Maybe that's true, but it should be well within reach to at least play fundamentally sound football. ISU isn't very close do doing that, and it has been that way under Rhoads' entire tenure. Nothing extraordinary is going to happen for ISU FB until that basic step is reached. More likely, a lot of losing and frustration are going to happen until that basic step is achieved.
Fundamentals, discipline, game sense, game poise...whatever you call it, ISU just doesn't exhibit it consistently enough right now to make any kind of progress.
That last on-side kick in the BU game was a perfect microcasm of the bigger problem. The ball has to travel 10 yards before an ISU player can be the first one to touch it. The play
WILL FAIL due to penalty if an ISU player is the first to touch the ball before it travels ten yards. This is basic football. It needs to be drilled into the players' head such that it is second nature. And yet an ISU kid runs up and falls on the ball 4 yards too early. It just leaves you speechless. Not to mention being offsides, but that call looked iffy to me.
The first on-side kick wasn't much better. The kick has to stay on the field of play to avoid a penalty, and yet ISU kicks it out of bounds. A pooch kick is one of the 3 or 4 basic things that the kicking team needs to master, and yet come game time, it fails. And then there was the offsides penalty on the punt where ISU is setting up a return. And then there was another 3rd/4th and 1 where ISU can't get one yard on two plays. And then there was the poor tackling.
It just goes on and on, game after game. If the players are consistently and continuously making these kind of fundamental mistakes year after year, then there is something wrong with the training and preparation.
