Locked On Hawkeyes - Daily Podcast On Iowa Hawkeyes Football & Basketball - Reviewing forgotten storylines from the 2004 Iowa football team | What a mass exodus of B1G big men means for the B1G and Iowa | Crafting our perfect Iowa basketball lineup

Episode Date: April 8, 2020

We continue our review of one of the greatest football seasons in Iowa Hawkeye history by taking a look at some of the key storylines from the 2004 season. Then we hop into some basketball talk by discussing all of the Big Ten big men that have declared for the NBA Draft. We wrap up by having a little fun and crafting our perfect Iowa basketball lineup with $15 courtesy of SpoCo Radio's initial concept. 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 got it! Smith! Decks down 85 yards! Iowa! Field for Smith. Oh, he got it. Smith. Touchdown. 85 yards. Iowa.

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 am your host, Andrew Wade, and I'm glad to be back for another Wednesday morning edition of the Locked On Hawkeyes podcast. Wade, and I'm glad to be back for another Wednesday morning edition of the Lockdown Hawkeyes podcast. On today's show, we're going to be continuing our breakdown of one of Iowa's best football seasons in the history of the program, that 2004 season where Iowa did win the Capital One Bowl under the guidance of starting quarterback Drew Tate.

We're also going to be talking a bit about some of the big men that have declared for the NBA draft and what that means for next season and whether or not we can really expect them all to actually stay in the NBA draft. And then finally, we're going to wrap it up with a nice little game courtesy of some folks on Twitter, I believe from Spoko Radio. I'll give the better shout out later on. But we're going to be playing a game to basically create our best Iowa basketball lineup using $15, based off of a little graph that they put together. Thought it would be fun to give a little shout-out to another Iowa show and to play the game, especially with what is all going on right now.

And then also, on Friday, we're going to finish up our conversation about the 2004 Iowa football team and transition into another great Iowa football team next week. But we have a special guest who's going to be joining the show to help us do that. So really excited to unveil that. I'm going to wait until we actually record the interview. Going to be doing it later today. So once I record that, I'll release that as a bit of a teaser for you all. But we're

going to be wrapping up that discussion with some of their thoughts on the season and the storylines from the season. Also, if you did not get an opportunity to, make sure to check out our interview with Bakari Evelyn yesterday. I had a great opportunity to talk to him, really enjoyed that conversation. I think you all will as well. and if you are tuning in for the first time make sure to hit that subscribe button on Apple or follow us on Spotify or wherever you downloaded this podcast at and make sure to give us that five-star review we would absolutely appreciate the love and the support and then finally if you are on social media make sure to follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. We're not going to be the ones always breaking news, most likely not breaking the news, but we're going to be giving our opinion anytime news is broken, making sure

we're getting that information out as well. So we're just a nice little source for you to go to if you just want to have some thoughts and opinions and analysis on what is actually happening. And that'll kind of give you a teaser for what we're going to begin covering on the show the following episode. So let's jump into it. Let's start that 2004 Iowa football team. As we talked about on Monday's show, as you know, we're going back to that Monday-Wednesday-Friday format, kind of trimming it down a little bit. As we talked about on the Monday show, though, we went through the schedule for Iowa and the fact they really started out two and two before going on an eight game winning streak, which included a win over Wisconsin to take that big 10 title and then also beating LSU in the Capital One Bowl.

