Iowa surprisingly more deserving of title game than Texas Tuesday, October 20, 2009

I have tickets to the Ohio State-Iowa game November 14 but can't go due to a class.

I was going with an Iowa fan and planned on cheering on the Hawkeyes, all the more now since Ohio State has less to play for than ever.

If Iowa wins out, they deserve to face the SEC champion in the National Championship game. I'm not predicting they'll win out, and if they stumble they deserve nothing. But if Iowa does go undefeated it will be an injustice when they're in the Rose Bowl rather than college football's National Championship Farce.

The SEC isn't college football's version of the NHL central division or anything, but it's clearly head and shoulders above the other conferences. Its winner, if it has one or fewer losses, should be penciled in right now as the #1 ranked team going into the college postseason.

Pushing Cincinnati and Boise State aside due to their conferences' inferiority, who would be the most deserving undefeated #2, Iowa or Texas?

Texas plays their entire division (OK, OK State, Baylor, A&M, and Tech) along with Colorado, Missouri and Kansas in the north. They'll add another Big 12 victory over Kansas, Kansas State or Nebraska in the Big 12 championship game. The rest of their schedule is filled out with non-BCS conference cupcakes, all of which they've already waxed.

Iowa, meanwhile, plays the hardest possible Big 10 schedule (i.e., they do not play Illinois or Purdue). That includes Ohio State, Penn State, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Northwestern, Michigan, Michigan State and Indiana. They too play non-BCS conference cupcakes, but only two. Their other two games were against the Big 12's Iowa State and the PAC-10's Arizona.

Are Iowa State or Arizona good? No. But neither is the worst team in their conference, either. And at least Iowa schedules real teams to play. Arizona actually borders on respectability.

If nothing else, Iowa deserves the championship bid just because they assembled a legitimate schedule.

There is no reason to think the Big 12 is any better than the Big 10 this season. The main argument would be that Texas lifts the conference, but if the point is to compare Texas to Iowa, they don't count. Yes, Illinois, Indiana and Purdue all belong in the MAC right now, but hey, Iowa only played one of them. Meanwhile, Texas feasts on Baylor, A&M and Kansas State.

Iowa's Big 10 oppoents have beaten Notre Dame, Arizona, Navy, Syracuse, and Iowa State this year. That's roughly equivalent to Texas' Big 12 opponents, who have beaten Georgia, Ole Miss, Illinois, Wake Forest and Duke. That's the same number of out-of-conference BCS conference (or relevant independent) wins, and if you played those teams against each other 1 through 5 high school tennis style, the teams the Big 10 beat would likely go 4-1.

The other argument for the Big 12 is that they did better in bowl games last year than the Big 10. Obviously true, but Iowa can't be blamed for that because they crushed South Carolina last year in the Outback Bowl.

If you want a "legit" argument for Texas, it's that they've earned the right to be there because they should have been declared co-national champions last year. But that's the problem with FBS. I could tell you that God told me to vote Iowa State number one and no one could tell me that's not right.

Until the beauty pageant ends and an objective system takes over, stick with FCS like John, or use this simple formula: Team with best record is better, but in case of tie, go with team who played actual BCS conference schools. By this measure, Iowa wins by two.