Locked On Hawkeyes - Daily Podcast On Iowa Hawkeyes Football & Basketball - Iowa Basketball Instant Reaction vs. Omaha, Nebraska Football breakdown, Best Kirk Ferentz Coaching seasons

Episode Date: November 22, 2022

Trent Condon is back for another edition of the Locked on Hawkeyes Podcast.A look back at the game against Omaha where Iowa had to play without Tony Perkins. A look at his injury and how concerning it is and the potential for long term effects. A great performance from Kris Murray and where our expectations should be for him the rest of the season and a look forward to what's coming up for the basketball team.A breakdown of the stats from Nebraska with the game coming up Friday. Some injury concerns are hitting the Hawkeyes including Sam LaPorta and where Iowa goes without him.And a look back at some of the best coaching seasons from Kirk Ferentz and where this season will rank if they can get back to Indy.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!LinkedInLinkedIn jobs helps you find the candidates you want to talk to, faster. Post your job for free at Linkedin.com/lockedoncollege Terms and conditions apply.Built BarBuilt Bar is a protein bar that tastes like a candy bar. Go to builtbar.com and use promo code “LOCKEDON15,” and you’ll get 15% off your next order.BetOnlineBetOnline.net has you covered this season with more props, odds and lines than ever before. BetOnline – Where The Game Starts!Underdog FantasySign up on underdogfantasy.com with the promo code LOCKED ON and get your first deposit doubled up to $100!SimpliSafeWith Fast Protect™️ Technology, exclusively from SimpliSafe, 24/7 monitoring agents capture evidence to accurately verify a threat for faster police response. There’s No Safe Like SimpliSafe. Visit SimpliSafe.com/LockedOnCollege to learn more.UpsideDownload the FREE Upside App at https://upside.app.link/locked to get $5 or more cash back on your first purchase of $10 or more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The newly ranked Iowa Hawkeyes get another win their fourth of the season as they beat Omaha 164. We break down the game minus Tony Perkins, what we saw out of the Hawkeye basketball team. Iowa gets ready on the football field for Nebraska on Black Friday. Our first deep dive into the Cornhuskers and what we anticipate we're going to see on Friday. And if Iowa completes it, they get to the Big Ten championship game. Where does this season rank in the great seasons of Kirk Ferentz as the Iowa head coach? That's all coming up today on Locked on Hawkeyes.

Locked on Hawkeyes, your daily podcast on the Iowa Hawkeyes. Part of the Locked on Podcast Network, your team every day. Welcome in. I'm Trent Condon, and this is the Locked On Hawkeyes podcast. Thanks for making Locked On Hawkeyes your first listen each and every day. Available wherever you get podcasts. You can also see us on the YouTube. That's right.

Find us there on YouTube. Just search Locked on Hawkeyes. Hit that subscribe button and it helps us get in front of more Hawkeye fans. Today's episode is brought to you by Upside. Download the free Upside app and use promo code LOCKED to get $10 or more cash back on your first purchase of $10 or more. That's LOCKED, Upside, and the Up upside app and use promo code locked to get dollars or more cash back on your first purchase of ten dollars or more that's locked upside and the upside app get into it here as iowa gets their fourth win of the season on the hardwood they roll past omaha 100 to 64 now if you were listening to our show on monday you heard biz and myself talk a little bit about the game loved iowa in the first half is Is that number Biz threw out there?

17.5. They covered that one. I love their both first half team total and game team total and hit both of those as well. So hopefully it helped you out a little bit and got you a little jingle jingle in your pocket going in to the holiday weekend. Well, it'll be a big one for this Iowa basketball team as they head down now to Florida. They will take on Clemson on Thanksgiving, on Black Friday, excuse me. That will be a six o'clock game. So right as the Iowa-Nebraska football game will be wrapping up, you'll have a chance to watch a little hardwood. Or if you're down there in Florida, I'll be jealous of you

making it there. I'll be in Cleveland. Yeah, that's where my Thanksgiving is going to be taking me this year. But I'll tell you, this Iowa basketball team, the news comes down in the afternoon that Tony Perkins was not going to be part of the squad. The point spread didn't change very much, and the outlook for this team didn't change a whole lot. Aaron Uless was inserted into the starting lineup, so it was Uless at the point guard position, followed by Peyton Sanford, Patrick McCaffrey, Chris Murray, and inside, Phillip Robracha. So not a whole lot of movement there, not a whole lot of change.

