Top 25

[fourthandshort]

The NCAA will not take 6 from the MVC...at this point ISU is out...7-4 will not be good enough this season.

If there are still 5 in top 10, they will be hardpressed not to take the 6th team at 7-4, who will have gone 2-3 againt top 10 teams and and finished 5-3 playing in the toughest conference, top to bottom, in country.

Plus I think it is mathematically impossible to go 5-3 in MVFC and finish 6th place ... if not impossible, I will bet my annual salary, it has never happened before. So a 7-4 record will likley mean we finished somewhere between 3rd (tied ?) and 5th place

Reminder, for every game played .. someone wins and someone loses .. everyone else has to play same basic schedule as us. The team to watch is WIU since they beat NAU early, but we have WIU at home .. so that is must win game (along with SIU) for us, if were both sitting 7-4.. Then just need to pick off one of the other top 4 teams.

Spack and staff knows how to right a ship .. he's done it before:

- 2011 after a bad EIU loss went 7-4 to rank top 10-12 but got screwed out of playoff bid
- 2012 after bad losses at home to easy teams .. MoST and SIU .. wnet 8-3 and made it to final 8
- 2013 after horrendous first half of season - finished very respectably during 5-6 season .. night and day, which paved way to 2014 natty run
- 2014 after several very weak offensive showings up thru game 8 .. granted we won despite our offensive issues, except for UNI game - Roberson has 3 1/2 games like Kolbe's worst game this last week. And he was gtting ripped by many fans.
- 2015 was wierd year with Roberson breaking his hand and we lost a lot of quality starters .. we struggled but were able to win ad got a 2 seed .. that was onne year I thought we were a little over-rated.
- 2016 after starting 2-4 land osing 3 games we should have won . finished 6-5, made playoffs, lost to #12 on road by a TD because of 2 Q4 special teams mstakes.

Just like now ... Many of us were all doom & gloom after each of these seasons low points. Well guess what .. most teams in top 20 go thru low points and recover.

And keep an eye on NAU .. Massey has them #11, Sagarin has them #14, Massey Composite has them #20. Subjective polls will slowly catch up to objective systems if they keep winning.

It's fine to crtiicise, but we also have to keep some objective perspective and not panic .. Spacks program deserves a little mroe credit for working thru issues in season. We lost 4.5 OL and have been dealing with 2 injured replacements .. tough siutation to overcome offensively.

 

[fourthandshort]

The NCAA will not take 6 from the MVC...at this point ISU is out...7-4 will not be good enough this season.

per my post on realistic expectations .. 7-4 means 5-3 in conference ... no way we are in 6th place at 5-3 .. most likely tied for 3rd or 4th, outside chance of 5th ... no way 6th .. if not mathematically impossible, willing to bet a lot it has never happened and will never happen ,, right ??

Go 7-4 against this schedule and we are a lock ... do basic math. 2 wins over top 10 teams, 3 losses to top 10 teams. No one else 7-4 can come close to that.

p.s. though Colonial is looking much deeper this year, just not as strong at top as last year. Big Sky and Southern are both weaker .. both at top and in depth.

 

[cpacmel]

The NCAA will not take 6 from the MVC...at this point ISU is out...7-4 will not be good enough this season.

Whatever doubt I had that 7-4 wouldn’t be good enough is now gone.

 

[dpdoughbird06]

It's fine to crtiicise, but we also have to keep some objective perspective and not panic .. Spacks program deserves a little mroe credit for working thru issues in season. We lost 4.5 OL and have been dealing with 2 injured replacements .. tough siutation to overcome offensively.

And our stud lineman returning from injury (Himmelman) was in his first game action in probably a month. In a dome. At altitude. I'd imagine OL is the hardest position to rotate in backups since everyone has to be on the same page, but if ever there was an environment to experiment, this was probably it. But we're still developing that continuity, so this really was a problem without a solution.

Thankfully, Carbondale is 7,000 feet closer to sea level. Beat the Dawgs and start climb back up the polls! Birds are still undefeated in the Valley.

 

[ChiRedbirdfan]

The one game poor performance is not the concern. Those games happen and can be corrected if the team is legit. It is the overall performance of the ISU offense this entire season. It could be argued that ISU has not played against a top defensive team and they have even struggled to score against mediocre teams. I hope the coaching staff will be making some offensive adjustments, including looking hard at the QB position, otherwise the next 6 weeks could be brutal.

 

[ChiRedbirdfan]

The one game poor performance is not the concern. Those games happen and can be corrected if the team is legit. It is the overall performance of the ISU offense this entire season. It could be argued that ISU has not played against a top defensive team and they have even struggled to score against mediocre teams. I hope the coaching staff will be making some offensive adjustments, including looking hard at the QB position, otherwise the next 6 weeks could be brutal.

 

[isuquinndog]

The NCAA will not take 6 from the MVC...at this point ISU is out...7-4 will not be good enough this season.

Whatever doubt I had that 7-4 wouldn’t be good enough is now gone.

:text-+1:

 

[Redbird28]

The sexiest/grass is greenest on the other side of the fence player on every college football team is the backup QB.

