The Iowa State Football team is back at home this weekend and looking for a win against their next rival, the Kansas Jayhawks.

“I think that the best tonic for this football team right now is to be back here in Ames,” said Head Football Coach Dan McCarney at his weekly press conference. “To get with our fans, to get back in our home atmosphere, and try to get back on the winning track.”

But turning around a football program is a task that even McCarney cannot do overnight.

“We have a long ways to go. We are very disappointed in the overall record a little bit right now,” McCarney said. “Obviously everyone knows that we could be 4-3 or 5-2 right now. We’re not. We are 2-5, and we’ve got some tough losses, but I am in this thing for the long haul. We have had three games where we have had half time leads, and we just couldn’t quite pull it off. We had three games that we lost by a total of seven points. Right now, collectively, we are not good enough to complete these games and finish them, and be out on top in the end.”

McCarney believes that some of the problems can be attributed to inexperience.

“Thirty-five out of our 44 kids on this football team are underclassmen,” McCarney said. “We’re playing ten freshman, eight of which are on defense. So we are going to have some tough days. We are going to have some heartache, and some gut wrenching losses, of which we have already had some of those, including last week down at Baylor.”

McCarney is optimistic on the upcoming game against Kansas.

“It’s going to be a real tough challenge. Kansas is an excellent team despite what happened in Lincoln last week,” McCarney said. “They still got 14 or 15 starters back of the top ten team, the team that drilled us 34 to seven down in Lawrence last year.”

McCarney was also quick to give praise to the recruiting efforts of Kansas head football coach Glen Mason.

“Glen has recruited well. He is in his ninth season, and has done a magnificent job turning that program around,” McCarney said.

The Jayhawks are 3-4 overall and 1-3 in the Big 12.