Expectations will be high for the Iowa football team next season,. The Hawkeyes have a number of key players back from last years team that finished 11-2 and beat Georgia Tech in the Orange Bowl.
Iowa coach Kirk Ferentz says they know they have some “very good” players back and preseason rankings are based on experience level, your success level and the name of your school. But he says those things don’t have much to do with how they play on the field, and they have a lot of work to do to replace players.
The Hawkeyes open spring practice this week and Ferentz hopes his team does not buy into the pre-season hype. He says the polls are usually not real accurate. Ferentz says while the Hawks have 20 wins in the last two seasons, many of them have been close.
He says their margin of error is typically pretty slim and the players have to understand that, and he says the teams that understand that tend to do the best. Ferentz says the program is getting used to dealing with expectations, as last year the expectations were high and they have had “a decent record.”
Ferentz says when you match the close loses with the close wins, you see how thin the margin is for success. Iowa will open next season at home on September fourth against Eastern Illinois.