You know, this was another tomato can. This is another going to be an easy victory. And in the past, these were the kind of games that would annoy me. Everybody plays by games, right? Everybody has the teams that are towards the bottom of the barrel, low majors, mid-majors in the league that you put in the schedule. You fill out your schedule that way. But back in the old days of the RPI system, it really drove me nuts

because it would hurt Iowa's strength of schedule and their non-conference RPI so bad, playing the dregs of college basketball. Well, today, with the new net system that is in place, it is an efficiency measure. And though it is capped at a 10-point margin of victory, that is true. Also, if you play these teams, efficiency is a part of this, both offensive and defensive efficiency. And if you play these bad teams and you club them,

as I was done now the last three years, beating these teams, but beating them by 30, 40, 50 points, that helps out your net rating. And I was done a really good job of that. And the same thing happened here. Put 100 on the board, always good to see see there are smiles on the faces after that one but early on it was a chris murray show 25 points in the first half he just so smooth and you know the question was posed to him after the game the comparisons are going to continue to be made between of course

him and his brother and and the comparisons that people want to throw out there they're different guys they're different type of players. Chris is a guy that better shooter growing up, and you saw that shooting ability certainly show up in a big-time way as he was hitting shots from all over the place. Maybe not as aggressive as Keegan could be at times, but I think that's okay if this team continues to be healthy throughout the season.

Not as deep as some of the past Fran teams that we've seen. But if he's out there, even if it's a consistent 18, 7 rebounds, something like that, a couple assists per game, a couple of blocks, steals, those types of things, you're going to be really, really good shape with Chris Murray. He's not a guy I think that has to get you 23, 24 a night because I think there is enough firepower offensively in this team. And as we've talked about here in the first couple of weeks of the season, defensively, they can do some different things. And that certainly makes you excited. Read through the box score, 30 points again, as mentioned, Chris Murray with a career high in that one as he hits 13 of 17 from the field,

including four of six from three. He was plus 33 in the plus minus on Monday night. A second in the team in scoring, it was Patrick McCaffrey. One of the better games from Patrick and most importantly for him. We know he can score. That's never been a problem for Patrick. It's being involved in different ways. Also had five rebounds in the game, three assists, three steals. That's what you need out of Patrick McCaffrey. He's going to be a score. He's going to put a double figures up this season. That's never been the problem. The problem that I've seen a lot of times with Patrick McCaffrey is there's not enough more. There needs to be more to his game.

And certainly that was the case on Monday night. Rabrasha had eight points and eight rebounds. Good to see on that front. Uless with four assists getting the start, as we mentioned, along with seven points at Sanford. Eight, six, and three across the line for him. Connor had 12 off the bench as he was hitting shots again, two or three from downtown. He was upsetting himself, the one miss that he had in the game. DeSante Bowen, thought we saw some things out of him, the young freshman. There's going to be a moment this year where they're going to need DeSante Bowen,

and there very well could be a game that he could win for him this year. He's got an ability to get to the rim. He's so smooth with the basketball. He's got some defensive intensity on top of it. I think a lot of things to be excited about, certainly about his future and what it could be going forward. Saw a little gundelay. Josh Dix also hit a couple of shots.

That was good to see late in the game. I hit one from the left wing, hit one from the right side. Good to see him out there. Another guy that's probably going to be a moment this year. They're going to need his shooting off the bench and him to come in. We'll see what he can do physically coming off that devastating broken leg from a season ago, but a good confidence boost certainly for him and a nice team win. Doing it without Tony Perkins, the heart and soul of this team, for my money, a guy that is going to have certainly a ton put on his shoulders this season.

It is going to be good to see. Interesting in the postgame, I saw a note from Chad Leistico of the Des Moines Register beat writer. And one thing that he mentioned is Fran talking about that injury. So first we heard it was a hip. Then it was something maybe in the thigh. And now Fran said in the postgame that it was a lower leg injury. Something's not right.

