After an afternoon where the Iowa offense looked lethargic and it seemed a Mid-American Conference (MAC) team was about to claim a third straight victory in Iowa City, Jake Rudock rallied the Hawkeyes in the final three minutes for a 17-13 victory over the Ball State Cardinals.

For a program that has a history of pulling out late victories, this has to rank amongst the most improbable of them all with Jake Duzey scoring the winning touchdown with just a minute left on the clock. For freshman Derrick Willies, his first college touchdown was a major factor in this comeback.

“It was a great feeling of relief after what was a hard fought game,” Willies said. “I blacked out for a second[after catching the touchdown] but it was awesome.”

Rudock had a career day with 322 passing yards and 2 touchdowns. He was a calming presence in the huddle and stayed poised enough to lead his team to a win. Rudock attributes that leadership to the way he was raised and taught to play the game.

“I have been playing sports my whole life. It is never going to be perfect and bad things are going to happen,” Rudock said. “It was the way I was brought up with my parents and coaches that kept telling me that its not other and to work hard as long as there is a chance.”

In a surprising move, backup quarterback C.J. Beathard started the second series of the game and led the Hawkeyes in a drive that resulted in a missed field goal after a touchdown was overturned. Head Coach Kirk Ferentz said it was part of the game plan heading into this week.

“We never got to it last week.  It’s something we said we’re going to do,” Ferentz said. “We basically thought coming into thegame, we’d do second and third series with him and just see where it took us.”

The real trouble for Iowa started came early in the second quarter, as Joshua Parker fumbled the handoff on an end around and Blake Dueitt ran it back to give Ball State a 7-0 lead.

It was on that same play that left tackle Brandon Scherff went down with what appeared to be a leg, though he came back later in same quarter and played without restraint the rest of the game.

“I stood up [after the tackle] and my leg locked up and I didn’t know what happened and didn’t want to stress anything so I just went back down,” Scherff said.

Though Ferentz had some anxious moments in the aftermath of the injury. He was relieved that he was did not sustain a serious injury and impressed by the way that Scherff came back into the game and played.

“The good news is his knee was stable when they examined it.  He’s a really tough minded guy.  For him to come back and do what he did is a positive,” Ferentz said.

The offense continued to struggle until late in the 4^th quarter when the team knew desperation time was upon it and the only choice was to go out and score.

“We knew that we needed to go down there and get a score but we couldn’t put all of our stock into scoring, we just had to worry about each play at a time,” Rudock said. “It was not too far out of reach and we always had a chance. We are grateful for what the defense did and holding [Ball State] to field goals when they did.”

Though it was a win, there are still some major concerns for the Hawkeyes going forward. Placekickers Marshall Koehn and Mick Ellis went a combined 1 for 4 on field goal attempts. A position that was a question mark heading into the season looks even murkier going forward.

“I’m glad that I was able to put one of them through to help the team but that was completely unacceptable,” Koehn said. “I am going to watch some film and hope to get better next week.”

Iowa has also had problems getting the running game going over the first two weeks of the season. Part of the problem has been finding the right number of carries for a roster that is uncharacteristically filled with healthy running backs. Ferentz stated that it was just good planning on Ball State’s part.

“They had an excellent game plan.  They did a really good job.  We didn’t establish anything really in that run game, especially in the first half,” Ferentz said. “We’re going to really have to look hard at that, but I thought we adjusted a little bit better in the third quarter.”

Iowa now sits at 2-0 and welcomes Iowa State next weekend for the annual Cy-Hawk rivalry game.

The post Rudock Leads Iowa to Improbable Victory appeared first on KRUI Radio.

With March Madness and the NCAA wrestling championships right around the corner, Iowans will be plenty busy when it comes to watching sports, and since the Hawkeyes are projected to make a good showing in both, this only amps up the entertainment value. However, this is always the case regardless of the year. Hawkeye wrestling is traditionally a powerhouse which automatically garners interest, and combine this with the fact that this state lives and breathes wrestling and there will always be a following. The same can be said for basketball. Next to football, it is the second highest revenue generating sport in college athletics. This year Iowa was projected to do (and has done) much better than they have in the past, and are in line to receive a bid for the NCAA tournament for the first time in eight years. However there is another sport that is off to hot start that has received little to no mention by the students or publications, and that is baseball.

Currently the Hawkeye baseball team is off to their best start in 74 years behind first-year head coach Rick Heller. Though they have yet to play at home (and with this weather, that is probably a good thing), the Hawks are off to a 9-4 start that includes wins over Ball State, Nebraska-Omaha, and Austin Peay. Though the Hawkeyes have not played any Big Ten opponents, and did just lose a series to K-State, the season ahead looks brighter than it did at this point last year in which Iowa was 7-6. Also last year as a team they batted only .268 and amassed only two home runs on the season. Compare this to a team ERA of 4.07 and it is clear to see why Iowa finished under .500. So any improvement is welcomed.

But alas, this is not meant to criticize last year, but to look forward to this year. College baseball has always been one of my favorite sports to watch, and it is a shame that it is not widely talked about except for during the College World Series. But this school especially seems to demonstrate a lack of interest in baseball, which is understandable considering the weather is not nice enough to even play baseball until the end of March, and Iowa does not have a history of being exceptionally good. The Hawkeyes have not won the conference or been to the NCAA tournament since 1990, and have not made it to the College World Series since 1972. But hopefully this season and this new coach are a step in the right the right direction and can once again get this school, and even this state excited about college baseball once again.

The post Time to Bring Back Iowa Baseball appeared first on KRUI Radio.