Outsiders view of ISU football

[cloneu]

Consistently brings stability. This is what ISU football needs the most to improve it's image. Overall this last decade has been pretty good for ISU, we have gone to 6 bowl games. There are 8 other BCS teams who have gone to this many, and 22 BCS teams who have gone to fewer bowl games in the last decade. Yet if you asked Joe Fan in Virginia, they would think maybe a handfull of BCS teams have been to fewer bowl games in the last decade. Even people who make a living watching/talking about college football would probably not know this.

But those 4 years we didn't make bowl games we were bad, really bad. And being that we have a history of being bad, it takes a lot to change people's perception of the football program.

We don't need to be going to BCS bowls to be good, just need to be consistent. A team that comes to my mind when I thing of as consistently good, but usually not top 10 material is Boston College. In fact they are one of 7 teams who have won at least 8 games every year the last 9 years. Something that USC, Florida, and Ohio St. have not done. We don't need to win 8 or 9 games every year, but regularly getting to 7 wins during the regular season would go a long way in changing the way people view our program.

[Wesley]

We cannot afford another Two Win Chiz. Period.

[Clark]

I've often wondered whether if would be better to be like Illinois (two BCS bowls in the 2000's, God awful the other years) or Minnesota (routinely 7-5 going to Insight bowl or Motor City bowl)

I think what ISU needs is a combination of regularly getting to 6 wins and occasionally getting to 9-10 wins. Say in a decade: 7-8 bowl games, including two Holiday/Cotton bowls.

[istater7]

not only consitency. our fan base needs to feel good about themselves, not whine about having to play texas every year in football or twice every year in basketball. we need to get away from the losers mentality. for example, that guy that started the thread "were done going to bowl games". we should relish the fact that we have the opportunity to be in this leauge and make the money and have the opportunity to play the best.

[Marc936]

i think more people would look at isu more if their is more players going to the NFL, illinois might be bad majority of the time, but there are a lot of starters to the nfl that are from university of illinois, so people look into them

[CyCrazy]

i think more people would look at isu more if their is more players going to the NFL, illinois might be bad majority of the time, but there are a lot of starters to the nfl that are from university of illinois, so people look into them

Illinois Basketball doesn't hurt thier curb appeal either, and 2 BCS bowls are swell.

[AllIowaTeams]

Consistently brings stability. This is what ISU football needs the most to improve it's image. Overall this last decade has been pretty good for ISU, we have gone to 6 bowl games. There are 8 other BCS teams who have gone to this many, and 22 BCS teams who have gone to fewer bowl games in the last decade. Yet if you asked Joe Fan in Virginia, they would think maybe a handfull of BCS teams have been to fewer bowl games in the last decade. Even people who make a living watching/talking about college football would probably not know this.

But those 4 years we didn't make bowl games we were bad, really bad. And being that we have a history of being bad, it takes a lot to change people's perception of the football program.

We don't need to be going to BCS bowls to be good, just need to be consistent. A team that comes to my mind when I thing of as consistently good, but usually not top 10 material is Boston College. In fact they are one of 7 teams who have won at least 8 games every year the last 9 years. Something that USC, Florida, and Ohio St. have not done. We don't need to win 8 or 9 games every year, but regularly getting to 7 wins during the regular season would go a long way in changing the way people view our program.

Wait...what? I may be reading this wrong, but the math doesn't seem to add up. Your numbers come out to 31 BCS teams. Also, I have a hard time believing only 8 schools matched or exceeded that number. I can think of 10 off the top of my head who exceeded it.

[GoShow97]

Consistently brings stability. This is what ISU football needs the most to improve it's image. Overall this last decade has been pretty good for ISU, we have gone to 6 bowl games. There are 8 other BCS teams who have gone to this many, and 22 BCS teams who have gone to fewer bowl games in the last decade. Yet if you asked Joe Fan in Virginia, they would think maybe a handfull of BCS teams have been to fewer bowl games in the last decade. Even people who make a living watching/talking about college football would probably not know this.