And you hope it's just one of those injuries. If you play at any sport, you get banged up. Things are going to happen. You hope that this isn't something debilitating, though Fran did say this has been an ongoing concern. Just something to keep in the back of your mind. He wasn't 100% that he's going to be ready to go. Perkins isn't going to be.

On Friday, Fran didn't say it was an automatic 100%. He's going to be there. Now look, Clemson's not very good. Iowa's got a great chance of that game. I think even minus Tony Perkins to win that basketball game and possibly set up a matchup with TCU in the championship game. TCU not playing great right now, but a very talented team with Miller, one of the best point guards in the country.

So you hope obviously Perkins is going to be able to go. Certainly changes the complexion for this team, and they can do it. Iowa, three of their next four games are going to be against ACC competition. Clemson on Friday. Then, of course, whoever they play in the next game between Cal and TCU followed up with the ACC Big Ten Challenge against Georgia Tech, and then they wrap things up against Duke in Madison square garden coming up here in just a couple of weeks.

It's going to be a busy time, ton of basketball right after that Duke game. I was got Iowa state, Wisconsin still on tap. So an important stretch coming up now for Iowa basketball, the lightweights are kind of out of the way here early on. There'll be a couple more at the end of the non-conference slate, but overall great start to the season.

Also ranked in the top 25. How about that for start to the season. Also ranked in the top 25. How about that for the Hawkeyes, seeing them in the top 25. That was a fun little surprise here this morning when the AP poll came out. Good to see they get the notoriety that they deserve after that dominating performance they had a week ago against Seton Hall.

A lot in front of this team, going to be fun, and hopefully everything is all good with Tony Perkins. So that is basketball. We'll have a lot more coming your way on the Hoops front here in the coming days and weeks, obviously, on the Locked On Hawkeyes podcast. But we got football, and we're going to talk football when we come back. Taking a look at Nebraska, look at their statistical profile. We'll see what the numbers say about this Nebraska team

searching for their fourth win of the season. This is their bowl game. How fired up are they going to be to take on this Hawkeye squad? We'll talk about that. And also Kirk Ferentz, if he completes this, if he gets Iowa to the Big Ten championship game once again, where do we put this in the great Kirk Ferentz seasons as we go through the history of Kirk Ferentz? That's all as we continue here on Lockdown Hawkeyes. Today's episode of the Lockdown Hawkeyes podcast is brought to you by Upside, an easy to use app that helps you save money. Inflation has us all thinking about different ways to cut back, driving less, dining out

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I'm in my car all afternoon. After my radio show finishes up that's when my real work begins that's out talking to clients getting people advertising wise that's what i do hey no more worrying about cutting back i want to stop by and get a slice of pizza at casey's when i get my gas yeah i can do that you know why because upside helps you out to get started download the free upside app use the promoED. You'll get $5 or more cash back on your first purchase of $10 or more. Next, claim an offer for whatever you're buying on Upside. Check in at the business.

Just pay as usual with your credit or debit card, and you get paid. In comparison to credit card rewards or loyalty programs, you can earn three times more cash back with Upside. Download the free Upside app and use promo code LOCKED. You'll get $5 or more cash back on your first the free upside app and use promo code locked you'll get five dollars or more cash back on your first purchase of ten dollars or more that's five dollars or more cash back on your first purchase of ten dollars or more using promo code locked trent connor back with you again here on the lockdown hawkeyes podcast thanks for making lockdown hawkeyes your first listen each and every day. For your next listen, check out Locked On Sports Today, their podcast.

It's the biggest stories of the day, plus instant reactions, big game recaps, and the take of the day. It's available on the Odyssey app, YouTube, or wherever you get podcasts. If you're on YouTube, hit that subscribe button. Help us get in front of more Hawkeye fans. As we roll through here here from the conversation on the basketball front we jump in to football it's black black Friday and it is another matchup against Nebraska of course Iowa has dominated this series ever since Sean Eichert the old AD

at Nebraska and the firing of Bo Pelini they said well we have to evaluate where Iowa was as a program well where Iowa is as a program today is certainly one that has exceeded anything that Nebraska has done. From, obviously, the Scott Frost tenure, and that's coming to a close as he was fired earlier this season. What the new regime is going to look like, who's going to go in there and get the job. This has been a fun series for Hawkeye fans.

