By Jordan Hansen
The ball almost didn’t go through.
If you watch a replay of Iowa placekicker Keith Duncan’s game-winning field goal, it barely sneaked in. It’s hard to tell exactly how much space there was between the ball and the upright, but it was close. So, too, was Michigan from blocking the kick.
Iowa head coach Kirk Ferentz loves to say there’s a “fine line” between winning and losing football games. Not that he was wrong in saying it before, but against Michigan, there truly wasn’t a whole lot of space between the Hawkeyes and Wolverines.
The scoreboard, of course, shows this. After all, Iowa did only manage to win by a single point. But even more, the game was just so close. It was not a pretty offensive game by the Hawkeyes by any means.
Just look at Beathard’s passing stats or Iowa’s third-down conversions. These would usually be a death warrant against Michigan, but through a combination of self-inflicted errors, questionable play calls, timely penalties, and good defense, Iowa kept things close.
Call it luck. Call it magic. Call it timely execution. Call it whatever you want. Iowa pulled a massive upset at a time when it maybe needed one the most.
Kirk Ferentz tearing up during an interview with ESPN’s Sam Ponder after the game proved that. There was a whole lot of doubt in the program a week ago after a brutal loss to Penn State.
Maybe some of that is still there. But for one night and one game, Iowa got to be the royalty of the college football world. It got the chance to be the Team That Pulled A Big Upset. A pretty fun place to be.
So, of course, was the field after the referees threw their hands up in the air. The grounds security didn’t even try to stop the flood of people flocking to the middle of the field from over the barriers.
Everyone wanted to be part of the moment. After the initial players and coaches ran to Duncan, waves of students, locals, and media splashed all over the field. Looking at a picture a photographer I know took, the field is completely filled with people.
It was a singularly joyous moment. People were loud, jumping up and down, smacking the players on their shoulder pads and helmets. There was screaming and people on others’ shoulders. A concert in which the rock stars hung out with all the fans in the mosh pit.
The celebration on the field lasted several minutes, but it felt like several hours. Or maybe even several days. There was a mindlessness to the way people sprinted on the field and then just looked around in wonder. One of those moments that takes a long time to register in a persons’ head.
Everything was in slow-motion and surreal. It was hard to move and even harder to find a reason to. It was something to simply bask in. It felt like a scene from a movie.
Or a weird, lucid dream.
But don’t worry. It was not a feverish delusion. It was real, and it was a spectacle.
