All of Iowa State's "big goals" remain intact despite Saturday's loss

[The Rob Gray]

All of Iowa State's "big goals" remain intact despite Saturday's loss

Iowa State Cyclones football head coach Matt Campbell hi-fives with fans as entering the field before the game against Texas Tech in the week-10 NCAA football at Jack Trice Stadium on Saturday, Nov. 2, 2024, in Ames, Iowa. © Nirmalendu Majumdar/Ames Tribune / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images A

cyclonefanatic.com

 

[keepngoal]

Agreed! Winning is still the goal and winning out puts us in the championship game and then the playoffs.

 

[acoustimac]

They need to have a goal of having a consistently good offense. It’s been an up and down mess all season.

 

[Dgilbertson]

Seems like scoreboards across the country helped out about as much as they could’ve.

Clemson beat bad at home
ATM got spanked on the road
Both to unranked teams as well
Plus the KState loss.

 

[Cyclonepride]

It certainly helps that KSU lost at Houston. It's all still out there for these guys.

 

[IlliniCy]

UCF and TT have exposed our offensive deficiencies.

KU - L
Cincy - W
Utah - W
KSU - L
Bowl game - L

Still no 10 win season.

 

[jctisu]

UCF and TT have exposed our offensive deficiencies.

KU - L
Cincy - W
Utah - W
KSU - L
Bowl game - L

Still no 10 win season.

Well let’s see if the staff makes the adjustment now that it’s happened two games in a row. Why are you just assuming a bowl loss? Because you are one of the sky is falling people with one loss? If we go 2-2 down the stretch our bowl opponent will be someone we can absolutely beat.

Sure we could lose out, win out, split some of these, etc. The KU game will be telling, so I would withhold judgement until then personally. But if you want to go all doom and gloom after our first loss have at it.

 

[IlliniCy]

Well let’s see if the staff makes the adjustment now that it’s happened two games in a row. Why are you just assuming a bowl loss? Because you are one of the sky is falling people with one loss? If we go 2-2 down the stretch our bowl opponent will be someone we can absolutely beat.

Sure we could lose out, win out, split some of these, etc. The KU game will be telling, so I would withhold judgement until then personally. But if you want to go all doom and gloom after our first loss have at it.

Been a Cyclone fan for 45 years. I've seen this movie too many times. It's just easier to expect the worst when the worst is what always happens.

Our coaching staff adjust? They weren't even smart enough to go pass heavy against the worst pass D in the country.

 

[rosshm16]

I'm reverting to my pre-season goal, which I thought was optimistic at the time, of a 9-3 regular season with a chance in a bowl game for our first 10-win season. That would still be the best season win-wise in Iowa State history.

@IlliniCy is right, this team's weaknesses have been exposed, the main one being we don't handle pressure well, the line is inconsistent at best and Rocco has struggled to find the open man when blitzed. There's not much to adjust on that, it's a central task for good football and we aren't good at it. We have no identity on offense, there's no "the offense hasn't played up to its potential" yet anymore, we're eight games into the season and we are what we've showed. Call me a doomer if you want since we're still 7-1 and that's objectively great, but this team has been super-lucky this year, we could very easily be 4-4 right now.

 

[Daserop]

The slow starts finally bit this team. More losses to follow.

 

[madguy30]

CMC's teams in the past had issues with not being succinct especially in some crucial moments.

This team had seemed to get rid of that trend in the early games but the last two have reverted back.

You can't get to a first and goal at the 1/2 yard line or whatever it was and have an offsides or a fumble (that was recovered).

You can't have the center going downfield on RPO twice.

You can't give up a 98 yard scoring drive.

You also can't go against your strengths and run some bunch/3 TE sets when you're getting some rhythm offensively.

On to the next but they'll need to be really good to win next week.

 

[Rogue52]

At this moment, I don’t see the team running through neutral site KU, vs. Cinnci, @ Utah, and vs. KSU unscathed. 3-1 is probably the most likely outcome with 4-0 and 2-2 about the same for next likely. Losing to Tech - especially at home - with those four games still in front of us really hurt.

 

[clone37]

I'm reverting to my pre-season goal, which I thought was optimistic at the time, of a 9-3 regular season with a chance in a bowl game for our first 10-win season. That would still be the best season win-wise in Iowa State history.

@IlliniCy is right, this team's weaknesses have been exposed, the main one being we don't handle pressure well, the line is inconsistent at best and Rocco has struggled to find the open man when blitzed. There's not much to adjust on that, it's a central task for good football and we aren't good at it. We have no identity on offense, there's no "the offense hasn't played up to its potential" yet anymore, we're eight games into the season and we are what we've showed. Call me a doomer if you want since we're still 7-1 and that's objectively great, but this team has been super-lucky this year, we could very easily be 4-4 right now.

The biggest thing to me, and something we all cannot deny, is the eye test. The last 2 games this team does not even look like a top 40 team.....same thing for the North Dakota game and first half of the Iowa game. Second half of the Iowa game, Arkansas St, Houston, Baylor, WVU we looked like a legit top 10 team. It is amazing to me how well Campbell has gotten his teams to play at times during his tenure, it really is extremely impressive. It is also equally puzzling how within the same seasons his teams will look so completely different and inept. Hopefully the better version shows up for all or most of these remaining games. Matt's history would tell you that things will be back and forth these last 4 games. I hope like hell he can change that narrative in the coming weeks and reach a new ceiling here.