And it doesn't matter if you're somebody like me that grew up with Nebraska being a dominant force. One of our best family friends, the Sweeneys, she's from Nebraska. I was from Nebraska. So they had Nebraska stuff growing up and had to tell you here about Nebraska and the great big eight and what they do and winning orange bowls and competing for national championships and ultimately breaking through and winning the national championships and those great teams of the mid nineties. I mean, that's what I grew up with. And if you're somebody a little bit younger, well, you don't remember those times. But boy, listening to the Cornhusker fans, they think it's just right around the corner. One thing I do have to say about this team.

So on my radio show, we talked during football season with Stephen M. Sippel. He's been on the Nebraska beat for decades. And I posed a question to him going into the game last week after getting absolutely clubbed by Michigan. Does this team quit? And he said, absolutely not. And I ended up watching a lot of the game on Saturday against Wisconsin. He was exactly right. I mean, that's a team that hasn't quit. They're not very good, but they haven't quit. There's something to say about that.

Anticipating that I was just going to be able to roll in and get this one because a team has quit. That's not going to be the case here. This is their bowl game. This is their final game of the season. They know that. They're playing for a trophy. And they would like nothing more if this really becomes a rivalry.

Not just a rivalry in name or a Hy-Vee sponsorship, but a real rivalry. What you need for it to happen is you've got to have a little conflict, right? And conflict would be, obviously, Nebraska pulling this upset and saying, even in a bad season, we're able to get you guys. And here we come. We've got a new coach, and we've got a new regime coming in, and change things.

And it would leave such a sour taste in the mouth of Hawkeye fans. So you look at this Nebraska team, they're not playing well. They're just not. And they had the lead against Wisconsin. I thought they were going to get it. That didn't happen. But you look at them statistically at this point in time, it's bad. Offensively, defensively, whatever numbers you want to look at,

this is a bad, bad Nebraska team. So starting off with the offense, and we've talked about the Iowa issues, obviously, this season and some of the problems that we've seen out of this squad. So, Iowa's still 130th in the country, second to last in the country in total offense. But Nebraska, you think they've been moving the ball this year. Casey Thompson, though he's banged up right now, he was pretty good at the beginning of the year. They're 101st in the country in total offense 98th in a rushing offense passing offense at 88 but they don't have the sixth ranked offense like the Iowa Hawkeyes do know

that defense this year in total defense is 108th rush defense is 117th like Purdue was able to move the football against them run the football against them you'd anticipate that Iowa would be able to move the football on the ground against this team. This is not what the Hawkeyes have seen the last two weeks. This is not like we saw against Minnesota and the week previous against Wisconsin. This is a team that struggles to stop the run. And we know what this Iowa offense is predicated on. Obviously, Spencer Petras may be playing his cleanest football of his career over this last month. Had just the one fumbleumble has not thrown an interception

now during the four game winning streak it's incredible with this program how they have turned it around and what Kirk Ference has done getting them in this position now they beat anybody great no they haven't we know that but you don't have to beat anybody great on Friday to punch your ticket get back to Indy and then it's a one game playoff right a one game playoff to get to the Rose Bowl and if it's Ohio State if it's Michigan they're going to be a huge underdog, but you're playing with house money at that point in time. Get back in the national spotlight, and you know what? There'll be people making fun of Iowa. They shouldn't be there. How bad the Big Ten West is, you don't have to apologize for anything. You go there, you give it your best shot,

and maybe, just maybe, another one of those crazy things can happen that's what we're hoping for but you have to get the win in this one it's crazy to say because i think anybody that has been listening here if you're new to it i'm a very optimistic guy in the real world in my life with my family my friends i'm an optimistic guy as it pertains though to the sports teams that i root for i am am not the most optimistic guy. The optimism is difficult. Maybe it's the scar tissue that is built up throughout the years of devastating losses. I'm a Bears fan. I was in kindergarten in 85. It hasn't been very good since then.

