Iowa Football: Hawkeyes Feel Loss of Adam Robinson As They Squeak By Indiana

Before the Indiana game, the Hawkeyes had been averaging 405.4 yards of offense per game. Against the Hoosiers, they tallied 445.

They had been averaging 159.5 rushing yards per game. Against IU, they came up with 155; just a hair under their average.

Their primary ball carrier in the Indiana game was true freshman Marcus Coker, who rumbled for 129 yards on 22 carries, or 5.9 yards per carry.

Their primary ball carrier this season has been Adam Robinson, who has 806 yards on 172 carries, which averages out to 4.69 YPC.

As we know, Robinson sat out against the Hoosiers. On paper, the statistics seem to indicate that Iowa more or less, picked up his slack, but Iowa's final point total tells a different story.

The Hawks scored 18 points against Indiana; a team that had been giving up 28.75 points per game before last Saturday. Iowa had been averaging 34.13 points per game in its previous eight contests.

As the statistics indicate, Iowa moved the ball between the 20's. However, once they reached the Hoosiers red zone, the offense seemed to stall.

In four red zone attempts, the Hawks managed only 9 points. That is 9 out of a possible 28 or 32 percent.

This is particularly shocking when you consider that before the IU game, Iowa was second in the conference in red zone opportunities converted into touchdowns. They had put just over 75 percent of their red zone opportunities into the end zone. Against Indiana, they were at 0 percent.

So, what was the problem? After all, even though Indiana's defense did play a fairly solid game, Iowa has faced much better defenses this year.

I think there were three issues. Firstly, quarterback Ricky Stanzi had arguably his worst game of the season (his worst game, which still saw him with a quarterback rating of 144.4).

Secondly, the red zone play calling was somewhat questionable. Despite running with relative ease against Indiana, in the red zone, Iowa only ran on seven of their 15 plays (not including kicks).

I don't think this was necessarily due to anything Marcus Coker did, as much as some degree of a lack of confidence in the true freshman. He is, after all, a true freshman.

Which leads me to the third issue: Iowa was missing Adam Robinson; he of 10 rushing touchdowns on the year, as well as one receiving touchdown. As I inferred, that third issue might have had a direct bearing on the second issue.

The fact is, despite Ricky Stanzi's conference-best efficiency rating of 175.13, despite receiver Darrell Johnson-Koulianos' second-in-the-conference eight touchdown receptions, despite the very admirable job that Marcus Coker did in his first college start, A-Rob is the MVP of this offense.

At the very least, though Ricky Stanzi is the leader of the O, Robinson is the spark plug off of which the team seems to feed. I think that was made readily apparent last Saturday.

Thankfully, according to Ferentz, A-Rob should be back, "at practice Tuesday. He's doing fine. The silver lining to this is he's going to be well-rested because he won't have been hit for a week.''

Let's hope so, because I don't think 18 points will do the trick against the Hawkeyes' next two opponents: Northwestern and Ohio State.