So what I wanted to cover on today's show is just really some of the big storylines from that season because you know that was you know that was a little over just a little under I guess I should say 30 years ago right so we should be talking about like it's my point that is that there are a lot of things that we probably don't even realize were going on during that season we We probably just think, you know, when you think about the 2004 season, you think about Drew Tate to Warren Holloway, the catch, and he's running down the field with his helmet off and his hair back, and Iowa fans are going wild. But do you remember the fact that we had absolutely no run game? The fact that we lost seven offensive starters fred russell declared early for the nfl draft but and then we also lost four defensive starters that team was honestly kind of in a position

similar to this upcoming season actually where we're losing quite a few star power type of players they lost you know we lost bob sanders that year. Dallas Clark, I believe, was also that year, I believe, or maybe the year before. But Robert Gallery, Fred Russell, Nathan Chandler. The list goes on for guys that we had to replace, but the star power is still pretty strong on this Iowa football team. There are still some very very good players but let's start with the offensive side of the ball one of the big storylines like I said losing seven players and losing the starting running back Fred Russell not as big of a concern because Iowa had a pretty good depth chart from a running back perspective but this was very similar to the 2009 season where things got a little wonky pretty quickly and injuries piled up very quickly.

I believe the starter that year actually coming in was actually Jamel Lewis. He injured himself later in the season. Albert Young and Marcus Schnur were both lost with ACL injuries within the first third of the season. Albert Young and Marcus Schnur were both lost with ACL injuries within the first quarter of the first third of the season. Lewis suffered a torn ACL in the win over Michigan State which basically left Marquis Simmons and Sam Brownlee. You may not remember Sam Brownlee but the guy was kind of an unsung hero in a sense because he was a former walk-on who came in and actually led the team in rushing. And actually had, I think, one of the worst leading rusher seasons in Iowa history with 227 yards and a 2.4-yard average. But nevertheless, at least stayed there at the running back position for the rest of the season.

But that put a lot of pressure on sophomore quarterback Drew Tate. And if you remember, we did have a conversation with Drew about a year ago, and we talked a bit about this season. And one of the things he said was he wanted to come into Iowa and be a gunslinger. And because of the situation that kind of allowed him to do that to an extent in that 2004 season, he ended up throwing for 2,786 yards with his leading receivers being Ed Hinkle, Clinton Solomon, Warren Holloway, and Scott Chandler.

Those were his top four receivers. But again, that running game was just almost non-existent. One of the worst running games I think we've seen in the Kirk Ferenc era for sure. One of the other big storylines, like I said, the injuries were huge across the board. And then also the devastation for Kirk, his dad passed away before the Penn State game. And then as you can imagine, Kirk is a pretty emotional guy. That was very tough for him, tough for the team. It sounds like they utilized that as almost like a motivational opportunity. And then going into that Penn State game right after his dad passed away, what an ugly game.

Kyle Schlickler kicking two field goals to win that game. Iowa had two safeties against Penn State. One was unintentional, one was an intentional safety that was basically they were punting out of the back of their end zone and decided to just take a safety as opposed to risk a blocked punt and another opportunity for Penn State to kick a field goal. Immediately after that, Javon Johnson had an interception to really help Iowa almost seal the deal there. That defense was probably the third biggest storyline I wanted to cover, and the fact that that defense was absurd. Chad Greenway, Jonathan Babineau, Matt Roth, Abdul Hodge, Javon Johnson.

That is a lethal defense, and you can see it in their rankings after the season. They finished 17th in the nation and point allowed at 17.6, not quite as good as this past season. But those players are all guys who played a bit in the NFL, played at least a couple downs in the NFL. Outside of the two big losses they had, the one to Arizona State and the one to Michigan, they never allowed over 30 points again, and they only allowed over 20 points three times, which includes the win over number 12 LSU.

And then the final thing I wanted to quickly cover is the Arizona State loss, that 44-7 loss, and the 30-17 loss. Losing seven offensive starters and four defensive starters, Iowa still had some expectations coming into that season, starting off the season ranked 19th. Losing those two games, though, really had fans questioning, what is this team going to be? Is this going to be a bad Iowa year? Can they turn it around? And so when we talk about adversity from this Iowa basketball team this past season, I would say the closest comparison from a football team perspective