I'm a Twins fan. 87 and 91 were great. And now I've also seen an 18-game losing streak in the playoffs out of that team. So maybe that's where some of that scar tissue comes from. And of course, we all know about the Hawkeye. I'm sure that is a part of it, but I'm optimistic. I'm confident that this team is going to find a way to win because that's what they've done week after week after week over the last month here. And I just don't see anything in the profile of this Nebraska team that really gives you a chance to pause a chance to say oh maybe just it's difficult to see that doesn't mean it can't happen it doesn't mean that it won't happen

it just means it's difficult on paper to come up with something realistically that makes you a little bit concerned about this Nebraska team with that we will talk more about the game LaShawn he's going to stop by later in the week we'll break things down a little bit deeper with him. The run game, I want to talk about that a little bit. Caleb Johnson saw the numbers from Pro Football Focus. He didn't grade out very well. Didn't play in the final three drives, is it injury related? He was on the depth chart.

Speaking of that depth chart, we did not see two players that came out on Monday afternoon. A little bit of a surprise on that front. Matty Pottembaum, the fullback. Of course, we saw redshirt freshman Eli Miller come into the game. His backup, Palisard, also I think only played one snap in the game. So had to go to the third team fullback when they went fullback in the game. He played seven snaps in there. But most importantly, of course, Sam Laporta.

Without Sam Laporta, how much has to change what they're doing offensively to tight end sets and the like Lachey played well he was really good again and Lachey I mean a budding star going into next season after Sam Laporta is going to depart and go off to the NFL we got to be excited about that but he's a guy that's made so many plays made so many tough catches for this team and has really evolved this season as a tight end you know the first couple of seasons he was good he was solid but he wasn't one of the greats he wasn't one of the guys that you throw up there with the Dallas Clarks the Tony Mowiakis the Marv Cooks going way back Mike Flagg he wasn't a guy like that he was just a guy he got plenty of catches but I think that was more kind of what else was around him.

And he was the best option that they had. He's taken that step this year. This guy is a very good tight end. He's going to remember for a long time. If he's not out there, it's up to Lachey. It's up to Estrego and a couple other youngsters to come out there and help them out. They're going to need it in a big time way.

Going to be tough. Got to put points on the board. Got to run the football. I think they have a chance to do that, though, against Nebraska. As we wrap up here on the Lockdown Hawkeyes podcast, Kirk Ferentz, he completes it. It's eight and four. It's not going to be going down. And Laura is one of his best teams.

This is certainly not one of his most talented teams. But the turnaround that they've had, if they can do it, if they can get back to Indianapolis, win the Big Ten West for the third time, what does that say? Where do we put this season in Iowa football? We'll talk about that as we roll through here. This is the Locked On Hawkeyes podcast. Well, you heard me earlier in the show talking a little bit about my love of betting, and it continues with BetOnline.

It's your number one source for sports betting information, stats, news, and analysis. Get the latest odds and trends for every professional and amateur league out there. Football, basketball, we got the World Cup going on right now. They even got eSports. They have it all at BetOnline. And if you love sports podcasts and you're right here so i'm sure you do you can find those at bet online as well always the fastest and easiest way to get your sports betting fix head to the website today or hop on your phone or your tablet to learn more bet online where the game starts we'll make our picks later in the week as well

as we look at the games coming up this week of course black friday and saturday rivalry week what a great great end to the season it is sad that it's going away but that's the reality right football season year after year always goes way too fast so as we wrap up here looking at kirk barron say and let's say Iowa wins it. Black Friday, punch their ticket to Indianapolis. You just get to sit back, relax, watch that Ohio State-Michigan game and do a little scouting, right? See what we're going to see with those two teams. Two teams that are certainly banged up, I think going to look different. And this Iowa team obviously looks a lot different than the one that we saw back in September

and October when they're playing those two teams. It's a better Iowa team. It's a different Spencer Petras. We think of where we were after that Ohio State game, after Spencer Petras was benched in the game and tears in his eyes as he's answering the questions after the game. A program that looked rudderless and back in Indianapolis with one more victory. That's where they are. Now, this is not a great team. This is not going to go down.

