With the 2009 season complete, BHGP looks back at the ten most sublimely absurd moments of the past decade for this sublimely absurd team, counting them down over the next two weeks the indefinite future.
The list so far:
10. Parking Gate-Gate
9. A Fair to Remember
8. "Two Words: Iowa Hawkeye Pride"
7. Shawn Prater Gets Roofied
6. Beutjer Becomes Someone Else's Future
5. Calloway and the Moped
4. The Rise and Fall of CBI
On October 28, 2006, Iowa welcomed Northern Illinois to Legendary Historic Kinnick Stadium for its annual oddly-timed October non-conference game. The respite could not have come a moment too soon for the Hawkeyes; they had dropped three of their last four games and exited the top 25, and starting quarterback Drew Tate was nursing an injury. Of course, being an 11:00 kickoff involving a non-top 25 team and a non-BCS cupcake, it was relegated to ESPNU.
Iowa jumped out to a 7-0 lead early, and a Northern Illinois drive stalled when a pass hit wideout Marcus Perez in the shoulder and dropped harmlessly to the turf. Enter ESPNU color commentator Brian Kinchen:
That silence you hear at the end is the sound of resumes updating.
I stayed home from this game, and was cooking breakfast when this happened. I stared at the screen in shock as my hash browns damn near set my apartment on fire. So congrats, Brian Kinchen: You almost burned down an apartment complex. Flamer.
Despite issuing the requisite apology, Kinchen was suspended indefinitely. In 2007, he told the Baltimore Sun the "kinda gay" incident was, "a signal that [broadcasting] was not something I should be doing on weekends while I've got four kids growing up. So I shut it all down to be a father."
Truer words have never been spoken.