was probably that 2004 team. Just the adversity that they had to overcome to go on a nice winning streak and finish as one of the best teams in Iowa football history with a 10-2 record and that win over LSU in the Capital One Bowl in dramatic fashion. Like I said, we're going to continue our discussion of this on Friday. I'm having hopefully a special guest on who's going to be talking a bit more about what the players felt throughout that season and how they felt about some of those situations we just discussed, some of those storylines that we just discussed as we continue to relive one of the best seasons

in Iowa football history. Coming up, though, I want to talk a bit about the big men who have declared for the NBA draft from the Big Ten and what that means for the Iowa basketball team and specifically Luka Garza. All right, we are back with segment number three, or sorry, excuse me, segment number two of the Lockdown Hawkeyes podcast. And as I said before the break,

I want to talk a bit about the guys who have declared for the NBA draft and what that means. I think it's really important to first make a note of the fact that anyone who declares for the NBA draft does not have to stay in the NBA draft. They have the opportunity to return. Some guys come out and say, you know, I'm going to the NBA draft and I am not coming back. Technically, that option is still on the table for a couple of these guys.

I think there's an opportunity or potential for a few of these guys to potentially come back. But it does leave a pretty big gap in the Big Ten. And one of the things, as we talked about, Luka Garza not winning any of the national awards this year, or any of the major national player of the year awards, I would say. He's won a lot of national player of the year awards from the media, but losing out in the wooden, the Naismith, those are big losses for him. The thing here, though, is he had to do that against some of the most talented big men in the country, and they all just lived in the Big Ten. And next year, if he does decide to come back, and I really feel like it's leaning that way,

I think he loves playing for the Iowa basketball team. I don't think his draft stock is high enough to consider leaving. I think he has the ability to potentially lead Iowa to a national championship and be relevant for the rest of his lifetime as one of the best players in Iowa basketball history. And he would be going up against a depleted big men group. I have no doubt that the Big Ten can restock quite easily. They've done that clearly over the past couple years. They've done a great job of continuing to bring in talent even when talent leaves when a mass

exodus occurs because the league is so talented. But just going to list this off real quick of who has already declared from the Big Ten from a big man perspective. We got former five-star recruit Jalen Smith from Maryland. We got Kofi Kochburn from Illinois. Daniel Otoro from Minnesota. Matt Harms has transferred from Purdue. Not sure where he's going to end up. He has a grad transfer, so he could theoretically end up back in the Big Ten.

Xavier Tillman also declared. I think he's probably one of the guys who is really looking at whether or not he should go in or stay back. Caleb Wesson from Ohio State, he also declared with one year left. And then John Teske graduated from Michigan. So that is six, seven guys. Seven guys out of the 14 take away Luka Garza. Seven guys out of the 13 have declared or are leaving the program. So that's huge for Luka Garza. Like I said, I think the talent is still going to be there. I still think every single night in the Big Ten is going to be tough for him.

I think there's an opportunity for a couple of these guys to potentially come back. I don't think Jalen Smith's coming back. John Teske can't come back. Caleb Wesson, he's projected as an early second-round draft pick. I think if you're at that point right now, I think you possibly do stay in the NBA draft and just kind of go for it. I mean, how much more is your draft stock going to increase from a senior year? And then Xavier Tillman, he's looked at as potentially a late first round draft pick. So I think he also

stays. Not exactly sure where the NBA stands on Kofi and Arturo. I'll try to figure some of that stuff out and post some of that information. But I really thought Daniel Arturo was very solid. I thought Kofi was a beast against Luka Garza. Whenever he was on the court, Luka Garza did struggle. So that is going to be looked at as a very valuable asset in the NBA. Minnesota clearly is already trying to replace Daniel Otoro as they recently got transfer Liam Robbins from Drake. And again, we've talked about this on the show when I thought there was a potential that he could even go to Iowa. Liam Robbins is a good big man, and he's a very good defensive big man. So he's going to be someone to battle with in two years.

