quick insight. There's actually a clip that Rob Howe of Hawkeye Nation posted that I do think is really important for you to listen

to if you haven't already. Again, Rob Howe, great guy to follow, great guy to listen to on Hawkeye Sports posted this video on his Twitter account. I want to give you some of the audio of that so you can get some context behind what I'm about to say. You can follow him at Rob Howe. That's R-O-B-H-O-W-E-H-N on Twitter. So let me drop that in right here. Do you have a decision to make after Thursday's game, or have you already made it? You know, I'm just still taking it day by day.

Just trying not to make it much of a drama dilemma like a lot of people are trying to. I've always been someone that cares about the team more than myself. I care about winning and my second minute is when I play a game, I want to try to win every game that I got out there with the team. And if not, try to win every game that I got out there with the team. If not, try to carry throughout the season and try to play through what I have in these past couple games. So I'd say I'm still taking it day by day. It's been tough, but it's nothing that I haven't encountered since I've gotten here.

So Bohannon did go on to say a little bit more as well about wanting to play out his senior year with Ryan Creener one of his best friends the guy he's been living with and how hard it would be to not be able to play with him in their final season together but man there's a lot of things really pulling at me here you know my heart says he's gonna play and my head says he's going to play and my head says he's not. He does talk a lot about wanting to make sure he's finally healthy. And I think for him, it's probably a tough decision as well. He wants to play with Ryan Kreener. I think he looks at this team, and this team is a talented team. With Jordan Bohannon on that squad, that clutch shooting,

this is an NCAA tournament team. This is a team that could win one or two games in the tournament, maybe even more depending on the continual growth of Joe Wieskamp and Luka Garza. This is a team that Bohannon doesn't have to carry either like he has had to in the past. Because you do have Wieskamp and Garza and you have shooters at other spots as well. I think without Bohannon, the chances of going to the tournament or the chances of winning a game or two does drop a little bit. Because you don't have that clutch play that you're going to get from Jordan Bohannon. But the other thing to keep in mind is, you know, he's getting older. What does his professional career look like? I think probably overseas is

a good option for him. I can't imagine, you know, a guy of his stature playing in the NBA, you know, does shoot really well, but guys who shoot really well still need to play some pretty good defense. And that's not something, you know something I think is one of his strengths per se. So I just, if he is healthy, if he is healthier, I struggle with not seeing him play out the rest of the season. That being said, if health is the of utmost importance, that is the number one thing I could see him shutting it down. So I guess to be honest, there's a lot of different emotions kind of going on here and

we'll find out after the Iowa-Iowa State game. But regardless, it's just a pretty Bohannon move to, if he does decide to redshirt, to sit out the Cal Poly game so he can play Iowa State, beat them at Jack Trice, excuse me, beat them at the Hilton Coliseum one more time, and then redshirt for the year and get healthier for next year. And if Bohannon does decide to register and comes back next year, and if Garza returns, and if we do return all those guys, watch out for next year's Iowa squad. I would be hella scared to face that team.

That's going to be a loaded team if they are able to return all those great players to that team. Coming up, though, we're going to talk a little bit about Carver-Hawkeye Arena and kind of what the expectations are for the arena and getting up for a men's basketball game and what I think could maybe make it a little bit better for the fans and obviously just for the team and creating that better atmosphere in Carver. Before we do that, though, I do have to thank our sponsor of the show today.

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I saw a lot of tweets about Carver and how it was barely seating anyone before the Iowa-Minnesota game, a Big Ten matchup. You know, it is embarrassing, right? You see Duke, the Cameron Crazies. You see the Assembly, Indiana. You see East Lansing and Michigan State and how they show up for games, or even Michigan Friday night when Iowa went there. The fans are incredible there, and they do a great job,

and they really make that home court advantage real. For me, that's huge, right? For a basketball team, that's huge. You have that momentum on your side. You saw it at Las Vegas, actually. I was in Las Vegas for the Las Vegas Invitational, and there was a ton of Iowa fans. And the team responded to that. They were excited.

