Yesterday was not a good news day for the Iowa Football program. The two negative stories were both extension of the recent incidents that have shed Iowa in a bad light. The first was another story about the rhabdo cases and the second was about crime and college football that highlighted the number of arrests Iowa has had recently which builds on the recent drug-related charges of DJK and Adam Robinson.

Cyrus Kouandjio comments on the Rhabdo incident

In an interview with Sporting News, Cyrus Kouandjio said that he was high on Iowa before the rhabdo cases which changed his mind. Here's the actual quote:

Q: If you would have had to sign in early fall, who would you have gone with then?

A: At first I really, really, really wanted to go to Iowa. I even told my best friend that I was going to Iowa. But when everything went down with them with the workouts and all, that was different. I had a bad vibe when I went there. Alabama may be far from home, but Iowa—living-style wise—it’s just out there and just not me. I wouldn’t have been able to thrive in that environment. I love their coaches and I love their team, but it was really just out for me.

Iowa is now accepting season ticket renewal orders for the 2011 season. If you had season tickets last year, then you have until April 29th to renew your seats. When you go to renew your tickets you'll notice that you'll be paying a little bit more this year. Iowa increased the price per ticket by $2 bringing the season total up from $360 to $374.

Here's a price per game breakdown from The Gazette:

• Tennessee Tech - $57
• Pittsburgh - $57
• Louisiana-Monroe - $57
• Northwestern - $65
• Indiana - $65
• Michigan - $70
• Michigan State - $65

McNutt out for spring

Marc Morehouse had a short post about some of the off-season surgeries for some Iowa players. The headliner is Marvin McNutt who had surgery on his thumb and shoulder. He'll be out for spring practice. Shane DiBona and Tanner Miller also had shoulder surgery and will likely be out this spring.

McNutt's absence will leave a huge opportunity for some of the less experienced receivers to get valuable practice time this spring. This will be vital to Iowa's offensive success in 2011 as behind McNutt, the next 4 leaders in receptions and receiving yards from last year (DJK, Reisner, Robinson, and Sandeman) are all gone (wide receivers Paul Chaney and Don Nordmann are also gone). This will leave Keenan Davis, who had just 11 catches for 131, as Iowa's leading returning receiver for spring practice. And, he'll be the only receiver with a collegiate catch. Next in line will likely be red-shirt freshman Kevonte Martin-Manley. After that, who knows? Jordan Cotton had some hype out of high school, but has yet to see the playing field. After that it's just walk-ons.

Rhabdo documents released

The Des Moines Register got its hands on hundreds of emails and documents from the Iowa Sport Information department regarding the Rhabdo 13 through the Freedom of Information Act. They have published all the emails, so you can read through them if you want. The vast majority of it is quite bland. About half of the emails are just back-and-forths trying to figure out the correct wording for the multiple press releases, including Kirk Ferentz's official statement, done around the time of the hospitalizations. The other half is mostly shooting done requests for information from various media outlets including ESPN's Pat Forde and some guy from the Wall Street Journal. There's also an email from a parent concerned about the school work his son would miss while in the hospital. They are student-athletes after all.

Iowa had a very senior heavy roster in 2010. There were also a handful of players that left the program (mostly running backs) and 1 junior who left for the NFL (Tyler Sash). As a result, there is a large amount of production that will need to be replaced by younger players in 2011 if the team wants to have a similar or more successful year.

What is interesting to me, is how the team was hit evenly across the board. Pretty much every major offensive and defensive statistic had about 60% of its volume produce by players who are no longer on the team. The notable exception is passing yards in which Ricky Stanzi had 3004 of the 3049 yards in 2010.