Note: This is strictly my opinion, and does not necessarily represent the views of On The Banks.
Once again, Rutgers fans and journalists have been stressing over the Iowa game and using the Hawkeyes as a painful measuring stick game. And once again, it’s a big mistake. This game should not be treated as bigger than any other conference matchup. It was already a big game and a disappointing loss for a litany of other reasons, but that is where we should leave it. A win is a win, a loss is a loss.
We’ve got two big road games coming up and bowl eligibility on the line, and those matter far more than some tired narrative about moving up from Tier 4 to Tier 3 of the Big Ten. That tier talk means nothing to me, and it should not matter to the majority of our fanbase the way it seems to.
Iowa Would Not Have Been A Signature Win
Let’s be clear: Iowa is not a “signature” win in 2025. They entered this game 2-1 with a loss to Iowa State. The only reason people may think that way is that Iowa has been consistent and stable as a program. But stability is not greatness. Iowa has built a culture of mediocrity—priding itself on a baseline of eight wins a year, refusing to fix an entire unit of the game, rarely stepping up in big games, and feeding fans the same product season after season.
How is that much different from where the Scarlet Knights are already at right now? One or two more wins a season are simply not worth everybody losing their mind and labeling us as a lower-tier program or not good enough to compete in the Big Ten. Rutgers will get there soon, and once that comes around, we can take it for what it is worth, but not stop there in terms of our expectations.
Why Rutgers fans would want to emulate that is beyond me. In fact, it only gets much worse once you get to their level, when the main focus becomes whether you can take the next step or not as a program. If you want to endure the same suffering their fans have been going through recently, then be my guest, but I want more for this team. If not, then I would want to at least enjoy the games for what they are worth rather than dwell on narratives like these, which only cause fans even more pain and suffering than they already go through.
Rutgers’ Real Standard
If we want to measure progress, it’s not by beating Iowa. It’s by beating ranked teams or by breaking into the rankings ourselves. Rutgers showed real improvement in this game despite the loss, and that should be the focus. Not whether we stack up against a program that has spent decades clinging to mediocrity.
And I question why Iowa is one of the few teams, if not the only team we seem to do this with. Last season’s win at Virginia Tech, which was the program’s first ever at Lane Stadium, could be argued as a signature win by some, but the home win over Washington, which reached the national championship the season prior, is also not seen by many as a signature win. That to me is very strange. I understand that the Huskies fell off the map, but it’s not like Iowa is some Big Ten superpower either.
On the flip side, if I were to throw out a ranked opponent to measure up against, Rutgers would likely fall way short, but nobody would make the same demands about beating any of those teams. We are fixated on the “sweet spot,” the team that is just out of reach, not anyone on our level that could be beaten, or anyone that is seen as a bridge too far. In the past, that might have been a Michigan State or Wisconsin, but I have never seen an obsession with a singular team as much as Rutgers coaches, media, and fans have with the Iowa Hawkeyes.
Even with similar-caliber teams like Minnesota or a somewhat better team like Washington, Rutgers fans and journalists will hardly discuss what tier they are in because it does not matter to them. It only seems to matter with Iowa, not even necessarily because of their record, but because of their earned respect and standing within the Big Ten Conference, and that to me is asinine and should be called out.
The Nonconference Mirage
Another issue: this strange viewpoint I see about being proud of a 3-0 nonconference record, as well as wins over lower-tier Big Ten programs. Beating MAC teams and squeaking past Ohio (even though they are a very strong MAC team) is not an achievement. That’s the bare minimum. Until Rutgers consistently schedules and defeats power-conference opponents at their level or higher, or at the very least blows out their entire nonconference slate, nobody should be bragging about nonconference wins. We can’t pretend that scraping by against Ohio is something worth celebrating while expecting sellout crowds and buy-in from fans once Big Ten play starts.
Rutgers used to struggle to do this, but since Greg Schiano returned to the Banks, the Scarlet Knights have done it every season, which includes road wins over Boston College, Syracuse, and Virginia Tech. It is good to respect the progress and the wins for bowl eligibility purposes, but at this point in the rebuild, eyes should be set on bigger things.
We cannot suddenly demand wins over Iowa when the team rolls out the mirage of starting 3-0 in the nonconference slate, asks for a packed stadium for bigger games, and then provides a disappointing loss to the first good team we see on the schedule, or some kind of other disappointment in conference play. This has happened year after year now, and I have frankly had enough of it. Rutgers fans deserve better.
Aiming Too Small
This is what frustrates me most: Rutgers fans and media tend to hyper-focus on small growth—on the “10-15% improvement”—but lose sight of the big picture. We dismiss potential wins that could actually matter, like one at Illinois or Washington, because those teams aren’t “consistent” in the old-school Iowa sense. We’ve set our sights on mediocrity instead of real success. We’d rather spend 10 to 15 years building a middle-of-the-pack program like they have done than aiming higher and trying to achieve something greater in a shorter time. Why?
And on top of that, we are not even willing to do what Iowa has done to earn its status before complaining that we have fallen short of them yet again. I have never heard a Rutgers fan demand that we win eight or more games a season like the Hawkeyes have done to earn their reputation. Too many of us only want a Cinderella win over a solid program just so we can get their respect without really earning it.
If we so achieve a win over Iowa as per popular demand, are we going to ask our program to take the next step, or be complacent with accomplishing the feat? Because if your answer is the second one, that is my exact problem with this whole argument. Iowa has made a living off of doing that, and for the life of me, I do not understand why we would want the same thing for our program.
In any case, that is not what we should be aiming for. If we end up there, then great, but it does not make sense to have mediocre standards on one hand, but on the other, be banging the drum for one win over an “upper-tier” team. If this is a consistent storyline throughout the course of the season, then so be it, but it only seems to be happening with a few select teams that, in my opinion, are not worth aspiring to be like in the first place.
The Bigger Picture
Rutgers has improved, no doubt. But if the standard we set is “beat Iowa once,” then we’re going nowhere worthwhile. Iowa is the definition of stagnation, and if we pedestal them, we’re only dooming ourselves to the same fate. Progress should be measured in wins, rankings, and real achievements—not in mental gymnastics about whether we’re moving up a mythical Big Ten tier, which again is barely worth a footnote to me.
It’s time Rutgers stops worshipping mediocrity. Respect the progress we have made, demand more, and don’t settle for Iowa, of all teams, as the ultimate goal. We cannot be asking why our program has failed to make progress or earn a “signature win” when the team we worship also does not make progress or earn signature wins very often. The lower standards we are setting are the exact reason this is happening in the first place.
The reason the jeers were so loud when Iowa came out of the tunnel this year was likely because, on one hand, we admire them, but at the same time, we are jealous of their program, and again, I do not think we should be. We can respect Coach Ferentz and what Iowa has built over time, but we should also want more in the long run, as far as I am concerned. In the age of the 12-team playoff, NIL, and revenue sharing, Rutgers has what it takes to break out of this high-floor, low-ceiling model and truly make a run at competing in the Big Ten Conference.
If you disagree with me, I would be more than happy to understand why, but I am tired of this narrative that Iowa is somehow an “elite” team, but also one that we should be able to beat just so we can prove a point that we have “finally made it in the Big Ten”. Let us settle on consistent logic, focus on the improvements that our team needs to make, and not aspire to be a consistent, solid, respected, but ultimately mediocre and underachieving program like the Iowa Hawkeyes.
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