Too many nightmares this season and seasons past. I know I wake up in the middle of the night (like many of you) and the first thought that comes to your mind is the depressive feeling of reality when you remember what happened to Iowa State the day/evening before. Last night would have been one of the nights you would do about anything to get back to sleep... and get back to a nightmare.
Yesterday felt like a nightmare during the daytime. We have been conditioned as Iowa State fans to expect the hammer coming down from the heavens and hitting you square on the head at anytime....but this hammer not only hit you in the head....it hit you in the privates at the same time with the claw end. I knew how the script was going to end right after the fumble. Actually I was thinking of scenarios before the fumble on how we could go in utter shipwreck mode to lose a game that Vegas would have given us 100% odds to win with under 2 minutes left of the freaking game. I shut the radio off at the time knowing full well it was not going to go to overtime. This was not premonition ....this is from years of Cardinal and Gold Pavlov dog conditioning. In true Cyclone fashion we compounded the gift by giving the hayden fry clone the only way to win in regulation. Although it almost seemed like demonic bad luck how things transpired....it all comes down to ball security. We called a play that had a higher risk of a fumble.The odds actually went up for sh# to happen when the kitties were in desperation mode to strip the football.....because it was their only option to win. They were not looking for a tackle...they were focused only on a turnover.
We don't need to sacrifice a goat (or an iowa city chicken) on the 50 yard line of Jack Trice to exorcize the demons....we just needed better coaching decisions at crunch time. We had a good team this year.... a 3 win team that should be at 7 wins at the moment. Many of our leads in the 2nd half evaporated when we started to play safe or cautious (how many 3rd and longs given up on defense and offense sputtering trying too hard not to make a mistake).... or the last minute arm chair quarterbacking in the 4 close losses this season may never have happened.
As I wrote this...I learned that Paul R. has been fired. Always a sad day when a coach gets fired, especially when he really was well liked....but that is the coaching profession. He is leaving a great bevy of players for the new coach next season. Hope the new coach can take us to levels that Paul was quite not able to do.
Yesterday felt like a nightmare during the daytime. We have been conditioned as Iowa State fans to expect the hammer coming down from the heavens and hitting you square on the head at anytime....but this hammer not only hit you in the head....it hit you in the privates at the same time with the claw end. I knew how the script was going to end right after the fumble. Actually I was thinking of scenarios before the fumble on how we could go in utter shipwreck mode to lose a game that Vegas would have given us 100% odds to win with under 2 minutes left of the freaking game. I shut the radio off at the time knowing full well it was not going to go to overtime. This was not premonition ....this is from years of Cardinal and Gold Pavlov dog conditioning. In true Cyclone fashion we compounded the gift by giving the hayden fry clone the only way to win in regulation. Although it almost seemed like demonic bad luck how things transpired....it all comes down to ball security. We called a play that had a higher risk of a fumble.The odds actually went up for sh# to happen when the kitties were in desperation mode to strip the football.....because it was their only option to win. They were not looking for a tackle...they were focused only on a turnover.
We don't need to sacrifice a goat (or an iowa city chicken) on the 50 yard line of Jack Trice to exorcize the demons....we just needed better coaching decisions at crunch time. We had a good team this year.... a 3 win team that should be at 7 wins at the moment. Many of our leads in the 2nd half evaporated when we started to play safe or cautious (how many 3rd and longs given up on defense and offense sputtering trying too hard not to make a mistake).... or the last minute arm chair quarterbacking in the 4 close losses this season may never have happened.
As I wrote this...I learned that Paul R. has been fired. Always a sad day when a coach gets fired, especially when he really was well liked....but that is the coaching profession. He is leaving a great bevy of players for the new coach next season. Hope the new coach can take us to levels that Paul was quite not able to do.