But those guys leaving does create a huge void of talent at the big man position for the Big Ten. And, again, whether or not they can replace that will be huge. But this potentially lines up Luka Garza to put together an even better season, a record-setting season for the Iowa basketball team and put him in an even better position to potentially claim a National Player of the Year award. Now, that being said, anytime you have some of the publicity that Luka Garza has right now, there's always the possibility of going down. There's always the possibility of regressing or letting the expectations get to you. But I just, I could not, I cannot see that with Luka Garza. He's such, he seems to be such a level-headed kid, a kid who just really loves playing basketball and works his absolute tail off. I mean, look at the response he put on his Twitter after losing the National Player of the Year award, another one, to OB.

He said, Hawkeye Nation, before you all react, I just want to say that winning one of six National Player of the Year awards and to be named National Player of the Year by six other media outlets is a tremendous honor for my family, the University of Iowa, and myself. Let's all congratulate OB for his incredible season. Just a truly a class act. I don't, if there's anyone who's not going to let some of the hype get to his head, it's 100% Luka. And that reminds me for my last thing here, Luka did claim the career Abdul-Jabbar Center

of the Year award. So another award to put in his trophy case. We wish he could have gotten the Naismith or the Wooden. to put in his trophy case. Again, we wish he could have gotten the Naismith or the Wooden. Those would have been fantastic to see him get what he rightfully deserves. I've talked about it on the show. I think Obi had a fantastic season, but what Luka did against better competition, as we just listed all those guys, those seven guys who are going to likely play in the NBA or

at least professional basketball, Luka had to go against them on a nightly basis, and he still put up fantastic numbers. Before we close out this quick segment, I wanted to quickly run down one other thing. Riley Till is officially in the transfer portal. To be honest, I wasn't sure if he would be going into the transfer portal. I know that he walked on senior night

as a redshirt junior after getting a scholarship. I know there was definitely not going to be a scholarship available for him next season. Iowa's right at the cap right now with the transfer of Cordell Pemzel, but still wasn't exactly expecting him to necessarily go somewhere. Sounds like he is leaving. My guess is, considering he's from Iowa, Drake potentially makes sense. I think he could potentially get some minutes there.

They need some bigger guys. And I actually really liked the hustle I saw from Till for Iowa, and that would fit very well with DeVries' defense at Drake. So I can see him going to Drake. I think they need some big guys. They're looking for that transfer market,. I think they need some big guys. They're looking for that transfer market. And I think Till could be an asset there.

I mean, hell, if we saw Till and Pemps will go to Drake, I think they, you know, Drake could be a team that, you know, could be scary for the Missouri Valley Conference next year. But we'll obviously keep you in tune with what is happening with Riley Till. And if that transfer market heats up for the former Iowa basketball player. But either way, kudos to him. Really appreciate all the effort and the hustle he put out when he was on the court. I thought you couldn't necessarily tell the talent gap between him and some of the others, but I think that was a large part because of his effort and his work ethic and the fact

that he was out hustling everyone on the court whenever he was there. So that being said, coming up on segment number three, we're going to be breaking down what we would create for a starting lineup of Iowa basketball players if we had $15 to spend. We'll be giving a shout-out to the folks who came up with that on Spellco Radio again when we tune back in for segment number three. All right, we are back for our third and final segment of the day, doing something a little bit fun, a little bit different on the final segment,

creating our top Iowa basketball lineup if we had $15. And this was discussed, I believe, on Spoko Radio. It was released by Jerry Sherwin, Dave Krah, and at Chai People's Champ. Those guys running that Spoko Radio show, haven't had a chance to listen to them, but definitely check it out. Sounds like they're doing some really fun stuff during this quarantine time, during this time where we don't have as many sports. But I took a look at it and decided that I wanted to do it. I wanted to create my starting five from that $15. Let me just quickly kind of go through this list so you know who is on it. And I'll obviously tweet it out as well with my list. But at Point Guard for $5, we have Ronnie Lester, $4, BJ Armstrong, $3, Andre Rulich,

