Iowa's O'Keefe doesn’t let outside 'noise' affect him

IOWA CITY - Ken O'Keefe walked the line bewteen man at the end and frustrated coach ready to dig in and fix.

Of course, it's the “at the end” and “ready to dig” time of the year.

Iowa (7-5) leaves today for its Dec. 28 Insight Bowl date with Missouri (10-2) with a simple quest - win game No. 8. Winning seemed so simple after Iowa drilled Michigan State, 37-6, on Oct. 30, but Iowa is just 1-3 since and now plays for some sort of validation or sign in life in the desert.

Since Oct. 30, Iowa's offense has averaged just 19 points a game. That only worked at Indiana, where a dropped pass let the Hawkeyes escape. During their three-game losing streak, the Hawkeyes missed touchdown opportunities in the red zone, looked discombobulated during two-minute drills and converted just 35 percent of third and fourth downs (14 of 40).

And so, the blame-the-offensive-coordinator game is in full swing.

“It's a pretty old game,” Iowa Coach Kirk Ferentz said. “I don't know. I've lost interest in it. I'm sure Ken was a hero after the Michigan State game. I'm sure all of us were. It's been different since then. That's football.”

O'Keefe hears it. He said his mom hears it. His family has typed his name into the Google Internet search engine a time or two.

“I'm going to speak out of both sides of my mouth here,” O'Keefe said. ”Number one, I really think you need to stay on top of that stuff as best you can.

“Number two, I never pay attention to any of it because I'm not a public relations guy, I'm a football coach. I don't need to be worried about my public relations. We need to be worried about making the next first down, finding a way for the team to get better offensively. Getting in that end zone, being better in the red zone, whatever it may be that particular week, go back at that, and not worry about everybody's opinion, including mom's.”

Right out of the chute this off-season, O'Keefe's name came up with the Indiana opening. Earlier this month, Oklahoma offensive coordinator Kevin Wilson took the job.

There was never a “no,” but the general point of his answer was that he's happy where he is.

“I think naturally that stuff will take care of itself if it happens or it doesn't happen,” said O'Keefe, 57. “I think the guys that stay focused on trying to do the best job at the job they're at right now are the ones that end up being successful at what they're doing. That's really all we've tried to do, all I've ever tried to do here.”

O'Keefe acknowledged that he's heard the “noise,” or at least his mother and family have. It's an old game, blame the coordinator, but it's not going anywhere.

O'Keefe seems to be OK with it. Seems to be.

“I'm not worried about the love factor, but I know it's tough on the quarterback because he's doing everything he can,” O'Keefe said. “Those are tough situations to be in. We're counting on him to make all the correct decisions out there all the time.

“I don't care if you're a coach or the quarterback, you're always wishing you had a few things back a lot of times. Even when you're winning games, you look at things, We could have done this or that different, wish we did this or that.

“But you're not saying it the same way as when you lose a ballgame. It certainly feels a lot differently in those situations because it's just kind of how the whole thing is.”