It's rather amazing to me that passionate Iowa football fans could be as interested in assistant coaches as they have been at this time. Even in the midst of an Iowa winter, Hawkeye coaching assignments have been at the forefront of sports coverage.

One change that has occurred in college football has been the elevation of coordinators and play-callers to the forefront of television coverage of the college game. And so it is with Iowa and its current personnel changes and future changes.

I have always been of the opinion that the coordinators and football staff were serving at the behest of the head football coach. And therefore, the head coach was the man who is responsible for the total program.

It is his job and his responsibility to get who he wants, and hopefully it forms a coaching team that becomes a winning combination. But it still goes back to the head coach's responsibility.

He is the one on the firing line, while the coordinators and others are just a member of the team. That, however, has changed as coordinators and quarterback coaches, receiver coaches, special teams coaches and coaches who coach coaches have become their own personalities.

They now have a defensive staff at Iowa, with three changes still to come on offense. Maybe we'll have the full staff assignments announced by Coach Ferentz by the time the coaches' cruise ship leaves the dock in Fort Lauderdale later this month.

But one thing is for sure, Coach Ferentz will have the people on board that he feels most comfortable with. And again to emphasize the point, that's what it should be, because the head coach is fully responsible.

NOTE I: On the high school trail, I had a nice visit last Friday with Adrian Arrington at the Washington Hall of Fame. He's looking forward to another season with the New Orleans Saints and Drew Brees.

He mentioned, too, that Super Bowl 47 will be in New Orleans in 2013 and Adrian figures the Saints have a shot at it. It would be the first time the home team would be playing in its own arena.

Adrian has an NFL championship ring from 2010 that is large enough to choke a horse. The ring rests in his bank in New Orleans most of the time, but for the Washington occasion he wanted the fans to have a look-see.

NOTE II: Last Tuesday I had a chance to see the Iowa City West-Cedar Rapids Kennedy boys basketball game. West was extended to the limit by the Cougars in a one-point game, 54-53, so the Trojans are still unbeaten and ranked No. 1.

Iowa City West is also the team of the future, with several underclassmen in prominent roles and a senior who gives them an inside presence in Jacob Gylten. Wartburg Coach Dick Peth was in attendance that night, apparently there to recruit Jacob.

However, I would say that for the Trojans to get to the state championship game, they will have to play better than they did against Kennedy.

(Bob Brooks is sports director at KMRY and has been one of the leading voices of college and prep sports in Eastern Iowa for more than 65 years. He is a 10-time winner of the Iowa Sportscaster of the Year Award, and was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in South Bend, Indiana in 2004. His sports reports can be heard weekday afternoons at 4:30 and 5:30, and Saturdays at 6:40 for the Hawkeye football wrap-up.)