Every coach and program has things they can sell and negatives that they need to overcome. Both ISU and iowa have a negative in location. ISU has a big negative in historical success, iowa has a negative in that their coach is old (and the racism allegations). Iowa has what is probably an overall negative in their conservative style of play. There's probably a net positive vs ISU in conference affiliation and size of the stadium/fanbase, but it isn't a lot. What iowa is selling is the NFL. And that is a VERY powerful selling point. Every single recruit wants to get there and if they think that there's a better chance of it happening in IC vs Ames, then that's tough to overcome. ISU is selling a more exciting brand of football, a young energetic staff and more of a family culture. While these things aren't as important as getting to the league, they're still important.
IMO as KF gets older and Campbell proves he's staying long term (the biggest recruiting negative against him), I think that you'll continue to see ISU able to compete with iowa head to head and win more than their share on the trail...especially as they close the gap on facilities and putting players in the pros.
To put it bluntly, KF has been landing better classes because he's been producing NFL players and everyone thought that CMC would leave. It's obvious as CMC has proven the doubters wrong and KF nears the end of his career that the tables have turned some.
