Iowa was robbed tonight. No, Dominique Douglas didn't find more credit cards and Jason Berryman is still trying to spend his previously taken singles. I am talking about the end of the Penn State - Iowa game held tonight in Bryce Jordan.
It was a back and forth battle for the first half, until Iowa went on a run in the 2nd half getting up as much as 12 points. Then some calls started to turn things around, Tate was called for his 4th and 5th fouls in less than a minutes time (both questionable). Once Tate left, Iowa went downhill fast. They couldn't stop Cornley and had no inside presence whatsoever.
Rick Hartzell and his fellow refs did their best to keep things close. As another Hawkeye comrade put it, "It was a tough loss. I guess Hartzell just wanted it more."
Fast forward to the end of the game (forget about the other junk calls throughout the game, Iowa worked their way through them).... PSU's last possession down the court. For whatever reason, the refs call the bucket good and charge Iowa will a foul. It was a marginal foul at best. Bohall nicked the PSU player and was called for the blocking foul. They call that tick-tack foul. VERY tick-tack. Ok, I can live with that call. Fine. If you are going to call that foul in the last 30 seconds of game, ok. Just be consistent. Iowa's next (and final) possession. Freeman drives the lane molested by the Talor Battle, goes up for the shot, and is taken down by Cornley. No foul. Nothing called. Whistles swallowed.
Look, I am a HUGE fan of swallowing the whistle at the end of the games. Unless someone is completely mugged, you have to swallow your whistle. With that in mind, the foul on Bohall should have never been called. Seeing that it was, I have no idea why there wasn't one called on Battle and then again on Cornley.
Just be consistent. That's all I want to see from refs. If you are a bad ref, at least be consistently bad. Refs are installed to be sure no one gains a competitive advantage. They failed in their roles tonight. Rick Hartzell - shame on you. You give the great state of Iowa a bad name. I thought better of you when I attended the University of Northern Iowa and you were the A.D. there. I was wrong then. How the Big Ten lets you continue to ref games is beyond me. I realize it's your only source of income now that you left UNI, but you'd think you would work on your trade in your free time. Guess not. You and your buddy, Steve Skiles, can go ahead and head the bookie to claim your prize.
I put together a video of the final moments of the game:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCY-6I0Tjyk
I am not sure you can look at it any other way.
Some good things came out of the game (kind of)... Kelly played well and Tate was rolling until he got into foul trouble.
Here are some highlight video I made and uploaded to YouTube...
Cyrus Tate Highlights at Penn State:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7DlYC33Bhz0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WtUoPOwdCOY
Iowa has Illinois on Saturday. Let's rock Carver. I'll be there to voice my support.
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