Locked On Hawkeyes - Daily Podcast On Iowa Hawkeyes Football & Basketball - Rapid Reaction: Iowa Football adds QB Mark Gronowski, 1st Half Hoops Reaction vs. Nebraska

Episode Date: January 8, 2025

Trent Condon returns with the latest Locked on Hawkeyes Podcast. Rapid Reaction: Iowa Football adds QB Mark Gronowski, 1st Half Hoops Reaction vs. NebraskaSupport Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!Rocket MoneyCancel your unwanted subscriptions and reach your financial goals faster with Rocket Money. Go to RocketMoney.com/lockedon today.GametimeDownload the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONCOLLEGE for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply. Download Gametime today. What time is it? Gametime.FanDuelThe NFL Playoffs are almost here, but it’s not too late to get in on the regular season action with FanDuel because right now, new customers can finish the season strong with TWO HUNDRED and FIFTY DOLLARS in BONUS BETS if your first FIVE DOLLAR bet wins. Visit FANDUEL.COM to get started.FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN)

Mark Gronowski's a Hawkeye, that's good basketball team, not so good ugly first half of basketball we are at half, we're going to talk Mark Gronowski and a little bit more, it's a rapid reaction mid-game, Locked On Hawkeyes here today You are Locked On Hawkeyes your daily podcast on the Iowa Hawkeyes part of the Locked On Hawkeyes, your daily podcast on the Iowa Hawkeyes.

Part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. Hey, welcome in. I'm Trent Condon, and this is the Locked On Hawkeyes podcast. Doing things a little bit different here. We're at halftime of the Iowa-Nebraska basketball game. Be back with you afterwards with a rapid reaction to that one. But while we got some time and we'll move the frustrations of what we saw in the first half of the basketball game aside here momentarily, let's get into the big news of the day as we've been waiting days and days and days. And we

finally get here. Mark Gronowski is an Iowa Hawkeye. It was, I think, something that we could see. It was trending that direction that Iowa was going to get their guy. It came down to the fact of, was he going to go to the NFL, take a shot, likely a third day pick, you know, fifth, sixth, seventh round, something like that, or potentially even have to go the undrafted free agent route, or on the other side, were they going to be able to make their shot? And Iowa did. Iowa made the presentation. And as we talked about earlier this week, it was something where they laid out a plan.

I think they put a formula together that made a whole lot of sense. And the biggest thing that they had to sell is this is going to be different than what Iowa football has been known for over the last five years. That's a difficult sell. It's a difficult sell for a lot of people. Now, money helps. And the Swarm Collective did a really good job of getting the funds together to make this happen, to get a guy that was a wanted quarterback.

Look, this wasn't just Iowa was the only one that wanted him. And you look at the portal rankings that are out there. ESPN had him as the number four quarterback. Another one of the recruiting services had him as a top 10 player at the quarterback position coming out. This was a coveted player. This was a player that other schools wanted to bring in on visits. And he simplified things. It was going to be Iowa or the NFL.

I think it was as simple as that. And Iowa, Tim Lester, Kirk Ferentz and company were able to lay out a plan of why this Iowa football team is going to be different offensively. Why the passing game, more importantly, is going to be different. Now, if you've been hiding behind a rock, and you don't know who Mark Gronowski is, right? You don't know kind of why the excitement is there. Well, you start right here with the numbers, and the numbers are immense. Over 10,000 yards passing in his career. He's thrown for 93 touchdowns.

He's also rushed for 1,700 yards and another 37 touchdowns. He's accumulated 130 touchdowns in his career. But it's not just the numbers. Big quarterback, good size, can move. He's not just the numbers. Big quarterback, good size, can move. He's not Lamar Jackson. He's not a runner that's going to shift and make a guy's ankles break. That's not who he is. But he's going to lower his head.

He's going to scramble when necessary. He's going to be able to pick up yardage. And when you score 37 times, even at the FCS level, on the ground over 40 years, that's highly impressive. Score 37 times, even at the FCS level, on the ground over 40 years. That's highly impressive. The other thing that you hear about Mark Gronowski, and the part maybe that I like more than anything, the numbers, the arm strength, the talent that he has,

all those things are great. But it is the intangibles. It is the winner. And I think if you played any level of sport, don't care if it's high school all the way through the professional level, I think we all know those guys that are just different, right? The guys that are gamers, the guys that do step up, the guys that have the leadership qualities, and they're not going to let you lose. It doesn't mean you win every time, but there are those kinds of people. And that's what you hear about Mark Gronowski, is he's that kind of guy.

