Last Saturday’s contest with Iowa resulted in yet another decisive loss for the Indiana Hoosiers.

Shocker.

Once again the defense was unable to stop a nosebleed and failed to force an Iowa punt until the fourth quarter. At first glance, a 21-point defeat at the hands of a middling B1G team appears to hold nothing worth celebrating.

The 45-24 final score makes it easy for one to dismiss the game’s result as ‘business as usual’ for Hoosier football. However, fans searching for a bright spot need look no further than the surprisingly solid play of Tre Roberson.

The first true freshman ever to start at quarterback for Indiana contributed the most effective performance IU fans have seen at any point during this year’s conference slate. Entering the game, Hoosier quarterbacks had been averaging a completion rate of less than 50% — a figure that Kevin Wilson made clear was unacceptable for the Indiana passing attack.

Roberson blew that mark out of the water against the Hawkeyes by completing 16/24 passes (good for 66%) for 197 yards and a touchdown with no interceptions. For good measure, he also led IU in rushing.

When all was said and done, Roberson had totaled nearly 300 total yards, earned B1G Freshman of the Week honors and put forth a strong bid for the starting quarterback job. Nothing against Wright-Baker or Kiel, but Roberson took an offense that had been stagnant through most of the conference season and gave it a much needed spark.

“The more he’s played his confidence has taken off a bit,” Kevin Wilson said Tuesday. “It was harder to see a separation earlier on this season, but we pretty much knew he’d be the starter after how well he practiced Tuesday… we didn’t announce him as the starter, but he was getting most of the 1^st team reps and guys just figured it out. He’s doing well now, and I’m interested to see how (Wright-Baker and Kiel) respond.”

Roberson’s electric starting debut was somewhat reminiscent of Antwaan Randle El (if Randle El could throw) and Kellen Lewis (before his career was waylaid with off-the-field issues). Kevin Johns, the co-offensive coordinator, reinforced this comparison when explaining Roberson’s play against Iowa.

“He was able to make plays with his legs when the plays broke down,” said Kevin Johns. “The one thing we really saw on film was that he had a really good presence, that it factor, that allowed him to go on the road against Iowa and succeed.”

While it’s obvious that a scrambling quarterback adds another threat that the defense needs to account for, offenses all over the country are successful with pocket passers. For Indiana football it seems that a signal caller who can make plays with his legs AND his arm is a prerequisite for offensive success.

Before readers start jumping down my throat and reminding me about Ben Chappell, I’ll give him his due credit. He’s easily the third best Indiana quarterback of the decade, and last year’s individual statistical performance was the second best at the position (behind Lewis’ monstrous 2007 campaign) over the same timeframe.

But even at his most productive, Chappell never matched the heights of either Lewis or Randle El.

A closer look at Indiana’s six most recent starting quarterbacks reveal two duel threats – the aforementioned Randle El and Lewis – and four more conventional passers – Gibran Hamdan, Matt Lovecchio, Blake Powers and Chappell. Since Randle El took the reigns in 1998 (not counting 2008, which saw a declining Lewis and an inexperienced Chappell share the starting job) the Hoosiers have seen six seasons with a pocket passer and six with a scrambler.

Over that 12-year period, the teams with duel-threat passers have averaged slightly better than four points more per game during the B1G season The numbers break down as follows:

None of the above numbers are advanced metrics, as the measurement was simply the average points scored per game during each conference season. They don’t reflect offensive schemes or complementary pieces in the offense, but as someone who’s watched Indiana football since the Lovecchio era (a dark, dark time), the numbers back up what always appeared to be true: IU offenses with pocket passers have always seemed to falter when the conference season rolls around.

Hypothesizing why is relatively easy, as the Hoosiers have never been able to consistently land top talent to fill out the offensive line. Watching Ben Chappell last season was a perfect example of this phenomenon, as he had a solid statistical year, but was beat up by the opposing defense every week. Roberson was hit plenty of times last week as well, but most of those times resulted in a positive result instead of no gain or a loss of yardage.

Partially stemming from their issues on the line, having a quarterback who can make plays with his legs is a positive for a team that generally struggles to manufacture a ground attack.

As mentioned above, Roberson led Indiana in rushing against Iowa and helped the Hoosiers to their second straight game of at least 200 yards on the ground. If he indeed remains the Indiana starter, he and sophomore tailback Stephen Houston could end up forming a quarterback-tailback 1-2 punch not seen since the days of Randle El and Levron Williams.

Roberson’s apparent emergence is made even more intriguing though, due to the fact that (until recently) Kevin Wilson had been looking to take a different approach at the quarterback position.

Wilson’s best offenses at Oklahoma featured a conventional quarterback, who stayed in the pocket and read the defense. Jason White, Sam Bradford and Landry Jones serve as Exhibits A, B and C to Wilson’s successes developing quarterbacks. With such a reputable group of receivers on the roster in his first year at Indiana, it’s likely that Wilson was hoping for a continuation of that blueprint here.

In playing Dusty Kiel and Ed Wright-Baker earlier this season, and in targeting Dusty’s younger brother (and top-rated recruit) Gunner, Wilson’s intention was obvious. The style Wright-Baker and Kiel were being asked to play only served to further indicate Wilson’s intentions for the offense, as they both operated within the pocket and ran only when protection broke down. It broke down often, and the offense sputtered as a result.

In my mind, Roberson taking the reigns can be taken as Wilson deviating from his preferred course of action, and not necessarily in a bad way. Wright-Baker was inconsistent, Dusty Kiel was ineffective and Gunner Kiel is unlikely to ever set foot on the Indiana campus. As a result, there was no reason not to give Tre Roberson a chance to stake his claim as a potential quarterback of the future – a development that may inject life into a season that had appeared moribund as recently as a week ago.

Based on what Roberson did last weekend, he’s more comfortable operating outside of the pocket and putting pressure on the defense with his legs as well as his arm. Considering Indiana’s current personnel (read: lack of size and talent on the offensive line), his skill set gives the Hoosiers a better chance to win than the other two quarterbacks on the roster – and maybe even the one conspicuously not on the roster – would have, both this season and into next year.

Getting back to Wilson though, it’s fascinating to watch him bending to his circumstances in this manner. Before the season began, he struck the fan base as a larger than life figure that would lift Indiana football from the doldrums and into relevance. What’s more, he gave the impression he would do it virtually overnight and on his own terms.

One win and seven losses later, that line of thinking was clearly off base. Rebuilding – or some would say building – Hoosier football is a Herculean task that fans and observers alike (myself included) may have taken a little lightly. Wilson hasn’t been able to impose his will to win (Today) onto the scoreboard thus far, and as a man not used to losing, that has to be affecting him to a degree.

Roberson starting isn’t Wilson admitting defeat; it’s him refusing to throw good money after bad. His desired system wasn’t working with his current group of players, so he did what any coach worth his salt would do – give his team a better chance to win.

It’s not written in stone that Wilson will stick with Roberson as his guy in the long term. He hasn’t yet ruled out the possibility of bringing in a quarterback in the 2012 class and he’s made clear that Wright-Baker or Kiel aren’t being ruled out as contenders for the job. However, the fact that Roberson has gotten a legitimate crack at the starting position is a positive harbinger for the Wilson era.

It’s said that the final step in the grieving process is acceptance and right now, accepting that Tre Roberson as Indiana’s best chance to win is a step in the right direction.