Tuesdays with Torbee

One. Freaking. Guy.

That’s what I kept yelling during the fourth quarter from my seats in Section 103 as David Bell turned Iowa defenders into hapless extras in yet another personal highlight reel created at the Hawkeyes’ expense.

Only I didn’t use the word “freaking” - much to the chagrin of Mrs. Torbee and the kindly older Purdue fan lady who greeted my late-game “congrats on the win, your team is excellent” with a “thanks, but I don’t care for the salty language.”

But if ever a game provided legitimate excuse for frequently deploying expletive-filled language, this (ahem) show was the one.

There is no sugarcoating last Saturday’s putrid performance. It was a total team loss. The offensive line played lousy. The quarterback played lousy. The defensive line got zero pressure, allowing all three Purdue quarterbacks to pass and run with impunity. Iowa’s heretofore consistently excellent placekicker shanked a field goal attempt. Even Tory Taylor looked pretty pedestrian. I guess Charlie Jones had a nice day returning all of Purdue’s scores, but no one on offense could take advantage and put points on the board themselves. It was a crap sandwich served on moldy bread on what was otherwise a beautiful fall homecoming day.

Look, most realistic Iowa fans knew this inconsistent team wasn’t really the second-best team in college football. It turns out you have to be able to move the ball and score with consistency to be a true Top 5 contender. But with only a pedestrian-appearing Purdue standing between the Hawkeyes entering the bye week with an undefeated record and #2 ranking, it was setting up for a few more weeks of tweaking the college football intelligentsia about the superiority of “complementary” football.

Turns out consistency is more important than complement, with Purdue Coach Jeff Brohm and star receiver David Bell showing a consistent ability to kick Iowa’s ass up and down a football field.

It is a good thing the bye week looms, as Saturday’s performance (or lack thereof) is the kind of thing that could defeat a program twice. If Iowa players had been resting on their laurels or thinking they could just show up and beat down their Big 10 West Division foes, that notion was brutally knocked out of them Saturday.

That said, I don’t feel like Iowa came out “flat” or uninspired or with a hangover from its emotional victory over Penn State. The first play of the game, a beautiful catch-and-run from Keagan Johnson, indicated Iowa was ready to go. Of course he was never really targeted again, one of many head-scratching personnel and coaching decisions that highlighted that the staff and players were all uncharacteristically off their game this day.

Tyler Goodson averaged a robust 5.7 yards a carry, but only toted the ball 12 times. Arland Bruce, the other explosive young wide receiver, was only targeted once. It’s pretty obvious Iowa has no real offensive identity. It often appears coordinator Brian Ferentz is content to just throw stuff against the wall, hoping something sticks. But what is inexplicable is even when he finds something that works, he seems to immediately shelve it, looking for some new approach.

But the biggest disappointment in my mind was the performance of Iowa’s defensive line. It’s easy to wonder what happened to a skilled secondary that had been picking off balls and making life miserable for opposing quarterbacks, but it seems obvious to me it all starts up front. They say if you don’t have one good quarterback, you don’t have any, but Iowa managed to make a trio of Purdue signal callers look like all stars. On throwing plays, they had all day. On running plays, they had gaping holes. Iowa may have held onto its long streak of holding teams to 24 points or less, but not because it played good defense on Saturday.

So is there a silver lining in this litany of gloom?

I think so. The Hawkeyes still control their own Big 10 championship destiny. Win out, and they go to Indianapolis with a shot at a big time bowl or even a backdoor playoff spot if they win the whole thing. Likely? Probably not. But possible.

The team I watched Saturday looked very little like the team I watched the first six games of the season.

I remain convinced that the raw talent on this squad is among the best of the Ferentz era. Some young guys need to get old in a hurry and the two lines need to shore up their technique and intensity. But there are no world-beating teams left on the schedule.

It’s also possible that Purdue is current-era Kirk Ferentz’s kryptonite. I have watched quite a few of their games, and it is only against Iowa that they somehow avoid penalties, turnovers and other costly mistakes. It is only against Iowa that their offensive line is a brick wall and their receivers scamper unmolested across the field. I have no logical explanation for it, so I’m going to chalk it up to them just being a bad matchup for Iowa’s brand of football. It happens.

I guess the other silver lining is that last Saturday was not a “coulda, woulda, shoulda” game. I didn’t wake up Sunday thinking “man, if they would have just….” Or “If that guy had only been able to….” To a man, Iowa was beaten soundly. Every player and coach needs to own that and figure out what went wrong and how to fix it.

Both Iowa and Wisconsin are wondering where things went wrong and know the game in Madison may determine the best of the West. Iowa is back rolling around in the West Division muck and will have to claw and scrape for any shred of respect. At least it’s a familiar position for this program. Time to get to work.

Follow me on Twitter @ToryBrecht