When they would do something great, they would pump their hands up and get the crowd even louder. And when a crowd is reacting to what's going on in the court, it makes the play on the court better. And if you don't understand that, then you haven't been around a ton of sports before. But I think most of you that are listening to the show understand how important that fan environment is. It's why Kinnick is such a scary place to go to as an opposing team, especially in October and early November. You don't want to go to Kinnick. You don't want to go to as an opposing team, especially in October and early in November. You don't want to go to Kinnick. You don't want to go to Kinnick at a night game versus a ranked team either because those fans have been tailgating for a while. Us Iowa fans know how to get down,

and we can make it pretty loud there and really put that home field advantage on our side, and that's what we need to do in Carver as well. But let's be honest here. It was a Monday night, right? It's finals week. There was some bad weather going on throughout the state. I believe that night, um, Minnesota isn't exactly a great big 10 team. Um, so there are some things that really weren't working in favor of Carver. And it sounds like the arena did get a little bit more full as the night went on and, you know, by tip off, but 15 minutes, the arena was almost empty. The other thing I think would really help

is to see some better marketing from the program and getting some of the students there. Again, I believe it was finals week or somewhere around finals week. If it wasn't finals week, the kids are probably out in general, but that makes it tough for students to get to the game. And I think the other thing is

people probably didn't have the greatest of expectations coming into the season of the men's basketball team, especially after how many losses they had from a personnel standpoint coming into the season. So that also could be a factor. And I don't think that's an excuse. I'm just being honest about kind of what had happened coming into that. So the other thing I think would really help, though, is in addition to the marketing, in addition to maybe, you know, I think a lot of people talked about making Carver or

giving some updates and renovations to Carver Hawkeye arena. Obviously it would be great to have food a little bit easier and more accessible. It would be a little bit nicer to have the court a little bit more condensed, right? Have the people right on the court. That way they can be louder. I think you can position the, you know position the student section a little bit better, not have them in the corner of the court. And then the other thing too is the arena is a decent ways away from the main part of campus. So it can be difficult to get to. And I know they have buses and everything, but in the middle of Iowa winter, you don't want to walk over there. If you don't have a car, you're not taking a Lyft or an Uber because you're a poor college kid. So you really got to be dedicated to want to make it over to Carver Hawkeye Arena. And I think

that's kind of where you're struggling at, right? On a football Saturday, they have all day to make it there. But on a Monday night after work, after school and cold weather, it can be a little bit difficult. So I do think it is important that if you are in the Iowa City area, if you are an Iowa basketball fan, that you do try to get out there and support the team. Get loud. If someone next to you is not getting loud, try to get them up. Try to get them excited.

I think that will really help the atmosphere of Carver. And also, it will help us with recruiting as well. How do you think it looks when a Xavier Foster, for example, comes to Iowa and there's half the, you know, half the arena is full and the crowd isn't getting up for anything. They're just kind of ho humming around. It's kind of quiet in there. How do you think it feels then when he goes to Hilton and he sees Iowa state fans going incredibly crazy for the cyclones, right? So, um, obviously that wasn't the main reason why he went to Iowa state. He did reference the fact that he wanted an NBA career and he felt like Iowa State could do that better for him.

But that does play into it for some of these recruits. So if we want to see a better on-court product, we need to give that energy and the vibrations from the arena and bring that into that atmosphere and make it an incredible atmosphere for the Iowa Hawkeyes men's and women's basketball team, kind of like we did for the wrestling team. We need to really bring that emotion and energy to each time that we're there and try to make it there as much as possible. And I think that's, it's kind of tough, right? It's the chicken or the egg kind of argument.

Does the team play better? Does the team perform well? Or do we yell first? Do we get up and excited and whatnot and the team will play better from that? For me, it's just kind of a, I think it's really important that if you're an Iowa basketball fan, you're trying to get to those games and that'll also help solve some of that problem. But it is disappointing to see such a lackluster attendance at a big time matchup in early December. at a Big Ten matchup in early December. That being said, though, that'll do it for our show today. Kind of a little bit of a rant there at the end, so I appreciate you dealing with me there. Feel free to share your feelings.

Let me know what your thoughts are on Carver Hockey Arena and what could make it a better atmosphere for the men's and women's basketball team and even, you know, I wouldn't say the wrestling team because they get a pretty good showing for that. But let me know what your thoughts are. Let me know what your thoughts are on Kirk Ferentz as well and what you think is going to happen with Jordan Bohannon. Would love to hear it.

Tweet at me. Message me on Facebook. DM us on Instagram. Let me know your thoughts. Love to hear that stuff anytime. Again, appreciate you all tuning in to today's episode of the Locked on Hawkeyes podcast. Have a fantastic Wednesday morning and Wednesday day in general, Hawkeye

Nation, and go Hawks.