Ferentz Speaks

Suspensions:
Jewel Hampton and Broderick Binns will serve a 1 game suspension at the beginning of the year for off-season alcohol-related charges. That means they'll miss the Eastern Illinois game, but will be back against ISU. Ferentz didn't mention Jordan Bernstine at all, so he may be in the clear.

Injuries:
Only one reported, so that's good. It's OLB Ross Petersen who is currently out with a torn pec.

Rumors Quashed:
Before Ferentz spoke with the press today there were a couple of big rumors floating around. The first is that A.J. Derby had decided to move to linebacker from quarterback in an attempt to see the field sooner. The second is that defensive coordinator Norm Parker is planning on retiring after this season. Ferentz said that both of these rumors were news to him, though didn't outright deny their truthfulness. We'll have to file these under "wait and see".

One other rumor was indirectly addressed as Ferentz said that all the members of the team are in good standing academically. That means Brandon Wegher is still on the team and has good enough grade. So no, he's not transferring to South Dakota State or anywhere.

Quick Notes:
  • Mike Daniels is considered a 5th starter on the defensive line. Maybe we'll see him start against EIU with Binns sitting out.
  • Conor Boffeli and Nolan MacMillan are both in the mix on the offensive line. If I had to guess, the spot they would be competing for the guard opposite Julian Vandervelde. The tackles seem in place with Reiff and Zusevics and center will be Ferentz or Koeppel.
  • Nebraska is an exciting addition, especially for fans.
  • Iowa's had a tough time against OSU, and the Big Ten title will go through Columbus again.
  • Arizona game does not excite Ferentz. He's not wild about west coast time zone, but doesn't think the heat will be a problem.

Video!

Also, HawkeyeNation.com has audio from Ferentz on the side.

Big Ten Coaches on Iowa

The coaches, including (and especially) Ferentz, mostly say a lot of fluffy coach speak. So I don't have full recaps here. I tried to pull out little piece from what they said if it pertained to Iowa. The results are kind of underwhelming, but here they are anyway.
  • Bret Bielema (Wisconsin) - Bielema wants a year end rivalry and thinks Iowa would be a good option.
    I'd like to have that tradition at Wisconsin, whether it's Minnesota, Iowa or Nebraska.
  • Pat Fitzgerald (Northwestern) - Fitz admits that Northwestern has gotten lucky against the Hawkeyes recently. On talking about the key to beating Iowa 4 out of the past 5 times he said:
    [The key is] an oblong football that bounces a lot of different ways.
  • Ron Zook (Illinois) - Talked about waterskiing and appliance shopping...not Iowa.
  • Rich Rodriguez (Michigan) - RichRod had nothing to say about Iowa, but did mention that he has no knowledge of what went on during summer work outs. *wink* *wink*
  • Mark Dantonio (Michigan State) - Dantonio didn't really feel like answering questions so took up basically his whole time allotment talking about MSU position by position.
  • Bill Lynch (Indiana) - Lynch didn't mention Iowa directly, but did say the Hoosiers were a couple of breaks from a bowl game...
    We were about 12 plays away from playing in a really good bowl game.
    I'm guessing 3 or 4 of those were against Iowa.
  • Danny Hope (Purdue) - Purdue doesn't play Iowa this year, so there was no mention of the Hawkeyes.
  • Joe Paterno (Penn State) - JoePa talked about problems "a little below than the intestines" and coaching until he dies...
  • Tim Brewster (Minnesota) - Brewster wants to keep the Iowa and Wisconsin rivalry games.
  • Jim Tressel (Ohio State) - Tressel knows Ohio State has a target on its back this year (just like every year pretty much). What I know is that Iowa will be ready on November 20.

Media Picks!

  1. Ohio State
  2. Iowa
  3. Wisconsin
Offensive Player of the Year: Terrelle Pryor
Defensive Player of the Year: Greg Jones

No real arguments from me. It makes perfect sense to put Iowa number 2 behind Ohio State and the POWs are fine. Personally I would have taken John Clay and Adrian Clayborn though.

