Tuesdays With Torbee

There is a lovely symmetry to us Hawkeye Report fans facing the New Year on a new web platform, forced out of our comfort zone and adjusting to new realities despite having the same guys in charge, and the Iowa football program dealing with a similar issue.

Change can make us uncomfortable and anxious and that is even more pronounced when your past track record is one of success, albeit with room for improvement. But change also forces you to leave your comfort zone, to face up to new realities and hopefully, to grow and prosper.

As we head into 2023 here is hoping that both Hawkeye Report and our beloved Iowa Hawkeye football program are facing the future clear-eyed and with resolve to roll with changes, not fight futilely against them.

For many fans, including me, the rapid changes in the sport we love are forcing a kind of reckoning. Any and all semblance of the “student-athlete experience” and the hoary old notion of amateurism have been obliterated in the era of NIL and unlimited, unregulated transfers. It is full-on professionalism with the biggest spenders poised to cement their spot at the top of the standings for the foreseeable future, much as it is in Major League Baseball or Premier League soccer.

The old traditionalist in me would prefer it were not this way. Hell, I’d go back to the old bowl system and long-winded debates over who “really” deserved the “mythical” national championship with zero qualms. As I’ve written before, I think college football is best when it is a tradition-rich, regional sport fueled by intense neighborly rivalries.

I also, however, recognize you can’t recreate the past. So the choice must be made, forge ahead and accept new circumstances or set aside interest and affinity for a sport I’ve followed for more than 30 years.

Much as I’ve decided to carry on with Hawkeye Report now at On3 instead of Rivals, I’m doing my best to embrace the Hawkeyes’ (and the sport’s) new reality.

Thankfully, it appears even the longest-tenured coach in all of college football has reached the same conclusion. Kirk Ferentz is embracing The Swarm NIL collective, actively hitting the transfer portal and if practice reports are accurate, looking to modernize a moribund offense that has been a good-not-great program’s biggest Achilles ’ heel.

Finding a way to win the Music City Bowl was a good start.

Sure, both teams grappled with multiple starters out and growing pains, but Iowa managed its shortcomings better and relied on its stellar defense and special teams to pitch a shutout over the similarly vexed Kentucky Wildcats. Freshman quarterback Joe Labas looked like a competent game manager, something his upperclassmen peers at the position often failed to do during the regular season, so we can count that as a win as well.

It is, of course, unlikely that Iowa football will undergo a complete makeover in the off-season. That is not and has never been Kirk Ferentz’s forte. However, it buoys me to hear his commitment to considering changes and potential upgrades. Here is hoping some shuffling and/or addition and subtraction in the coaching staff structure is in the works as well. As noted ad nauseam, the Iowa football program is a mere average offense away from being a 10-game-plus winner and Big 10 title contender.

With the pending addition of USC and UCLA to the Big 10, and presumably the move away from set divisions, the path for Iowa to a conference title or College Football Playoff appearance isn’t getting any easier. Unlike the aforementioned, or Michigan, Ohio State and Penn State, the Hawkeyes don’t have a blue blood history to bolster its down years and provide assurance they will ascend to the top again.

That said, Iowa is in a much-better position than many of its peers, despite the grumbling of naysayers. Yes, the antiquated and atrophied offense has been an anchor to top-level success. Yet, despite that, since 2015, Iowa is one of only five teams to win at least eight games in every season and more than half of its games in the COVID-19-shortened 2020 season. The four others? Alabama, Clemson, Ohio State and Georgia. The Hawkeyes also have notched 71 wins since 2015, tied for the 10th most among Power 5 programs.

Is it frustrating that one side of the ball is likely what kept Iowa out of the rarefied air Alabama, Clemson, Ohio State and Georgia have reached? Absolutely! But wouldn’t you rather have one component of the program to overhaul rather than the entire thing, like our friends in Nebraska and any other number of programs?

The future, of course, is opaque. Whining and pining for the past isn’t going to stop it from coming. Time to embrace it or hop off the bandwagon.

Follow me on Twitter @ToryBrecht