Dear Old Gold
Fansided

Black and Gold Rundown: Consensus King and Fran McCaffery’s Timeouts

By Dylan Burn

facebooktwitterreddit

Desmond King continues his hot streak and Fran McCaffery met with the media yesterday to discuss Drake and last Thursday.

What a wild ride it has been for Iowa junior cornerback and Detroit, MI native, Desmond King over the past week.  King was selected as a first team All-American by the five outlets required to be named a consensus All-American.  The Associated Press, Walter Camp, Sporting News, Football Writers of America Association, and the American Football Coaches Association all agree that Desmond King was a first teamer.

To go along with those five, King was also named to the first team by USA Today, SI, Pro Football Focus, and ESPN.  He is also one of five finalists for the Walter Camp Player of the Year Award and is the only defensive player of the five.

King’s consensus status makes him the 23rd Hawkeye in history to receive the honor.

More from Dear Old Gold

He was the first Hawkeye to have multiple multi-interception games since the late Tyler Sash did it back in 2009 (Sash was one of my favorites).  King’s eight picks tie Nile Kinnick and Lou King for the school lead.

He’s also the first Hawkeye defensive back to earn All-American status since Merton Hanks did it back in 1990. That’s a long time.

Switching gears over to basketball as Fran McCaffery met with the media today in Iowa City.  McCaffery was asked mostly about the Drake game and the timeout he held in his back pocket at the end of the Iowa State game last Thursday.

"If you’re playing a team that has — you’re giving them an opportunity to change personnel, change defenses, so you then have to in a time-out give them multiple play-call options, which is really complicated. So if you know who’s on the floor and what defense they’re in and you have play action called, why do you have to call time-out? You’re just going to come out and run what you just called. – Fran McCaffery, hawkeyenation.com"

I agree with some of what he has to say, but I’ve noticed one thing all year long and that is that McCaffery is very good at drawing up plays in a timeout.  It seems like every time Iowa has the ball out underneath or on the side and McCaffery is given the chance to draw something up for his guys, they score.

It seems like every time Iowa is put in this late game situation and a timeout isn’t taken, they usually come up short.  It’s been one thing that I hear fans give McCaffery crap for.

I don’t see him changing his ways anytime soon, so Iowa fans are going to have to get used to Fran letting his guys play at the end of games and if you don’t believe me.

"So if it gets fumbled or there’s a charge or something, you feel, geez, we should have taken a time-out, but I’ll always let my guys go. – Fran McCaffery, hawkeyenation.com"

We can gripe all we want, but at the end of the day, Fran won’t be taking a timeout.

Home/Iowa Basketball