Well done, PopeLando! Your service this season has not been overlooked, and I for one hope you choose to continue this saga next year. You're definitely getting better as each week goes by; the references and jokes made in this one were some of your funniest material yet!

In regards to the actual content, I am very glad Iowa's defense actually looked legit and not inflated by playing the dregs that is the B1G West. I think that gave Michigan a good reality check, especially now that we know Bama is on the horizon in four weeks. 

I've loved these - thanks, PopeLando!

Is Ashton Kutcher difficult to deal with, or do you not like him on general principles?

Iowa’s drive chart: punt, punt, punt, punt, fumble, punt, punt, fumble, downs, punt, fumble, downs, downs, sweet release of death.

This is glorious, about the most Iowa game possible on offense.  The only thing missing was Deacon Hill flinging the ball directly at Michigan defenders on a regular basis -- he was surprisingly accurate more often than not.

Iowa's offensive futility is one thing; what really killed Iowa in the BTCG were the turnovers. If Iowa doesn't fumble on the first Sainristil hit, they likely kick a FG there and it's a 10-3 game. If they don't fumble the second time, they punt--albeit from deep in their own territory--and probably keep Michigan out of the end zone, if not off the scoreboard entirely, in that segment of the game. Then they gifted M another three points with a third fumble well after the outcome was decided.

Just taking those ten points away from M and giving that FG to Iowa makes the score 16-3, which is still a comfortable victory by Iowa standards. But the score would have been closer longer, which puts more pressure on the opponent, so who knows? What a disaster. If you're not going to move the ball or score, at least don't turn it over. Just a really terrible, wretched performance by the Iowa offense all-around. Not that I am complaining!!

A few items:

Truly excellent work! Granted, Iowa is a target rich environment in which to go hunting, but you crushed these writeups. Bravo!

It's okay to use Charlie as a pinata. People who arrogantly self-medicate and then ignore the feedback? Well, they become social targets that are too easy to ignore.

Kutcher is his obnoxious character from the sitcoms; he and his bride/sitcom alum have been fined by the SEC for selling unregistered crypto securities for their cartoon about doper felines; they also write letters of support for convicted rapists. Thinking is not a strength for either of them.

But. I've gone way OT. Apologies.

Repeat: excellent diaries. Thank you!

Just putting this for posterity:

Tory Taylor, Iowa Punter-- 4119 punting yards through 13 games

Rex Grossman, Florida QB in his "F it I'm throwing deep cause the OBC told me so" year (2001)-- 3896 passing yards in 12 games. 

I did not enter into the topic expecting such deep-cut Star Wars references. Corran Horn? Again, was not expecting that.

AWOI made me LOL.

I think that pic of Sheen is him doing a Marty Feldman impersonation.

Good work.  You should get a nice bonus.

Love me some iowatch. Even moreso now that the Hawkeyes are in the rearview mirror. That was a stupid game against a stupid team. But I enjoyed it all the more because I truly felt that I understood said stupid team intrinsically. 

Nice.

PL should at least get an interim guest hosting spot on Opponent Watch -- at the very least for the Rose Bowl.

(I am a little bit concerned that I understood everything in the opening three paragraphs...but...I don't care.)

Nicely done.  Are you suggesting that Kirk Ferentz is as crazy as General Zaroff?  I thought this was an interesting topic from day one.  I don't know of any sports team that matches Iowa for the punting is winning concept.

Hey, want to guess how many Big Ten teams have exceeded 25 points per game? Four. Zero in the B1G West. Ye gods.

Wow. This is absolutely incredible.

After seeing these numbers, I had to take a look at last year's averages. Only 7 teams in the B1G averaged ≥ 25 ppg and Iowa only averaged 17.7.

This makes me wonder if you think it's possible that they were setting Ferentz the Younger up for failure (you may have answered this in a previous diary)? I mean, they were basically saying that Iowa needs to score at least 1 more touchdown/game and they have to be in the top half of the B1G in terms of points/game. And given the randomness of turnovers, pick-6s, safeties, etc., I'm sure they were counting on fewer defensive scores when they wrote the contract. So they probably expected that the offense would have to score something like 10-14 more points/game than last year. That's a pretty high bar. 

Great work as always! You've gotta find a way to keep this going next year, even if it is a different team/storyline. You just have too much talent for it. Seriously!

So……is the lack of scoring in the b1g due to excellent defense, OR, is it due to truly awful offenses? I’d have to say that it’s a little bit of both, considering just how good we know Michigan’s, Iowa’s, PSU’s, OSU’s, and to a slightly lesser extent Nebraska’s defenses are. 
 

Against those teams, turnovers caused by Michigan’s own defense led to an average of nearly a TD per game. Add in the defense forcing a punt and Michigan’s punt return special teams making a play and it’s pretty much another FG per game for a total of nearly 10 pts per game for each of those teams. Michigan’s avg. score in those games was 31.25. Subtract the 10 pts per game from Michigan’s defensive play and you are left with an offensive output of about 3 TDs per game. In all other games this season Michigan’s offense seems to have led to an avg of 4 TDs and a FG per game, all against defenses not in the top 10 (or 20 or 30). 
 

That’s a lot of extrapolations from the games this year but seems to support the idea that although b1g offenses were pretty bad, much of that was caused by the defenses they played against. 

i can't help but think how dangerous they could be with even a serviceable offense. like ranked 55th or something. why isn't that possible?