Ken O’Keefe takes a lot of criticism for being too predictable, too bland, too un-spread-like…When the Hawkeye’s offense struggles, the blame is put on his shoulders and “Fire KOK!” is a popular phrase. For the most part I think he’s doing a good job with the play calling, but I’ll be honest, I’ve had some angry feelings towards the man in the past and have thought the offense was too predictable. But O’Keefe said during the bye week last year, “How would you be able to predict exactly what's going on, even if you had our game plan?" So, that’s the question I’m trying to tackle.

The first, and worst step, was gathering every offense play Iowa ran last year…all 838 of them. I got my data from the Play-by-Play on ESPN and input it into an Excel spreadsheet to start my analysis. I looked at the Down, Yards to Go, Field Position, Time Left in Half/Game, and the Point Spread in relationship to a pass call or a run call and it revealed some interesting trends.

I’ve always thought Iowa was a 1st down – run, 2nd down – run, 3rd down – pass type team. And guess what, it is! On 1st down, the Hawkeyes ran the ball 59% of the time. On 2nd and 3rd down it was 68% and 36% respectively. When it was 2nd and less than 10 yards, Iowa ran the ball 80% of the time.

Another assumption I had was that when Iowa was losing, they would pass more, and when winning would run more. To my surprise, when down, KOK only called for a pass 51% of the time. That’s pretty balanced. On the flip side though, when winning, Iowa ran the ball 60% of the time. The play calling did get more predictable, however, in the fourth quarter. When down, it was 59% passing, and when up, it was 66% run.

And finally, field position…My guess would have been pass more between the 20s, and run when close to either goal line. For the most part this is how it shook out. I split the field into quarters though. Between Iowa’s goal line and the 25, they ran 61% of the time. Between the 25 and 50, it was very balanced with 52% runs. Once getting past midfield, however, the play calling become much more run oriented. Between the opponents 50 and 26, it was 58% runs. And from there to the end zone, 65% of the calls were rushing plays.

Overall, last year was pretty balanced…but with Shonn Greene obviously the numbers tip towards more rushes. The final tally came in at 354 pass plays and 483 run plays. I think there is enough information here to put something together that can predict the play calling with some degree of accuracy (more to come later!) but really, even when it does seem predictable I only have about a 60-65% confidence that I could pick pass or run correctly. And to me, that’s not really predictable.

Some interesting quick facts:

  • When Iowa was up by 7, they ran 26 pass plays and 26 run plays.
  • The most balanced game of the year was against Illinois. 51% pass – 49% run.
  • The least balanced game was the bowl game against South Carolina. 30% pass – 70% run.
  • Iowa likes to get out and establish the run, with more run plays in the first quarter than any other quarter.
  • There was not a single pass play run the 4th quarter against Purdue.
  • Against Penn State, Iowa passed the ball 15 times in the 4th quarter alone…they only ran 15 plays the entire first half.