Iowa bowl picture clearing up

The games have all been played but it will likely be at least two more weeks before Big Ten teams, including the Hawkeyes, know for sure just where they'll be spending the final days of 2008 and perhaps

the first couple of 2009.

Waiting to find out your team's future isn't much fun, but at least one person isn't too worried about things at the moment.

Yeah, but it will be an easy wait though, Iowa coach Kirk Ferentz said after his team pounded Minnesota 55-0 last Saturday night to finish the year 8-4 and 5-3 in the Big Ten.

The long wait was last year knowing pretty much that nothing was going to happen. This one's going to be no problems there, no complaints.

Representatives from five of the seven bowls affiliated with the Big Ten were in the press box at the Metrodome to watch Iowa finish up the season on a high note. At halftime and with Iowa ahead comfortably, reps from the Capital One and Outback Bowls gathered with the Iowa media to say what they could at the moment, which wasn't much.

The Florida Citrus Sports rep, who scouts teams for both the Cap One and Champs Sports Bowls, stressed the committee would definitely be looking at how teams finished the season when they take the first non-BCS Big Ten team available.

But that's the snag. While Penn State locked up a berth in the Rose Bowl by claiming the Big Ten crown, there is still a remote possibility that Ohio State could receive an at-large bid to the BCS. If that happens, everyone below the Buckeyes would be pulled up by the boot straps to a higher bowl.

In the event the Buckeyes don't get invited to the BCS dance, they will most certainly be tabbed for the Capital One Bowl, where they will play one of the top teams from the Southeastern Conference.

That leaves a three-way battle between Michigan State, Iowa, and Northwestern for the only remaining New Year's Day bowl game on the docket, the Outback Bowl. The Hawkeyes have been to the Tampa-based game twice, beating Florida in 2004 and falling to the Gators in 2006.

Michigan State would appear to have the upper hand, but that may not be the case if you look at how the teams finished the season. The Spartans laid a giant egg against the Nittany Lions in Happy Valley while the Hawkeyes thrashed a seemingly hapless Minnesota team on the road.

One team is ending the year full steam ahead, the other limping toward the postseason.

What Michigan State has going in its favor at the moment is a one-win advantage over the Hawks as well as a head-to-head win during the season. Bowls do look at such things - and the Big Ten will most certainly put some pressure on the Capital One to take a 9-win team - but they aren't bound to follow the way the standings finished up.

That bodes well for Iowa, as does their past history.

Hawkeye fans have a reputation for traveling well, and given the fact Iowa was left out of the bowl picture entirely last season, there should be several thousand black-and-gold clad fans clamoring to spend part of December and January some place warm.

And in tough economic times, bowls will most certainly consider the all-mighty dollar first and foremost when it comes time to select a team.

If for some reason the Hawkeyes aren't snatched up by the two Florida-based January 1 games, they should fall no farther than the Alamo Bowl. Iowa has played in San Antonio four times since the bowl's inception in the early 90's, including a loss to Texas there in 2006.

The Alamo Bowl would likely be facing a choice of selecting Iowa or Northwestern, assuming Ohio State and Michigan State fill the Cap One and Outback Bowls, respectively, which is the most likely scenario.

Both teams finished the year with 5-3 records in Big Ten play but the Wildcats beat the Hawkeyes on the field this season. However, Northwestern has a hit-and-miss record when it comes to bringing fans to

bowl games, especially to second-tier games such as the Alamo and Champs Sports Bowls.

An Alamo Bowl representative in Minneapolis over the weekend spent the final minutes of Iowa's 55-0 dismantling of the Gophers taking pictures of the primarily black-and-gold seats inside the Metrodome. As if the San Antonio-based bowl needed further evidence the Hawks traveled well, there will be some digital pictures to prove it.

Iowa likely wins the battle for the Alamo if it comes to it, leaving a 9-win Northwestern team stuck in the Orlando-based Champs Sports Bowl. The Gophers, who had dreams of the Rose Bowl earlier in the year when they were 7-1, will likely head to the Insight Bowl while the disappointing Wisconsin Badgers will visit the Motor City Bowl for a likely matchup with Top 25 Ball State.

Handicapping the race at this point, it would appear there is a 60 percent chance of Iowa playing in the Outback Bowl, a 35 percent chance of going to San Antonio, and a tantalizing 5 percent longshot at heading to Orlando for the Capital One Bowl. Unless the Big Ten works behind the scenes to make sure both 9-win teams are selected ahead of Iowa, there is no way the Hawks, in theory, should fall past the Alamo Bowl.

Unless the BCS releases Ohio State from consideration, expect to wait at least another week and a half to two weeks before various conference title games clear up the always cloudy BCS picture. At least it's a better wait than the one Ferentz and the Hawks went through last year.