Iowa Depth Chart

Offense:
  • SE | Derrell Johnson-Koulianos/Colin Sandeman
  • LT | Riley Reiff, Matt Tobin
  • LG | Julian Vandervelde, Woody Orne
  • C | Josh Koeppel/James Ferentz, Conor Boffeli
  • RG | Adam Gettis, Cody Hundertmark
  • RT | Markus Zusevics, Brett Van Sloten
  • TE | Allen Reisner, Brad Herman
  • WR | Marvin McNutt, Keenan Davis
  • QB | Ricky Stanzi, James Vandenberg
  • RB | Adam Robinson, Brandon Wegher, Jewel Hampton
  • FB | Brett Morse, Wade Leppert

Defense:
  • DE | Adrian Clayborn, Lebron Daniel
  • DT | Karl Klug, Thomas Nardo
  • DT | Christian Ballard, Mike Daniels
  • DE | Broderick Binns, Joe Forgy
  • OLB | Tyler Nielsen, Ross Petersen
  • MLB | Jeff Tarpinian, Bruce Davis
  • WLB | Jeremiha Hunter, Troy Johnson
  • LC | Shaun Prater, Greg Castillo
  • FS | Brett Greenwood, Kyle Steinbrecher, Jack Swanson
  • SS | Tyler Sash, Tom Donatell, Nick Nielsen
  • RC | Micah Hyde, Jordan Bernstine

Special Teams:
  • PK | Daniel Murray/Trent Mossbrucker
  • P | Ryan Donahue, Eric Guthrie
  • KR | Derrell Johnson-Koulianos, Brandon Wegher
  • PR | Colin Sandeman, Paul Chaney Jr.

There are not really any big surprises here. The most interesting position is probably running back. Robinson currently gets the nod as number 1, though I would guess that Wegher and Hampton are not far behind. At receiver, DJK as usual hasn't cemented his name as a starter and is listed with an "or" with Sandeman. Kick returners has changes slightly since the spring and I really like the idea of DJK and Wegher back there.

Big Ten Divisions

Jim Delany announced that the competitive balance piece of the formula for creating the division will look back though 1993 when Penn State joined the Big Ten. So, I went to stassen.com and dug up the win/loss records for each team. Here are the winning percentages:
  1. Ohio State - 79.7%
  2. Nebraska - 76.0%
  3. Penn State - 70.3%
  4. Michigan - 69.5%
  5. Wisconsin - 68.7%
  6. Iowa - 58.0%
  7. Purdue - 53.0%
  8. Michigan State - 49.5%
  9. Northwestern - 48.0%
  10. Minnesota - 45.3%
  11. Illinois - 38.3%
  12. Indiana - 35.4%

Based on those numbers the most fair alignment I could come up with would be:
Division A: Ohio State, Michigan, Iowa, Purdue, Northwestern, Illinois (57.8% winning percentage)
Division B: Nebraska, Penn State, Wisconsin, Michigan State, Minnesota, Indiana (57.5% winning percentage)

Those look pretty crappy though in terms of preserving traditional rivalries. If we went back to the geographical approach, the division would still be pretty fair.
Division West: Nebraska, Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, Illinois, Northwestern (55.7% winning percentage)
Division East: Ohio State, Penn State, Michigan, Purdue, Michigan State, Indiana(59.6% winning percentage)

I honestly do not believe that is overly unbalance in favor of the East. So come on people, let just do what makes sense and split these divisions up geographically. The Big Ten will probably expand again in a year anyway and then we can take another look at it. However they do it though, we should know in 30-45 days.

More from Delany
Delany also mentioned that a 9-game conference season is likely to happen in the future. It's probably not going to happen next year, but maybe 3 to 4 years down the road. With the Big XII moving to a 9-game schedule as well, this could spell the end of Iowa-Iowa State game.

Also, the Big Ten is the Big Ten is the Big Ten...Delany says no name change. There will be a Big Ten Championship game, though we don't know where yet. And, expansion is not dead, but will be but on the back-burner during football season.