Saturday’s scrimmage revealed many new characteristics of the ISU football team, but one of its biggest inconsistencies carried over from last season — the kicking game.

The cardinal team, made up of the first and fourth strings, squeaked out a victory over the white team, 27-24, on a goal-line stop as time expired. The white team, second and third stringers, was given a 21-0 lead to start the game.

Coach Dan McCarney expressed disappointment in the team’s inability to convert on field goal opportunities. The Cyclones had four kickers attempt to split the uprights — Bret Culbertson, Corey Paetznick, Brian Jansen and Tony Yelk — and Yelk was the only one to convert.

“Who’s your No. 1 kicker? I don’t know; roll the dice, pick a number,” McCarney said. “Who’s it going to be? I don’t know — none of those guys looked like the starting kicker today.”

The cardinal team drove the field three times in the first quarter, entering the red zone twice, and came away with nothing to show for it. Culbertson missed a 40-yard field goal wide right, Paetznick missed a 29-yarder wide left and Jansen missed a 21-yard shot when his kick ricocheted off the left upright. Culbertson missed his second attempt of the day, another 40-yarder, early in the second quarter. Jansen also missed a point after touchdown attempt.

Yelk relieved the crowd after he punched a 29-yard kick through for the white team, making the score 24-0. He competed for the first time in Jack Trice Stadium since 2003 and said he was happy with the results. In addition to making the game’s only field goal, he punted three times, averaging 49 yards per kick.

“It’s good to be back. I thought I did pretty well today,” Yelk said. “Punting may have been a little inconsistent, but I’ll take it for the first time back out there.”

Culbertson said he was disappointed with his performance Saturday but is eager to bounce back from a poor performance.

“Everybody has their bad days. It’s just too bad it had to be out in front of everybody,” he said. “I’m not going to let one bad day get me down.”

With the exception of Yelk, McCarney said he does not know which kickers he will invite back to fall camp, based on Saturday’s game.

“Tony will be [at camp] — who are we kidding?” McCarney said. “All of those other guys, I don’t know. We’ll evaluate and make decisions.”

The shaky field goal unit only received its chances because of an offense that consistently marched down the field at will, only to stall in the red zone.

Quarterback Bret Meyer had a productive day behind center, connecting on 22 of 34 passes for 318 yards and one touchdown. Although the highlight of the day was Meyer’s 70-yard touchdown strike to receiver Jon Davis, most eyes were on quarterback-turned-receiver Austin Flynn, who made his first catch in Jack Trice in the second quarter. Flynn caught five passes for 70 yards.

“I think [the offense] is gelling pretty good,” Flynn said. “The problem is when we get in the red zone. We keep trying to improve, especially from last year. It was almost the same thing today.”

Meyer agreed, saying he was unhappy with the way the cardinal team was unable to finish drives.

“It was pretty bad how we weren’t finishing in the red zone and leaving it up to our kickers,” he said. “Defense is solid, obviously, so we have to score.”

Meyer also said the kicking game did not frustrate the offense, despite the misses.

“We know that Culbertson can kick better than he did, so I’m not too worried about it,” he said.

Despite the lack of production in the red zone and with the kicking unit, McCarney said the team has had a productive offseason thus far.

“All in all, it was a good spring,” he said. “I think we made some strides.”

Game notes

• Entering the game as the No. 2 quarterback, Kyle Van Winkle suffered a broken collarbone in the third quarter. Coach Dan McCarney said the team expects Van Winkle to be back throwing the ball sometime in July.

• No. 3 quarterback Terrance Highsmith made a good case for the primary backup job, connecting on 7 of 13 passes with one interception. Highsmith showed a soft touch with the deep ball, but his legs were the most impressive, rushing the ball 10 times for 54 yards.

• Junior Ryan Baum had a solid performance in his first action at wide receiver. Playing on the white team, the special-teams-player-turned-receiver made four catches for 100 yards, including a 54-yard reception from Highsmith.

• Defensively, Caleb Berg of the white team led all tacklers with 11 tackles, followed by David Rahe with seven. On the cardinal squad, Matt Robertson had six total tackles, followed by Nick Leaders with five, including three tackles for loss and one sack.

— Pat Brown

Click here to see a photo gallery from the game