By Chris Williams, CycloneFanatic.com Publisher
After making arguably the boldest play call in Iowa State football history, Paul Rhoads showed nothing but confidence during his Monday press conference.
When Rhoads elected to fake a PAT that eventually ended the game in Iowa State’s 31-30 overtime loss to Nebraska on Saturday, it wasn’t a spur of the moment decision. It was calculated. It was strategic. And despite what some might be questioning, senior holder (backup punter) Daniel Kuehl was the right man for the job.
“You mean Daniel Kuehl, the same guy who ran a fake field goal perfectly early in the season as our backup punter and the holder who took that fake field goal right to the last second, drew all of the UNI defenders in and pitched it at the perfect time to allow us to move the first down chains and score a touchdown against UNI? Daniel Kuehl is doing pretty good,” Rhoads told reporters. “He’ll do a nice job of holding again this week and if I ask him to run a fake, I bet he goes out and executes it perfectly.”
“We were playing to win the game. We made a sound decision in an effort to win the ball game in one play against a team that is ranked number eight in the country and also in the top 10 of the BCS rankings.”
Rhoads released some other interesting pieces of information during the press conference. For instance, when Grant Mahoney lined up and buried a 57-yard field goal towards the end of Saturday’s first half, that wasn’t the original call.
“Looking back, the fake field goal was actually called on that kick that we made at the end of the half,” Rhoads said. “But they were in a safe alignment. That is why I called a timeout, to get us out of it.”
After Saturday, Iowa State is now 3-for-4 in fake situations this season.
“Every one that we have run has been well designed and well conceived,” Rhoads said. “We’ve run them at strategic times of the game and for the most part, we have had great success with those plays, 75 percent on the year if you are looking at four of them. I don’t know if that is gutsy or smart football.”
