Here we go again. Yesterday, the Big Ten conference announced that Iowa was guaranteed a BCS berth and filled all its other contractual bowl slots, starting with the #2 bowl (Penn State in the Capital One Bowl, still more nicely known as the "Citrus Bowl") and going down through all but the last one -- the Motor City Bowl on December 26th in Detroit.

The problem, as the above link shows, is that the BCS has made no such guarantees, at least not publicly. The BCS honchos had a teleconference before the Big Ten made its announcement, and that's a strong indicator that the BCS is leaning towards giving Iowa the last at-large spot, but it's not guaranteed yet. As far as anyone knows, the Orange Bowl still has the right to pick Notre Dame and screw Iowa.

It's a Big Ten power play -- if the BCS does not accept Iowa now, the #3 team in the country and Big Ten Conference Co-Champ has to go to a third-tier bowl game and play Toledo (I'm not making this up). That would not help keep the Big Ten and Rose Bowl in the BCS alliance. But CollegeBCS.com points out it may have been necessary -- it's now December 4, and it's getting late to get cheap airfare to many of these bowls, particularly if the BCS puts off making obvious decisions for another four days. Why won't it release Texas and Kansas State, neither of which has a shot at a BCS bowl in any reasonable scenario? Let the other bowls invite them and let their fans start planning.