Typically, if that trigger ever gets pulled it's proven that the backup QB is the backup QB for a reason and the grass isn't necessarily greener.

Trust in the coaching staff, sink or swim. Spack and co. have turned us into a perennial playoff team. They know what they are doing.

As dpdoughbird06 said before, Birds are still undefeated in the Valley.

 

[fourthandshort]

The sexiest/grass is greenest on the other side of the fence player on every college football team is the backup QB.

Typically, if that trigger ever gets pulled it's proven that the backup QB is the backup QB for a reason and the grass isn't necessarily greener.

Trust in the coaching staff, sink or swim. Spack and co. have turned us into a perennial playoff team. They know what they are doing.

As dpdoughbird06 said before, Birds are still undefeated in the Valley.

so the savior that is Trubisky, came in to save the Bears .. and while he showed some promise, his QBR for game was worse than any game Glennon had in the first 4 games .. including 1 pick, 1 fumble, and much lower pass completion % than Glennon. In the end we lost, and needed a trick punt team play and 2 pt XP conversion to make it interesting.

Even more Interesting in that the Bear's main problem is OL and WR ... sound familiar. Kolbe had 1 bad game. The 2 prior he averaged 330 yards passing and like 170% QBR. And did this during games our run game and OL struggled.

Though I have always like the idea of putting in a Broadnax play package, just to mix things up each and give opponents something else to game plan for.

 

[Redbird28]

The sexiest/grass is greenest on the other side of the fence player on every college football team is the backup QB.

Typically, if that trigger ever gets pulled it's proven that the backup QB is the backup QB for a reason and the grass isn't necessarily greener.

Trust in the coaching staff, sink or swim. Spack and co. have turned us into a perennial playoff team. They know what they are doing.

As dpdoughbird06 said before, Birds are still undefeated in the Valley.

so the savior that is Trubisky, came in to save the Bears .. and while he showed some promise, his QBR for game was worse than any game Glennon had in the first 4 games .. including 1 pick, 1 fumble, and much lower pass completion % than Glennon. In the end we lost, and needed a trick punt team play and 2 pt XP conversion to make it interesting.

Even more Interesting in that the Bear's main problem is OL and WR ... sound familiar. Kolbe had 1 bad game. The 2 prior he averaged 330 yards passing and like 170% QBR. And did this during games our run game and OL struggled.

Though I have always like the idea of putting in a Broadnax play package, just to mix things up each and give opponents something else to game plan for.

No issue with a play package, but I don't want it scripted in at a specific point in the game come rain or shine.

Say Kolbe is lighting the world on fire in the first half, but the coaches had told Broadnax he is getting the 2nd series in the 2nd quarter during pre-game prep, I would hope they would stall the timing of that series to capitalize on the positive momentum Kolbe had generated instead of sticking to the pre-determined script.

To me, the best time to use an alternate package is when the coaches see something the defense is doing that they can capitalize on and also help Kolbe to see better if he were standing on the sideline. Use that time not only to throw a curve ball at the defense but also as a teaching mechanism for when Kolbe goes back in. I personally would never want to see it in the middle of a positive stretch of production that could potentially derail the momentum for the rest of the game.

Curve ball, yes. Potential momentum breaker, never.

 

[TreRoberson4Heisman]

ISU at 24 with No. 4 South Dakota coming to town.

https://twitter.com/NCAA_FCS/status/919956232974274561

 

[TreRoberson4Heisman]

ISU at 24 with No. 4 South Dakota coming to town.

https://twitter.com/NCAA_FCS/status/919956232974274561

 

[Source]

24 in both polls is very surprising to me.

 

[ChiRedbirdfan]

24 in both polls is very surprising to me.

Shows how little the voters truly know, be it the good or bad, about most FCS teams.

 

[cpacmel]

Computers must know little too, Massey has us @29.

 

[ChiRedbirdfan]

Computers must know little too, Massey has us @29.

but the computers are proving my point.

 

[cpacmel]

Computers must know little too, Massey has us @29.

but the computers are proving my point.

Not really. Most people would say a 5 spot difference is negligible.

If #29 beats #24 it’s not a huge upset. Plenty of time #29 is favored to beat #24....

 

[fourthandshort]

Objective versus subjective .... and subjective is usually behind the objective curve .. Not always but usually.

 

[Virginia Redbird]

I have to admit I was very surprised the Birds were still in the top 25 after last Saturday. With SD at #4 if the Birds can pull off the Homecoming upset they will bounce back up somewhat in the rankings. That is a big if but maybe coming back to Hancock and being Homecoming they get a win. Last year not too many people gave them a chance with SDSU coming to Hancock. If they are going to get things moving this is the week the need to do it!

 

[ChiRedbirdfan]

Computers must know little too, Massey has us @29.

but the computers are proving my point.

Not really. Most people would say a 5 spot difference is negligible.

If #29 beats #24 it’s not a huge upset. Plenty of time #29 is favored to beat #24....

Yea really, IMO. ISU being rated in the top 25 is generous. They need a signature win big time. Do you believe ISU should currently be rated in the top 25?