It was a bad weekend of Big Ten football for people with the first name Kirk.
Michigan State senior quarterback Kirk Cousins had the ugliest game of his career in a 24-3 loss at Nebraska.
Cousins hit only 11 of 27 passes (40.7 percent), the worst completion rate in his 33 starts at MSU. His 86 yards passing were his fewest ever by 34 yards. His longest completion of 20 yards was his second worst in a single game.
Yet Kirk Cousins had a pleasant afternoon compared with Kirk Ferentz.
First, take note that Iowa's coach, whose contract was extended last season through 2020, is paid $3.8 million a year.
That means Ferentz took in $73,000 last week while preparing his team to lose 22-21 to Minnesota, which this season has often played like the worst major-college football team in the past 25 years.
He also made about $73,000 in the week ahead of a 27-24 loss last year to a Gopher team that struggled so badly its coach was fired at the end of 2010.
Those two losses are among a current run of five straight road setbacks in two seasons.
Recent home games haven't been all that special, either, including the biggest comeback in school history — from 21 points behind late in the third quarter — to hold off 4-4 Pittsburgh.
Yet rarely do I hear a discouraging word about Ferentz, in his 13th year. So being new to this Big Ten business, Hawkeye fans, I need a little help.
I get that Ferentz is an eminently likable guy. I get that he has turned down other jobs to stay loyal to the school that has employed him for 22 years overall.
But he's the fifth-highest paid college coach in the country, and his career winning percentage is .599. His Big Ten record is 55-45. Does anybody hold his feet to the fire seeking more?
Are there questions about why Iowa pays national-championship money — only Nick Saban, Les Miles, Bob Stoops and Mack Brown make more — for a coach who in his first 12 years has two shared league titles and has reached two Bowl Championship Series games?
I realize Iowa that isn't Southern California in terms of population and recruiting. I know about the dark decades before Hayden Fry arrived.
Still, it's jarring to hear Ferentz talk so matter of factly about how hard it is for the Hawkeyes to nab big-time recruits, and that they often shop in the scratch-and-dent section for players who don't fit a size profile or who might change positions.
And Hawkeye fans just nod and seem to accept it. Is that really good enough? I'm just asking.
A few critics have emerged after the Minnesota debacle.
There are complaints that the longtime assistants on Ferentz's staff are too beholden to some moldy strategy, and that the head coach isn't getting the player development through the season recently that the program has prided itself on.
All I know is that Iowa has lost to Iowa State, let a woebegone Minnesota team keep the Floyd the Pig Trophy and could bookend the season with losses to rivals or neighbors by falling to Nebraska the day after Thanksgiving.
That's a game, with the schedule ahead, that might keep Iowa from going to a bowl.
So, Iowa fans, again as the new kid on the Big Ten block, I wonder: Is 7-5, 6-6 or 5-7 enough bang for your buck?
Contact the writer:
402-444-1024, lee.barfknecht@owh.com
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