$2, Jeff Horner, and $1, Jordan Bohannon. At shooting guard, in order from five to one is Fred Brown, Kevin Gamble, Adam Haleska, Peter Jock, and Devin Marble. At small forward, we got Roy Marble, John Johnson, Jared Uthoff, Greg Brunner, and Matt Gatens. At power forward, we got Greg Stokes, Reggie Evans, Aaron White, Ryan Bowen, Tyler Cook. And at center, we got Luka Garza, Don Nelson, A.C. Earl, Greg Stokes, and Adam Woodbury. So I took a look at this lineup, and keep in mind, I'm a big defensive guy.

I like the idea of having a strong defense. I think strong defense travels. And with this lineup, you're able to create a pretty solid lineup of defenders that also play incredibly good offense. And so you'll notice that as kind of a theme with especially at my power forward position. So I took, I played two lineups that I thought were really kind of special. And my first lineup started with BJ Armstrong at the point guard position. I just don't know how you can't take a guy like BJ, who had a fantastic Iowa career, also had a fantastic NBA career as well, winning NBA championships with the Chicago Bulls under Michael Jordan, a three-time NBA champion.

His number 10 is retired by the University of Iowa. At the time, he ranked sixth in the school's all-time steals list, fourth in total points. He shot 44% from three-point range and averaged 18.6 points per game and 5.4 assists as a senior. I obviously didn't get a chance to see him play in my lifetime at Iowa, but when you can have a guy who can shoot over 40% from three and be six on the team's all-time steals list, to me that speaks volumes to his perimeter defense. That's a guy I want on my team, and obviously his leadership and character ability, I would love for him to be my point guard. I went cheap at the shooting guard position, getting Devin Marble with a dollar. And I just feel like Devin Marble has fantastic size.

He's clearly bouncing around some pro basketball leagues right now. A fantastic score. And I think as you see this team kind of round out, you'll understand you just just need someone at shooting guard position that's going to shoot and that's going to score and put up points I really think the shooting guard position was one of those areas where you really couldn't go wrong with who you picked because there was so much talent on that shooting guard position whereas at the point guard position I feel like if you know for someone who values defense you're probably not going to go all the way down to one to get Jordan Bohannon, who I think is a fantastic player. I love Jordan Bohannon, but the defense is not necessarily his strongest suit. Nevertheless, back on to my lineup, Jared Uthoff. This is a guy you're going to see. I really wanted to have him on both my

lists, but I wanted to make it a little bit creative as well. I picked Jared Dutoff, I think at $3, he's a fantastic steal. He is a guy who can shoot the ball, who has a ton of versatility to guard multiple positions, and he's a large reason why that Iowa basketball team that he was on in 2015-2016 put together two incredible seasons and made the NCAA tournament. He is a great defender. I believe he was Big Ten Defensive Player of the Year when he was at the school. You can't take that away. And the fact that he still can put together fantastic offensive performance, you have to go with that. And then finally to round it out,

I picked Ryan Bowen and Luka Garza. Bowen played in the NBA, had a great career at Iowa. To me, he's more of a defensive guy though. And I wanted to pair a defensive guy with Luka Garza. I think Luka Garza has gotten better at defense, but really his offensive firepower is where the reason why I picked Luka. And I just felt like it was important, especially considering, you know, kind of what is going on. But you have two guys like that, two big men who can really be versatile down low Bowen and his senior career senior year averaged 14.4 points per game 8.7 rebounds per game and 2.5 assists per game and then finally Luka Garza who just put together one of the most phenomenal seasons in Iowa

basketball history to me I just had to take I want to take Luka Garza at least once and at two dollars I thought Ryan was a steal for a great defender and a post passer who could really help space out the floor. Jared Uthoff and Devin Marble shooting the ball. And then obviously B.J. Armstrong. So you've got three guys who can shoot the ball. Actually, four guys if you count Garza who can shoot the ball deep. Bowen is a guy who can handle the defensive side of the ball