 

[NoCreativity]

UCF and TT have exposed our offensive deficiencies.

KU - L
Cincy - W
Utah - W
KSU - L
Bowl game - L

Still no 10 win season.

Agreed, if this team can't take care of Tech and UCF in Ames there's zero evidence we are running the table.

I think we finish 9-3, lose to Kansas and then either Utah or K-State, this team is playing terrible football right now.

 

[BigDH01]

I'm reverting to my pre-season goal, which I thought was optimistic at the time, of a 9-3 regular season with a chance in a bowl game for our first 10-win season. That would still be the best season win-wise in Iowa State history.

@IlliniCy is right, this team's weaknesses have been exposed, the main one being we don't handle pressure well, the line is inconsistent at best and Rocco has struggled to find the open man when blitzed. There's not much to adjust on that, it's a central task for good football and we aren't good at it. We have no identity on offense, there's no "the offense hasn't played up to its potential" yet anymore, we're eight games into the season and we are what we've showed. Call me a doomer if you want since we're still 7-1 and that's objectively great, but this team has been super-lucky this year, we could very easily be 4-4 right now.

We are in the top half of a lower tier conference and had an amazing and somewhat lucky start. Lucky in that it hasn't been that difficult and in that the tossup games have gone our way.

I don't think there's going to be another Texas or Oklahoma in the conference and there will be a lot of attrition amongst the top half due to circumstance and luck. This time, we caught a TTU with their starters back and lost an extremely close game. On the flip side, we snatched victories against Iowa and UCF that could've easily gone the other way. We should just be happy when the stars align and conversely we should have patience in the seasons where the coin flips don't go our way. We were just as likely to enter yesterday 5-2 as 7-0. We're just too evenly matched with the competition to be dominant. And to be honest, I think it'd be neat to be in the CFP but the Big 12 champ is going to go get destroyed by rosters stacked with NFL talent.

 

[NoCreativity]

CMC's teams in the past had issues with not being succinct especially in some crucial moments.

This team had seemed to get rid of that trend in the early games but the last two have reverted back.

You can't get to a first and goal at the 1/2 yard line or whatever it was and have an offsides or a fumble (that was recovered).

You can't have the center going downfield on RPO twice.

You can't give up a 98 yard scoring drive.

You also can't go against your strengths and run some bunch/3 TE sets when you're getting some rhythm offensively.

On to the next but they'll need to be really good to win next week.

How about the defensive "hands to the face" that negated the INT? We would have gotten the ball back in field goal range. Just really poor football IQ all the way around yesterday.

 

[madguy30]

The biggest thing to me, and something we all cannot deny, is the eye test. The last 2 games this team does not even look like a top 40 team.....same thing for the North Dakota game and first half of the Iowa game. Second half of the Iowa game, Arkansas St, Houston, Baylor, WVU we looked like a legit top 10 team. It is amazing to me how well Campbell has gotten his teams to play at times during his tenure, it really is extremely impressive. It is also equally puzzling how within the same seasons his teams will look so completely different and inept. Hopefully the better version shows up for all or most of these remaining games. Matt's history would tell you that things will be back and forth these last 4 games. I hope like hell he can change that narrative in the coming weeks and reach a new ceiling here.

A team that looks like they're not top 40 but also looks like they're Top Ten (that's debatable) is probably around Top 25ish which has been the case about all season.

The reward to being undefeated was moving up in the polls but in reality they're a pretty good team that can still do some good things in November.

The 'but they were Top Ten!' thing is kind of like when the CF guys were saying how ISU looked like a Final Four team (whatever that means) last January like it just automatically means it's going to remain that way.

 

[madguy30]

We're just too evenly matched with the competition to be dominant. And to be honest, I think it'd be neat to be in the CFP but the Big 12 champ is going to go get destroyed by rosters stacked with NFL talent.

Bolded is a perfect way to put it.

Tech has a bad pass defense but it's not like there was some big talent disparity yesterday or in any of ISU's conference games.

 

[werdnamanhill]

If we play like that in arrowhead, we get smacked.

 

[swiacy]

We are in the top half of a lower tier conference and had an amazing and somewhat lucky start. Lucky in that it hasn't been that difficult and in that the tossup games have gone our way.

I don't think there's going to be another Texas or Oklahoma in the conference and there will be a lot of attrition amongst the top half due to circumstance and luck. This time, we caught a TTU with their starters back and lost an extremely close game. On the flip side, we snatched victories against Iowa and UCF that could've easily gone the other way. We should just be happy when the stars align and conversely we should have patience in the seasons where the coin flips don't go our way. We were just as likely to enter yesterday 5-2 as 7-0. We're just too evenly matched with the competition to be dominant. And to be honest, I think it'd be neat to be in the CFP but the Big 12 champ is going to go get destroyed by rosters stacked with NFL talent.

This is a sound logical assessment. I haven’t watched any BYU games thou and they may be the outlier in the Big 12. They get NFL level talent, have a quality coach who has an established program and have a distinct fan/recruitment base similar to ND. And a home field environment that is a tough place for visiting teams. I could see them becoming the new power in the conference.