All rugby punts, all the time for Ferentz

IOWA CITY - Up until Saturday night, Kirk Ferentz's history with the rugby punt could be distilled down to two thoughts.

In their 30-27 victory over Michigan at Kinnick Stadium in 2003, the Hawkeyes blocked a rugby-style punt that turned out to be a key play.

'I'm not sure what kind of punts those were,” Ferentz said in the postgame. 'They looked like rugby punts and we don't have anyone from Australia on our football team, so it took a while to decipher it.”

Last September on his radio show, after Ball State had a rugby-style punter against the Hawkeyes, Ferentz said he wasn't 'a fan of that style.” His point was the punter runs outside of the tackle box and downhill.

'When a punter does that, he's fair game,” Ferentz said. His overall point was it's hard to contain a punter who is in full stride knowing you can't hit the punter or it's a 15-yard penalty.

We fast forward to Iowa's first drive against Pitt last week. The Hawkeyes went three-and-out and then there was kicker Marshall Koehn lined up as the punter. He took off to the right, looking like a possible fake, and booted a rugby punt that went end-over-end for 64 yards and out of bounds at the Panthers' 4.

'It's a new me,” Ferentz said with a smile.

Let's get to the mechanics of this particular event, a first in Ferentz's 17-plus seasons.

Koehn said the idea was installed by assistant coach Seth Wallace.

'When coach Wallace started facilitating a lot of things from his time at Valdosta (Ga.) State,” Koehn said. 'He's brought a lot of different things to the table as far as the punt game (including the shield formation Iowa has adopted this season).”

Koehn practiced it during camp and actually used rugby punts during his days as a prep at Solon High School.

'It's not too difficult really,” Koehn said. 'You don't have to worry about getting a spiral on it. You're just looking for an end-over-end kick and I got a good roll on that one.”

It wasn't all unicorns and shoulder rubs for Iowa's punt team Saturday night. Iowa did have a punt blocked and returned for a TD.

Maybe the rugby punt becomes more of a thing to throw off pressure? 'We'll mix it in to help alternate the pressures,” said Koehn, who's already run two fake field goals and is ready, willing and able to run a fake punt.

Without the blocked punt, however, the average of the four punts between Koehn and Dillon Kidd would've been 57.75 yards.

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