He has that intangible. Those things that you can't quantify, those things that you can't put a number to, he is that kind of player. So the question I get, and I heard this a couple of times today, got a text from a couple of buddies. And the question was, Why is this different? What changes now with Mark Gronowski? We know the difficult nature of the schedule next year

Three playoff teams will be coming into Kinnick Stadium next year Road trips to Wisconsin and Iowa State and Nebraska It's going to be a daunting schedule next year It's going to be incredibly difficult You already have Brendan Sullivan. I heard a bunch of that. Well, you already have a quarterback. That's fine.

Iowa can't afford fine going into next year. Iowa needs somebody special. Iowa needs a difference maker at the quarterback position. Brendan Sullivan's not a difference maker. Brendan Sullivan was fun because he was a guy that could move around, and we hadn't seen that so long at the quarterback position. But Brendan Sullivan, as a quarterback over the course of a 12-13 game season, he's not a difference maker.

He's 3-8 in his career as a starter, and we saw the warts show up. Two terrible throws against UCLA. Leighton across the middle, did it twice. Got his bell rung a couple of times in that game and eventually was out with the ankle injury. He comes back in the bowl game, looks very good in the scripted plays. But when those scripted plays went away

and after he got hit again, he didn't look like the same guy. You can blame play calling. Saying that Iowa went too conservative. I think if you look deeper at that, you'll find that that wasn't exactly the case. But that aside, so that's what we're left with. And that's what we kind of have here is Mark Grodowski can be a difference maker. He can be different. A collection wide receivers that come back a year older. Jacob Gill acclimated himself,

I think, incredibly well. Yeah, he had the tough drop against Mizzou. That's going to happen. But proved at minimum, this is a good receiver. This is a solid receiver. Reese Van Der Zee showed flashes as a true freshman, something that's a rarity. You get excited about his upside, maybe what he could be. We saw more and more Jarrett Bowie, and he did it as a blocker, but also we know that there's some ability to go along with it. Dayton Howard's a big guy, and now they're also looking to bring in the kid from Chattanooga. So you've got a lot there. And if they can get that speed component,

if you get Seth Anderson healthy for a season, I mean, how big would that be? You saw it when he came back in the middle of the year. He's fast. Seth Anderson's got speed. I mean, he can make plays. If Kate McNamara would have delivered a good ball, he would have had a touchdown,

as he did in this first play two years ago. There's a chance. And that's all it is, is a chance. And maybe I'm crazy. And maybe I shouldn't. But I believe in Tim Lester. I really do. I believe that Tim Lester can be the guy

that is going to deliver competent, competent play on the offensive side. We saw the improvements this year in the running game. We saw just overall the offense, what a step forward it took. That's what you have. That's what you're going to be. And I think there's a deserved level, excuse me, of excitement that goes along with it.

We're going to talk more about this as we have a little bit more time. We're just a halftime of this one. Want to get something up, though, live on YouTube. You can catch us right now if you're just listening a little bit in the post. We will have this up for you on the podcast side here momentarily after it goes final. But more on this coming up. We got to talk a little bit more about the basketball first half, though. Definitely want to get into that.

The frustrations that were there. And boy, were they immense. Just a terrible first half. Overall, from Iowa, basketball, some crazy things. And where's Drew Thelwell? Took us 12 minutes to find out of game time what it is. We'll talk about that when we come back. Locked on Hawkeyes.

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with Rocket Money. Go to rocketmoney.com slash locked on today. That's rocketmoney.com slash locked on today. That's rocketmoney.com slash locked on. One more time, rocketmoney.com slash locked on. Trey, kind of back with you once again here, live halftime edition of Locked On Hawkeyes as Iowa trails a bye three against Nebraska here. And if you're watching live on YouTube,

we're about eight minutes away from the second half. So let's get into it. Drew Thillwell, I think that's the big question. We don't have to know everything, right? We don't. But something happened. So I tweeted out a picture. It came from the Iowa basketball Twitter account,

Iowa Hoops. And it was before the game, Brock Harding and Drew Thillwell, and you can see on the clock, there was 44 minutes left in the pregame when they're jumping together at midcourt, banging, I don't know, hips. Is that what you do? I don't know. I'm old and weird. Whatever they're doing, or you leap and you bounce into each other, right? You jump into each other, you mosh pit into each other, whatever you call it. So they're doing that. You jump into each other, you mosh pit into each other, whatever you call it. So they're doing that.

And I don't know if that's where the injury happened, but then the game starts. Oh, Thelwell's not in the starting lineup, okay? That's odd. But I guess Nebraska a little bit bigger now. Maybe they should have gone bigger the last time out, but they didn't, okay? So they put an extra big in there. You go back to Laje de Bali, And Thelwa's on the bench. And the first half goes. And

it's getting towards the 12-minute mark. Brock Harding's playing terrible. Had a couple of turnovers. Hit a three-pointer early. His next one hits off the side of the backboard from the wing. It wasn't the corner. It wasn't the wing. Like, the corner wing. Whatever. How do you hit the backboard from there?

