1st Quarter Sanity Check

Apparently, the Iowa State football team spent too much time in Hilton Coliseum last winter. An offense that was promised to be vastly improved, more resembles that of Coach McDermott’s recent basketball squad (an outfit led by NBA pick Craig Brackins that was supposed to score loads of points)…and we all know how that turned out.

We’ve already hit the quarter pole of the college football season, and it’s clear (based on my preseason predictions), that my sanity was not all there. Shocking, I know. But seriously, I didn’t think I’d be that far off the mark! With that said, here’s a more “educated” analysis of those predictions based on the first 4 games:

1. Iowa State will finish in the top 10 in the nation in total offense—Honestly, this is the one that frustrates (and surprises) me the most. I really thought that year two would begin to produce results similar to what Offensive Coordinator Tom Herman accomplished at Rice. But it just hasn’t. The offensive line was supposed to be better than this—much better, but it hasn’t. Austin Arnaud was supposed to be much better than he has—but he hasn’t been either. My prediction was so far off on this that Iowa State is currently in danger of finishing in the bottom 10 in the nation. They rank 106th of 120 FBS teams through 4 games. Ouch.
2. Austin Arnaud or Alexander Robinson will be a Heisman candidate late into the season—Well, you can bet your life savings this prediction is not coming true. Iowa State’s best player so far this year has not been an offensive player. Surprisingly, it’s been sophomore linebacker A.J. Klein, who ranks 22nd nationally with 41 total tackles. He also has 2 interception returns for touchdowns. Last I checked, not too many defensive players have won the Heisman. Who would have guessed?
3. Iowa State will beat Iowa—To quote a line from Naked Gun 2 ½: "Truth hurts. Maybe not as much as jumping on a bicycle with a seat missing, but it hurts."
4. Iowa State will finish with more wins than Iowa—See Quote from #3.
5. Paul Rhoades will be a leading candidate for the Penn State job in the off-season—I still think Rhoades is a great coach, but the Penn State job is certainly far-fetched at this point. It would take a miraculous finish with wins over Nebraska and either Oklahoma or Texas to make that kind of an argument.

Well, there’s still plenty of football left to be played, and plenty of great possibilities for the Hawkeyes and Cyclones. But so far, it looks like my predictions were merely pipe dreams, something we Cyclone fans have become all too familiar with.