The Ghost of Dan McCarney

Gary_ISU

Active Member
Apr 12, 2006
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I was very disappointned in the loss on Thursday. Not overly surprised but disappointed all the same. The thing that is most troublesome for me was this looked exactly like a Dan McCarney coached team.

We were incredibly vanilla and conservative on both sides of the ball. A couple times, I thought Cotton was calling the plays again. 3rd and 7 in the first half from the 28, we run it up the middle and settle for a missed 45 year field goal. First play of the 4th quarter 2nd and 6, we run up the middle for 3 and then the odd play with Bates. We had trouble with false starts same as the last few years.

I thought the defense looked okay and made enough plays but received no help from the offense in the second half. Down by 9 with the ball at the Kent State 30 yard line and we lose a yard and miss a 47 yard field goal. The problem was not Culbertson but the fact we lost a yard when we needed a touchdown. It felt a lot like the last couple years. Other things, missed field goals, no rush etc.

I think the most disturbing thing is that we ran out of gas. I thought based upon the workouts we were going through we would not wear down against Kent State.

The only difference I could see was Bass. We have not had a real running back since Haywood.

Maybe I should not be surprised we looked like Mac's team. 80% of the players were recruited by Mac. He was on the job 12 years and Chizik and his staff have had 10 months. This was the beginning of a new era at ISU unfortunately it looked a lot like the old era. I expected a much more agressive and relentless team. Perhaps we simply do not have the talent to play that way.

I am in no way down on Chizik and his staff. I still expect great things and think he is the right man for the job. I just hope to see a little something different against UNI.
 
I was thining the same thing. If I wanted off tackle on 3 and 8 why not keep Barney. Maybe we are limited by the players we have to what we can actually call. I was so disappointed last Thursday night.

Don't judge trends on one game. We ran on 1 third and 7. If it continues, then complain. Running on 2nd and 6 isn't a bad thing. Gave us a third and 3. I'll take 3rd and 3 all season long. And the Bates play on 3rd and 3 certainly wasn't conservative. Just probably bad timing to run that for the first time every.

We started 2 freshman on the O-line and a juco sophmore. That'll explain the false starts. They just need to stop now.

I admit, we ran all the time, but it was working. Kent State couldn't stop us until the 4th quarter. Penalties and turnovers stopped us. You would probably argue we should pass more, but all 3 turnovers came on passing plays, so maybe we shouldn't have passed so much.
 
Oh....this should be good...
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McCarney left.... Dang.. Your telling me I can't wear my "Fire Coach Mac" shirt.

I suppose they hired someone up and coming that the fans aren't going to give a chance also...:wideeyed:
 
Dan McCarney won his first game in Ames and Coach Chizik lost his first.....:eek:Fortunatly I don't think there's any correlation between first game and the rest of your record.

Why is this a surprise for anybody by the way??? We all know the both lines are almost entirely new people. That is a not a recipie for success. Bob Stoups could be coaching on the side line and I don't think it would have made any difference this year.

Go easy on critizing Coach Ciziks play calling. This is his 1st year, not his 12th....
 
I'll keep my long winded comments to myself until I'm done watching the mediacom replay.....
 
Maybe we are limited by the players we have to what we can actually call.

Weird because I recall hearing this last year as well. I guess the play calling wasn't solely based on bad judgement. I will be the first to say that I believe Dan needed to go, but I think now people can realize the rationalism of everything. Sometimes you need to see it more than once to actually believe it.

Though there were some situations that definately reminded everyone of last year, I think there is no doubt that a lot of it was different. I dont think I saw one 5-8 yard hook pass play along the sidelines. A lot more balls attempted over the middle, and way more naked bootlegs (maybe one too many). This coaching staff has done a fine job of mixing it up. Sorry, there's no ghost.

Oh, and I got to add this one last thing:
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How DID Bob Stoops do his first season at OKLAHOMA anyway? Hmmm?

7-5, the previous coach went 3-8, 4-8, and 5-6 before Stoops was hired.

Just give the season a chance. It'll take nothing short of a miracle to get to a bowl after this loss to Kent State, but it's still possible.
 
This coaching staff has done a fine job of mixing it up. Sorry, there's no ghost.

Great point. Cotton ran the ball a lot, even when it was apparent we weren't getting production from the rushing game. McFarland ran the ball because J.J. was having a great game. There's a big difference in that.

God forbid that the coaches should ever run on a 3rd and 5 because everyone knows it's a passing down.

Had Meyer never committed the turnovers, and had the swings of momentum never been so violent, ISU would have likely beaten Kent State, and people on the boards would be singing a much different tune.
 
I'll be the first one to tell you (as well as many of the people I talk to :wink:), I was a pretty big McCarney supporter. But I also knew that it was a time for a change.

Last year, as far as the offense was concerned, I thought there was two problems: Cotton being the first, Meyer being the second. Now, I thought it was mostly Cotton, and my dad thought it was mostly Meyer. So far, he's been right. We'll see how the rest of the games play out.

OK, I lied. There were three: the third being the lack of a healthy running back that could hit the hole quick and not go down on first contact. Now, I think Stevie WAS good back. He just wasn't the type of back that went well with our line and our offense.

As far as the defense goes:
Last years main problem was TACKLING.
This years main problem is TACKLING.
Even the great Ace Bowen was guilty of trying to simply "shoulder" his guy down and allowing a first down instead of a wrapping up and making an actual tackle.
Not to mention the D-Line isn't exactly you wright to Pete Caroll about.

Special Teams:
Can't we find somebody that can catch the damn ball?

I don't care that we haven't had a punt blocked, and I don't care if we don't get a punt blocked this year..... I still HATE the punt formation we have. I don't see any advantage to it, and I see defenders able to build up steam, or momentum, if you will. Don't like it. Never have, never will.

Peace out girlscout
 
Actually I thought our tackling was DECEANT(not great) when we were able to get to the player. It always seemed we were a 1/2 step behind everyone thus missing the opprotunity to tackle. That comes down to team speed. Last game, they had a quick RB and QB, so it made it extra difficult to get to the oppropriate guy. But I would agree that some tried to just plow the guy over and that didn't always do anything. Wrapping up is a must.
 
as far as offensive playcalling goes...I wanna ask one thing...how many 3rd and LONGS were we in???

We need to establish a run with JJ (who is gonna be a goodin) so that Meyer can work off of it and not put the whole thing on his back.

I think are bigger problems are honestly on D (as weird as the sounds coming off only scoring 14 on Kent State)...we need to get more pressure on the QB from the front 4, instead of having to blitz to get pressure...and god dangit - LET'S LEARN TO TACKLE, do any of these guys pay attention to Alvin Bowen on film?!?!?!?!? or do they just assume he will make every tackle, sooooo just let him do his thing and try just to slow up a would-be-tackle for him.
 
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I'll probably get slammed for this but I thought the play calling was fine. A few things to keep in mind.

#1-If the players can't run the basic plays succesfully you don't just say "Well screw it let's just throw it downfield". ISU needs to do better on 1st and 2nd down. No team has a good conversion on 3rd and 12's. The "Well screw it let's thow it downfield" thing only works on a regular basis when you have the right players. The ISU offense is not ready for anything fancy. I'm not saying we shouldn't throw the ball, because we should but I wouldn't expect to see anything fancy.

#2 Good or bad Mac had very little to do with the offense.

#3 Stupid penalties. ISU killed themselves with dumb penalties which got them into a lot of those bad 3rd down situations.
 

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