Goodness gracious. Right before the game, I was at my son's the wing like the corner wing whatever how do you hit the backboard from there goodness gracious right before the game i was at my son's five-year-old basketball i didn't even see any of that off the side of the backboard not from the corner either anyway you're asking where's drew thelwell and so the questions start building and on social media they start building and we're waiting and waiting and oh, he's out. Questionable, I guess is what they said. Questionable, right? To come back in there.

Again, we don't have to know. But I will tell you one thing. As a gambler, where there is participation reports that are put out, I didn't see anything on the participation report about that. Tweaks happen. Torn ankle, twisted knee, whatever it is. They said lower body on the broadcast. Paul Burmeister on the call.

That's what they said, but I don't know. It's just the oddity of it. I don't know. Defensively, speaking of Brock Harding, he's getting bullied. They start to post him up a bunch. And this has always been the concern with Brock Harding. Now, when you're 160 pounds, there's going to be physical matchups that you're going to struggle with. And we see that with Brock Harding. But they keep going inside. They're posting him up.

And that's going to happen, right? There's small players in the Big Ten. There's guys that have been able to survive. And you're going to have to take the good and the bad with Brock Harding. You just are. He's not a perfect player. Iowa doesn't get perfect players. There's a wart here. But nobody's helping. Watching this team defensively, going back to Friday night,

and you have to anticipate. If there's any kind of just testicular fortitude with the squad, we're not going to get beat up like that. And then you see it happen. Guys looking around. I don't. I've talked to people that have gone to practices that have been inside Iowa basketball.

Yes, it's an offensive system. That's what Fran coaches. It's an offensive game. We're going to get up and down the floor. And he's great at it. He is a great offensive. Not a good. He is a great offensive system. That's what Fran coaches. It's an offensive game. We're going to get up and down the floor. And he's great at it. He's a great offensive, not a good. He is a great offensive coach. But my frustration continues with this program

as we've been having this conversation now for seven years. Ever since Adam Woodbury graduated, this team has been awful every single year defensively. Have they done anything to change? No. Have they done anything in terms of hedging? More drop coverage? Change what they do in the zone defense?

There's changes, there's looks, but there's not a dedicated effort to do something. Do you bring in a true defensive coordinator like Michigan's done in the past and other programs have done? No. It's just more of the same. Roll the ball out, Hope for the best.

And you see it tonight. I mean, this fan base has just so completely checked out. And after talking to a few younger people. So one of the broadcasters on the Iowa Sports Radio Network with myself, Lucas Strain, he's on the afternoon show from 2 to 5. And Lucas just graduated from Iowa. Loves Iowa basketball. Loves Iowa sports. And Lucas doesn't This is a guy that just graduated college. We're not talking about my son that's 5, my daughter that's 9.

That's not what we're talking about. We're talking about a guy that's now 23 years old. He has vague memories of the Licklider era. All he remembers and his vivid memories are the Licklider era. All he remembers, and his vivid memories, are the Fran McCaffrey era. And think of the number of fans that we have lost.

I know, I know our demographics, certainly watching on YouTube. And I know, it's an older group. Old like me. I'm in my mid-40s. and you guys skew older and you know what we have these memories but that's not for everybody and we're talking about a lost generation 26 years without a sweet 16 i've defended fran a ton but boy it feels like we have almost reached the point of no return. And if you lose this one, this is going to be trouble.

This is going to be big trouble. With that, the game's back on. We're going to flip back over. And get ready for this. If it ends in a loss, it's not going to be good. If it ends in a win, I'll be excited. I'll be happy. We need some happy. Mark Gronowski makes us happy. We'll be with you again after the game here. A little bonus episode and a lot more on Mark Gronowski, more on Phillips,

the wide receiver from Chattanooga, the potential of getting him. What else is in the Iowa portal on the football side of things? Portal Kirk is struck again. Can Iowa bounce back in the second half? We'll talk about that back with you later tonight with more Locked on Hawkeyes. Hey, hit the subscribe button if you're watching right now on YouTube. It just takes a moment. Really do appreciate it. Even if you're not watching every single time, lets you know when there is a new episode and really helps us with those metrics, those analytics, those numbers really does help.

Just hit subscribe. Takes a moment here on Locked on Hawkeyes. If you're listening on the podcast side, five-star reviews, really would appreciate that. We'll be back with you again tonight with more Rapid Reaction, Iowa, Nebraska, after that one, and more in the portal. We'll talk to you then. Go Hawks.