One way or another, the Big Ten football championship is going through Iowa City this year.
Call it the Hawkeye Invitational.
Let's toss out Purdue (2-0), Northwestern (1-1) and five others with two-or-more conference losses and just focus on the real contenders for the title -- Michigan State (3-0), Iowa (2-0), Ohio State (2-1) and Wisconsin (2-1).
Over the next five weeks, they'll be playing what amounts to an unofficial tournament at Kinnick Stadium.
Round 1: Wisconsin goes to Iowa City Saturday.
Round 2: Michigan State will be there next week.
Round 3: Ohio State comes in Nov. 20.
Those are the only games remaining between the top four contenders.
Michigan State doesn't play Ohio State this season and already beat Wisconsin.
Wisconsin knocked off top-ranked Ohio State last week.
So who's the favorite?
You can say it's Iowa because of the home field. The Hawkeyes are favored by 5 1/2 points over Wisconsin, likely will be favored over Michigan State and could be a slight underdog against Ohio State.
However, home or not, it's going to be difficult to sweep.
Michigan State has a favorable schedule other than the Iowa City stop. The Spartans' other four games are at Northwestern, home against Minnesota and Purdue, before finishing at Penn State.
At the very least, MSU is in good position to share the title, which would be its first since 1990.
Ohio State's chances basically come down to beating Iowa and hoping Michigan State stumbles somewhere. The Buckeyes should cruise in their other four -- vs. Purdue, at Minnesota, vs. Penn State, vs. Michigan.
Wisconsin also could roll after this week. The Badgers finish with Purdue on the road, Indiana at home, Michigan on the road, Northwestern at home.
While the first official Big Ten championship game isn't until next year in Indianapolis, Iowa season-ticket holders must feel like they've hit the jackpot.
Scalpers should just set up camp in Iowa City for the next month.
The host of this mini-tournament, however, is taking it one round at a time.
"I'm not looking at the race," Iowa coach Kirk Ferentz said. "There is no race yet. We're two games into it.
"Right now, I know we have a tough game Saturday. That's as far as I've looked."
That game will feature an intense match-up in the trenches -- Wisconsin's big, physical, veteran offensive line against Iowa's Adrian Clayborn and arguably the nation's top front four.
Wisconsin coach Bret Bielema, a former Iowa player, has to get his team to an emotional peak for the second time in eight days, which won't be easy, big game or not.
Bielema said he looked in the players' eyes a day after upsetting Ohio State and could see "they had invested a lot in that game."
They'll have to make the same type of investment, if not even more, being on the road in a hostile environment if they want to win the first round of the Hawkeye Invitational.
Bowl bonanza
Maybe this is why they still call it the Big TEN: Thanks in part to some cupcake scheduling in non-league games, the conference could have as many as 10 bowl-eligible teams.
The NCAA record for most bids by a conference in a season is 10, by the ACC in 2008 and the SEC last season.
The Big Ten record is eight bids, in 2003 and 2007.
The only one realistically out of it now is Minnesota (1-6).
Michigan State (7-0), Ohio State (6-1) and Wisconsin (6-1) already have qualified.
Michigan (5-2), Northwestern (5-1) and Iowa (5-1) need only one victory. Michigan has five games to play while Northwestern and Iowa have six.
Purdue (4-2) and Indiana (4-2) must win two of their final six, but their schedules get tougher.
Illinois (3-3) and Penn State (3-3) have to split their last six games to be eligible.
A team with six victories in the 12-game regular season qualifies and should get a bid this year, considering there's now 70 slots for the 35 bowl games.
If you break down each one individually, you can make a case for all 10 of these teams becoming eligible in the Big Ten.
Of course, when one wins another loses, so one or two could fall short in the end.
The Big Ten, which has eight guaranteed bowl bids, is on track to get two BCS slots, instead of just one, for the sixth straight year.
If so, that would open up bids for nine conference teams. Those bowls include the Rose, another BCS game, Capital One (Orlando), Outback (Tampa), Gator (Jacksonville), Insight (Tempe), Texas (Houston), Dallas Football Classic and Little Caesars Pizza (Detroit).
A 10th eligible team would have to hope there's an opening created by another conference not filling all of its automatic spots.
Oct. 20, 2010