and can shoot the ball pretty well. And he did develop kind of a somewhat of a shooting stroke, I would say, towards the end of his career. He was shooting a few threes, I guess, a game, but not going to be a guy who's really going to step out and be a perimeter shooter. So I thought that was a really nice fit. My other lineup that I put together for the $15 for Iowa basketball, and I'll go through this a little quicker just to make sure we're getting through it, but I picked Jeff Horner, Peter Jock, John Johnson, Reggie Evans, and A.C. Earl. And the reason why I went with that, I really wanted to put together a ridiculously good

front court from a defensive position or defensive standpoint. Reggie Evans is a guy who played in the NBA for many years, an absolute beast. And A.C. Earl is a guy who was a stud at blocking shots. Huge stud there. I think between the two of them, no one's going to be able to go in the paint and be able to get out alive. In the NBA, in his short time, he only averaged 5.1 points per game, 2.7 rebounds per game, and 0.7 blocks per game. The 0.7 blocks doesn't typically stand out, but when you put it in perspective to the other stats, that is darn impressive. In the NBA, imagine at the college level, he was a blocked machine. Reggie Evans, just an absolute animal rebounding the ball.

And so I wanted to surround those guys with some shooters. So I picked Peter Jock and John Johnson. John Johnson was one of the studs who led Iowa to the Final Four in the 80s. Absolute beast. Also played in the NBA. Peter Jock, we know how he is. Six-foot-six guy who has a beautiful shooting stroke. Was crushing it in the nba peter jock we know how he is six foot six guy who has a beautiful shooting stroke was crushing it in the g league went overseas this past year my guess is

probably to make a bit more money it's a little bit more lucrative to play overseas and then finally jeff horner i felt like with two shooters, two fantastic post players, you want a guy like Jeff Horner who can shoot the ball but also can distribute the ball as well. Currently a head coach with Truman State. I just felt like you wanted a guy like him on the court at all times. And that's really where the money lies as well. So those are the guys who I picked for my $15 lineup. I'll make sure to send that on my Twitter account.

Let me know who your thoughts are. And also, again, a shout out to Spoko Radio for the idea. I really enjoyed putting that together. It was a lot of fun. So that'll do it, though, for our show today. Like I said, we'll have a show coming up on Friday morning as well. We have hopefully a special guest breaking down some more about the 2004 football team and then some other fun topics we're going to be covering on the show.

If you did like what you heard today, make sure to like, review, and subscribe wherever you downloaded this podcast at. Subscribe on Apple, follow us on Spotify. Wherever you get it, just make sure to follow us. And make sure to tune in to Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. We're going to be dropping more content every single day in between our shows.

Again, thank you all for tuning in to today. If you did like some of the NBA draft talk, I highly recommend checking out Chad Ford's NBA Big Board. And if you don't remember Chad Ford, he has been a leader in NBA draft coverage over the last 25 years. And he has a brand new podcast, Chad Ford's NBA Big Board on the Locked On Podcast Network. This is really his first venture since his non-compete has expired with ESPN. And the NBA draft landscape is really kind of ever-changing, especially without the ability to do combines right now,

the ability to do some of the in-person stuff. Some of this analysis is going to be really key to kind of help you identify where players could go right now, especially without being able to do the interviews and that kind of stuff. Some of this analysis is going to be really key to kind of help you identify where players could go right now, especially without being able to do the interviews and that kind of stuff in person. He is a fantastic analyst, and he's going to be joining quite a few of the kind of national basketball shows that we have on the Locked On Podcast Network. So make sure to check out his own show, though, Chad Ford's NBA Big Word on the Locked On

Podcast Network. You will not be disappointed. And again, thank you all for tuning in. Stay safe out there, Hawkeye Nation, and go Hawks. you