Bowl projections

Well yesterday's games did very little to un-muddy the bowl projections water. The Big 10's hopes were made worse by what happened in Columbus as Illinois not only knocked the Bucks out of the BCS title game, but might have knocked the Buckeyes out of an at-large bid as well should they lose to Michigan this weekend.

Illinois, however, might have an outside shot at their own BCS game depending on some of the football remaining to be played- specifically any game featuring Hawaii.

Ok, with all this in mind I have 2 bowl scenarios, both that involve the following results from next weekend:

No Brainers:
Wisconsin over Minn
Iowa over W Mich
Illinois over Northwestern

Tougher Picks:
Mich State over PSU
Indiana over Purdue
Michigan over OSU

In each of those games the better team is the road team, but all are pretty equal so I am going with the home squads.

That would leave the conference with 10 bowl eligible teams, 9 of which would have 7 wins. It would pretty much leave NU out in the cold, but any team that loses at home to Duke has no business making a bowl game.
Indiana and MSU really need wins next weekend to get to the magicical 7 win plateau. A 6-6 IU team that goes 2-6 in conference can join NU at home for the holidays as far as I am concerned*

So with all of that in mind scenario #1 involves Illinois making the BCS, scenario #2 involves the Big 10 only getting one team in the BCS.

With that in mind, here is scenario #1

Championship: LSU v Orgeon
Orange: Clemson v KU/Mizzou loser
Sugar: Georgia v Illinois
Rose: Michigan vs Arizona State
Fiesta: Oklahoma v West Virginia


Big 10 matchups:

Citrus: Ohio State vs Tennessee
Outback: Wisconsin vs Florida
Alamo: Penn State vs Texas Tech
Champs Sports: Iowa vs Virginia
Insight: Indiana vs Nebraska
Motor City: Purdue vs Central Mich
Las Vegas: Mich State vs BYU

Iowa is going to jump a few teams and I think the Insight Bowl would like a crack at an IU squad that has not made it to a Bowl game in 14 years. The Motor City Bowl will have a hard time passing up on the Spartans, but Purdue might make for a more interesting game.
Wisconsin gets picked over a 4-4 Penn State team (so lets hope they lose at MSU)


Scenario 2

Championship: LSU v Oregon
Orange: KU/Mizzou loser v Clemson
Sugar: Georgia v Hawaii
Fiesta: Oklahoma v West Virginia
Rose: Arizona State v Michigan


Citrus: Illinois vs Tennessee
Outback: Ohio State vs Auburn
Alamo: Wisconsin vs Texas Tech
Champs: Penn State vs Virginia
Insight: Iowa vs Nebraska
Motor City: Indiana vs Central Mich

Las Vegas: Purdue vs BYU
NO BOWL: Michigan State

Now watch as Illinois will lose to NU and screw it all up


*I think the next NCAA rule needs to be a minimum of 3 conference wins in order to make a bowl.