No reason for Hawkeyes to dismiss Purdue

PITTSBURGH - It's been said a million times that baseball is a game of inches.

Big deal. So is golf, tennis, hockey, archery, bull-roping and sky diving. And football.

Iowa's 24-20 win over Pittsburgh Saturday could have had a much-different result had Pitt quarterback Chad Voytik taken just a pinch off one pass and added just a little more height to another on the Panthers' last scoring drive.

Trying to answer Iowa's 94-yard touchdown drive on its first possession of the second half, Pitt had a 3rd-and-8 at the Hawkeyes' 34. Voytik spotted a wide-open Tyler Boyd in the end zone and hit him, but Boyd couldn't make the catch before stepping out of the end zone.

A dubious personal foul penalty on Iowa cornerback Desmond King gave the Panthers a first-down. It was 3rd-and-14 at the 23 when Voytik passed to Ronald Jones for 12 yards. Had the pass been a little higher, Jones probably could have gotten a first-down.

A touchdown would have given Pitt a 24-14 lead, but it settled for settled for a field goal and a 20-14 lead.

Holding Pitt to three points kept momentum on Iowa's side, and it grew from there.

It was a game of inches in a season of inches. Iowa could have been 0-4, 1-3, 2-2 or 4-0. It's 3-1. You are what your record says you are, Bill Parcells once said in a lucid moment. Is that true for Iowa? Does it matter?

For the first time since 1948, each of the Hawkeyes' first four games were settled by one score. For the first time since I can recall, the first four games were all interesting.

If that's true about Game 5, it may not speak well of Iowa. The Big Ten season starts Saturday for the Hawkeyes, at Purdue. That's where interest in college football goes to die.

Iowa was 5-4 and coming off a 28-9 home drubbing from Wisconsin when it went to Purdue last November. The Hawkeyes racked up 509 yards and rock-and-rolled all over Ross-Ade Stadium, winning 38-14 before a crowd of 41,038. The atmosphere was as dreary for a Big Ten game as you'll find, and I'm not referring to the weather.

Purdue dropped to 1-9 on its way to 1-11 with that defeat. This year's Boilermakers have already exceeded that record. They're 2-2 after beating Southern Illinois 35-13 Saturday in West Lafayette.

Don't dismiss that too lightly. SIU came to Ross-Ade ranked 13th in the FCS' coaches' poll. Purdue soared to a 25-0 lead, with sophomore Danny Etling throwing for two touchdowns and running for another in the first 20 minutes.

So things are better, if incrementally. This still isn't a big or deep Purdue team, and second-year Boilers coach Darrell Hazell has much rebuilding left. But if Iowa and its fans have learned anything through the first one-third of the season, it's that no one is to be taken lightly.

Because if Etling puts a timely pass here or there on the numbers and inside the lines instead of missing by a few inches, anything can happen Saturday.

Which doesn't change the fact that, as of now, Purdue still is the softest touch on Iowa's conference schedule. For what little that's worth.

Oh, the Boilermakers' average home crowd this season is 34,958. So 'dreary” still applies.

l Comments: (319) 368-8840; mike.hlas@sourcemedia.net