But those 4 years we didn't make bowl games we were bad, really bad. And being that we have a history of being bad, it takes a lot to change people's perception of the football program.

We don't need to be going to BCS bowls to be good, just need to be consistent. A team that comes to my mind when I thing of as consistently good, but usually not top 10 material is Boston College. In fact they are one of 7 teams who have won at least 8 games every year the last 9 years. Something that USC, Florida, and Ohio St. have not done. We don't need to win 8 or 9 games every year, but regularly getting to 7 wins during the regular season would go a long way in changing the way people view our program.

Anyone who is using bowl games as a measure of success in todays' environment is simply using the wrong performance metric, especially considering that .500 teams get bowl invites.

[bigsag]

CloneU has it right. But the consistency (for a U like Iowa State) isn't found as much in our win-loss record, as it is important to have consistency in our coaching staffs. We need bright, innovative head coaches committed to ISU. Perhaps CPR and CFH still have need to prove their coaching abilities. But IMO, I have not seen a more potentially outstanding group of head coaches than what we have now at Iowa State. (I'm talking about the head coaches as a group.) If the new "Big 12" only gives us 5 years, before we're back in this same situation, that may be time enough to prove some things.

I am excited to be a Cyclone !

[cloneu]

Wait...what? I may be reading this wrong, but the math doesn't seem to add up. Your numbers come out to 31 BCS teams. Also, I have a hard time believing only 8 schools matched or exceeded that number. I can think of 10 off the top of my head who exceeded it.

8 other schools went to exactly 6 bowl games. That would leave 34 teams who went to more bowl games than us.

[isuno1fan]

8 wins consistantly. Without that we will always be considered underperformers.

[Tedcyclone]

Consistently brings stability. This is what ISU football needs the most to improve it's image. Overall this last decade has been pretty good for ISU, we have gone to 6 bowl games. There are 8 other BCS teams who have gone to this many, and 22 BCS teams who have gone to fewer bowl games in the last decade. Yet if you asked Joe Fan in Virginia, they would think maybe a handfull of BCS teams have been to fewer bowl games in the last decade. Even people who make a living watching/talking about college football would probably not know this.

But those 4 years we didn't make bowl games we were bad, really bad. And being that we have a history of being bad, it takes a lot to change people's perception of the football program.

We don't need to be going to BCS bowls to be good, just need to be consistent. A team that comes to my mind when I thing of as consistently good, but usually not top 10 material is Boston College. In fact they are one of 7 teams who have won at least 8 games every year the last 9 years. Something that USC, Florida, and Ohio St. have not done. We don't need to win 8 or 9 games every year, but regularly getting to 7 wins during the regular season would go a long way in changing the way people view our program.

I beleive ISU can be a winning program but as far as other conferences or big networks wanting them is a different story..no one is knocking down Boston College to join... a 10 year span of utter domination may help, but outside that we are always going to be in the same boat. that boat is fine as long as we are in a Major BCS conference.

[CykoAGR]

My take on this is that if we consistently win 6-7 games and go to a blah.com bowl, the ISU fanbase will be sick of this after about 3-4 years (see Danny Mac era) and begin to say that we need to find someone to get us over the hump. I for one would have this attitude. In order to be relevant I agree, we need to be consistent. Win at a minimum 6 games probably 9 out of 10 years and win 8 or 9 or even 10 games at least two times in that same 10 year span. We dont need BCS every year but we need to play in Jan. a few times.

As one other posted stated we cant stand another two year stretch like the Chizick era.

[Wesley]

8 wins consistantly. Without that we will always be considered underperformers.

Ok, Baylor's *** will be grass for us. Every year. Home and away.

[iccyfan]

What do "outsiders" think of ISU Football, as in fans outside the midwest? I'll answer your question with another question. What do you know or think of Mississippi State, Washington State, etc.? We've been conditioned to believe they're non-competitive members of power conferences, who can't compete because they're the #2 schools in their respective states and located in "back-water" cities. They periodically "flash" (ie - Ryan Leaf) but never seem to sustain success in the key programs. That's what outsiders think of ISU...