Watched Iowa game again-my thoughts

[Winnipegopher]

If you feel like a break from the coaching threads.

I just finished watching the Iowa game for the third time. My thoughts:

• Minnesota dominated physically. TCF and outdoors was a HUGE advantage. It may not be every November but Iowa clearly did not want play outdoors. They were manhandled. I have never seen Minnesota physically dominate Iowa to that extent.
• Gray is awesome. His third and four run was phenomenal and runner-up for play of the year (see two bullets down). The Gophers were a completely better team when he took snaps at QB. I still don’t understand why he wasn’t back there (in spells) all year. He is a qb who loves contact- that is awesome.
• Weber is a warrior and f*ucking tough. Some NFL team will take a chance on him and it wouldn’t surprise me if he had a good NFL career. You cannot teach toughness and the arm strength is there.
• Stoudemire is a player. FWIW, his return against Illinois was the play of the year for the Gophers. Without it, it may have been a 1-11 year.
• It scares me that Adam Lueck is clearly the intellectual (if not physical) 2nd team QB. Weber always goes to Lueck as soon as he comes off and Lueck signals in plays. Gray is on the field so he can’t but why not Alipate? Alipate was the only Gopher who looked cold during the game, he was fully bundled by the fourth quarter.
• Congratulations to the seniors, waht a way to end their careers.

 

[Seany]

Yep. I was amazed at our line domination on both sides of the ball, and particularly the way we manhandled their defensive line. That shocked me, and whether it was due to the cold or not, that wasn't the same Iowa defense they'd been playing earlier in the year, but then again they'd been pretty much regressing as a defense as the season wore on.

Iowa seemed a pretty dispirited bunch pretty much from the start of the game, which a few people speculated might be a possibility due to their season having fallen so far off the rails- but whatever the case, it was a great win and the best I've seen this team play as an overall unit in a long, long time.

 

[BarnBurner]

If you feel like a break from the coaching threads.

I just finished watching the Iowa game for the third time. My thoughts:

• Minnesota dominated physically. TCF and outdoors was a HUGE advantage. It may not be every November but Iowa clearly did not want play outdoors. They were manhandled. I have never seen Minnesota physically dominate Iowa to that extent.
• Gray is awesome. His third and four run was phenomenal and runner-up for play of the year (see two bullets down). The Gophers were a completely better team when he took snaps at QB. I still don’t understand why he wasn’t back there (in spells) all year. He is a qb who loves contact- that is awesome.
• Weber is a warrior and f*ucking tough. Some NFL team will take a chance on him and it wouldn’t surprise me if he had a good NFL career. You cannot teach toughness and the arm strength is there.
• Stoudemire is a player. FWIW, his return against Illinois was the play of the year for the Gophers. Without it, it may have been a 1-11 year.
• It scares me that Adam Lueck is clearly the intellectual (if not physical) 2nd team QB. Weber always goes to Lueck as soon as he comes off and Lueck signals in plays. Gray is on the field so he can’t but why not Alipate? Alipate was the only Gopher who looked cold during the game, he was fully bundled by the fourth quarter.
• Congratulations to the seniors, waht a way to end their careers.

Stoudermire is a helluva player. It is too bad he didnt play cb all along.

 

[gophmeister]

I watched it Thursday night and my wife kept asking why. You could tell we wanted it more. Also, the weather was a factor. From Coker's slip and falls to Iowa dropped balls, you could see the Iowa players were having a tough time with the cold. Going forward, I think we'll be able to dominate the month of November in TCF.

 

[Seany]

It's very exciting to think of the day when games like that are no longer an anomaly but a regularity again, games in which we are physically dominant over or at the very least on par with high quality opponents, and I firmly believe that day will come.

 

[Seany]

I watched it Thursday night and my wife kept asking why. You could tell we wanted it more. Also, the weather was a factor. From Coker's slip and falls to Iowa dropped balls, you could see the Iowa players were having a tough time with the cold. Going forward, I think we'll be able to dominate the month of November in TCF.

Yeah. I noticed they weren't handling the field conditions very well at all, especially as the game went on. You saw numerous Hawkeyes players slipping around out there, while the Gophers seemed to have little to no trouble with the field at all. I'm not sure why they didn't try the blatantly obvious solution of changing their spikes so as to try and give themselves better traction out there, but that was like how the whole game went for Iowa. It seemed their heads were hardly even in it.

We seemed to love that weather, and dominated in it. That is SO freaking cool and just awesome to see. It does my heart an enormous amount of good, after all those years of pillowy soft Gophers teams and crappy Dome-ball. It was just one game of course, but what a game. What a showing!

Just one game, but it all starts somewhere.

 

[Winnipegopher]

I forgot:

Congrats to Eric Ellestad who had a great final game!

Onside kick was perfect and so were the field goals.

Great end to a difficult year.

 

[husker70]

If you get a chance to watch it again, Hoese had a heck of a game. He knock out two Iowa players.Shawn Prater, and the linebacker. He was devasting on the iso plays, and if you watch Gray's TD around the right end, its Hoese collapsing the corner. He owned the Iowa linebackers. I have not seen this type of blocking since Tapeh. Hoese gets my game ball

 

[MrGopher]

I forgot:

Congrats to Eric Ellestad who had a great final game!

Onside kick was perfect and so were the field goals.

Great end to a difficult year.

This is an important point.

We were probably too rough on him this year; and some of that came from me.

Congrats, Eric.

 

[GRGOPHER]

+1

 

[oak_street1981]

If you get a chance to watch it again, Hoese had a heck of a game. He knock out two Iowa players.Shawn Prater, and the linebacker. He was devasting on the iso plays, and if you watch Gray's TD around the right end, its Hoese collapsing the corner. He owned the Iowa linebackers. I have not seen this type of blocking since Tapeh. Hoese gets my game ball

If you slow down the on side kick on the DVR you will see Hoese and Rallis just destroy the right side (1 of two)hawkeye player trying to move back to cover the kick.

The power runs at the end of the game, behind Carufel and #71, with Bunders pulling from L guard were impressive as well. That play worked over and over again.

Some of these running formations and results were absent most of the last four years.

 

[Formo]

If you slow down the on side kick on the DVR you will see Hoese and Rallis just destroy the right side (1 of two)hawkeye player trying to move back to cover the kick.

The power runs at the end of the game, behind Carufel and #71, with Bunders pulling from L guard were impressive as well. That play worked over and over again.

Some of these running formations and results were absent most of the last four years.

Truer words have yet to be spoken on GH.com...