Bowl season is among us. There are 3 games today (New Mexico: BYU-UTEP, Humanitarian: Northern Illinois-Fresno St., and New Orleans: Ohio-Troy) and there has finally been a shift from talking about off the field issues to talking about the Insight Bowl. Ferentz, along with Ken O'Keefe and Norm Parker, met with the press yesterday to discuss the upcoming bowl game. The best part of the presser was just having Norm back healthy and as witty as ever.
Quick hits
Ferentz:- Injuries - Tarpinian is doing better and has a shot at playing. Sandeman is 100%. Gettis and MacMillan are rusty but could provide some depth on the O-line.
- Receiver - Filling in for DJK will be kind of a committee approach. Chaney will be the other kick returner with Davis, but Sandeman, McNutt, and Nordmann will also have to step up.
- Since the bowl game is the last game, there will be no holding Coker back. He will get the majority of the carries.
- Unsurprisingly, Ferentz has not thought a lot about the division names or the new trophies.
Parker:
- Health - Norm has feeling better and has been out on the practice field and in the office. He expects to be back next year.
- Missouri's offense - They run an offense like Northwestern only more bizarre. They use unbalanced formations and spread the ball around quickly.
- Quote of the day - "You start to get out of bed, you say, Oh, $#!%, I only got one leg on, I better get the other leg on."
O'Keefe:
- Blitzes - Missouri blitzes a lot and brings in speedy guys from different spots. Stanzi will need to make the right call and the interior line will need to step up to the challenge.
- Running back - Likes Coker's physical style, but will also need guys like Morse and O'Meara who know the system to step up, especially with blocking.
- Google - He has never Googled himself, but his kids have. Another family mention, his mom is apparently critical of him.
- Indiana job - Question skirted.
HawkeyeSports.com has the full transcript of the press conference [pdf].
Legends and Leaders?
Jim Delany has heard the fans and understand the vastness of disapproval for the new division names. After the new year, Delany says that the Big Ten may reconsider the division names to try to figure out if they are sustainable or not.To get a 90 percent non-approval rating was really surprising. It showed that we didn’t connect with our fans in a way that we wanted to. It’s humbling, to say the least, because we’re trying to build fan bases, not push them away.Personally I still like Plains and Lakes or Black and Blue. Who knows though. It can't get much worse.