First off, I know I have a hugely juvenile sense of humor, but this is hilarious.
Second, I’ve heard people from several schools claim that The Hawkeye Victory Polka (the official name of The Beer Song according to the university) originated at their school, and they’ve been playing it forever, and that Iowa must have gotten it from them. The University of Wyoming, Michigan Tech, and even Wisconsin have claimed it as theirs. It’s not. Iowa started it. I’m not saying that Iowa created the song, it’s traditional and has been around forever. I’m saying, as best I can tell (and I’ve looked a fair amount), Iowa was the first to use it as a tradition at college sporting events. Don’t believe me? Watch this, and wait for about 3:10 in. I would usually say skip ahead, but with this particular instance it’s worth watching.
1985. If you can provide video evidence of an earlier use of it in college football, I’ll yield (actually, I’ll just dig until I find an older one of Iowa).
On the more serious side of Iowa Football history – this post on BHGP has a good appreciation of Forest Evashevski, former Iowa coach and the only Iowa coach (crosses finger) so far (uncrosses finger) to win a Rose Bowl, who is currently battling liver cancer. Worth the quick read. Here’s a bit more about one of his teams:
Further down in the same post is a link to this interesting article about what happens in the locker room during half time, which is basically summed up by Pat Angerer, “If you need a rah-rah speech at halftime, you’re playing the wrong sport.” He’s quickly becoming my favorite source of Iowa Football quotes. I also really like this one from ESPN:
“Our job is to put the fire out,” said linebacker Pat Angerer, who led Iowa with nine tackles, a sack and a pass breakup. “It’s as simple as that. We just said, ‘We’re back out here, we might as well stop them.’”
Might as well, didn’t really have any other plans for tonight anyway. And what effect has this defensive style had on our opponents so far? Something like this.
And speaking of our defense, let us now here from Norm Parker’s toes (that will make ever slightly more sense if you note that Norm is currently down to 7 remaining toes). Also, I think there’s a good chance that if I do have kids, “Parker” might have to be in one of their names somewhere.