You're not going to be bouncing your grandkids underneath talking about this one like you do with 2002 Iowa. You're not going to be talking about this team, 1985 Hawkeyes going back to Hayden. But we're just talking about the Kirk Aaron. You know, 2004, the last time they won a Big Ten championship as they shared it with Michigan that season. 2009, the Orange Bowl team that goes and beats Georgia Tech and had a great season. Undefeated in 2015, the 12-0 regular season.

A couple others you got to throw in the mix, though. Some of the best coaching jobs that Kirk did. You know, I throw 2003 in there because they had to really adjust on the fly. After the graduation of Brad Banks, a whole bunch of that offensive line outside of Robert Gallery they departed and they went from an offensive team in 2002 and evolved into the more defensive team of 2003 Bob Sanders was a big part of that very good defense obviously but evolved on the fly and won 10 games that season for the first time

and program history in program going back to way back to the 1980s they had that one so doing that in back-to-back years getting to 10 and 3 winning a january bowl game for the first time since the rose bowl of the 1950s that one kind of gets missed because of 02 and 04 it's the one in between but i think you got to throw that one in the mix mentioned 2009 don't forget about 2008 and a similar season to this one, a program that was kind of left for dead. By the end of the season that year, Iowa goes down, plays South Carolina in the Outback Bowl, just absolutely clubbed the Gamecocks in that one. And at the end of the season, Iowa was playing as well as anybody in the country. You had the green out game and the upset against Penn State. I mean, they were playing

some great football and really turned around in 2008. I think that's one of the better coaching jobs you've seen out of Kirk Ferentz. And another one I think that has been missed and will probably be missed when we look back and whatever Kirk's tenure comes to a close, and we're talking about some of those teams, the 2020 season. Of course, what we were dealing with with a global pandemic, number one, the Big Ten for a while not playing as everybody else was playing or not. Most everybody else was playing the SEC, the Big 12, the ACC. They're playing football and the Big Ten finally making the decision to call

back. So you had to figure that out. Iowa starts off 0-2. But oh, by the way, you have the allegations of racial discrimination inside the program that summer of 2020 you had all that going on you start oh and two you let two games you absolutely should have won off and you're oh and two and you rip off six consecutive victories and it would have been eight straight wins if michigan would have shown up they quit on the season and on top of it and missouri would have shown up in the in Nashville for the music city bowl you're talking about a team that would have had eight consecutive victories a really good coaching job that season this one's different and you can point the finger at Kirk for not fixing

this offense we know going into this season that this offense had big time issues he did nothing he said he was going to bet on himself and it looked like that thing was going to be awful they've done it in terms of wins. The offense is still not good. And that's not to say that the offense doesn't need to change in a ball because it absolutely does to compete at the highest levels. But this one, he gets it done, runs off five straight wins to end the regular season. And dare to dream, right?

I don't think they're beating either of those teams in the championship. We saw the gap between Michigan, Ohio State, and Iowa and where it was earlier this season, but that happens. Oh, boy. I mean, we're having a completely different conversation. That's for next week. Hopefully, we'll get there. Hopefully, we get the win against Nebraska,

and we can have some fun with that. Thanks for making Locked On, Hawkeyes, your first listen each and every day. For your second listen, check making Locked On Hawkeyes your first listen each and every day. For your second listen, check out Locked On Sports today from the games that matter to the most to the biggest stories in sports. Go beyond the scoreboard and behind the scenes with local experts and insights

that only Locked On can provide. Locked On Sports today, available on this app, YouTube, or wherever you get podcasts. Hope to track down LaShawn here later in the week. We'll get you a little bit deeper look into things with him. Of course, make our picks for the week. And as I mentioned a little bit earlier, going to be in Cleveland for Thanksgiving, going

to be hanging out with my future brother-in-law, an Ohio State grad. So I'm not going to tell him, but if Iowa does get the win on Black Friday, I'm not going to be rooting for his Buckeyes. I'm going to be a Wolverines fan because that is a team, I think all of us, Michigan, probably the one we'd rather see in the Big Ten championship game. Got to win more to get to that point. We got games to win also down in Florida on the basketball front.

Women's basketball, wrestling underway. It's a great time, a busy time of Iowa sports, and it's a great time to be a Hawkeye fan. Thanks for being with us once again here on Locked On Hawkeyes. We'll talk to you again tomorrow. Go Hawks!