Bowl Speculation As Iowa Heads To Ohio State

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- The bowl season is heating up, with the winner of Saturday's 3:30 p.m. game against Iowa at Ohio Stadium determining one of the spots in the Rose Bowl.

Some possible bowl matchups, subject to change at a moment's notice and completely open to question at all times:

BCS national championship: Florida/Alabama winner in SEC title game vs. Texas.

Rose: Ohio State/Iowa winner vs. Nov. 21 Oregon/Arizona winner.

Fiesta: USC vs. TCU.

Sugar: Florida/Alabama loser vs. Dec. 5 Cincinnati/Pittsburgh winner.

Orange: Georgia Tech vs. Penn State.

Perhaps you're thinking 'Penn State? Are you kidding me?' But think about it. The Orange is locked into Georgia Tech and needs to have a team that will put fannies in the seats and have fans who turn on TVs. And at this time of year, the Big Ten carries a big stick in terms of TV ratings and ticket sales.

If Ohio State loses to Iowa, the Buckeyes might just drop into the Orange. If Iowa loses to Ohio State, it's unlikely the Hawkeyes - with losses in two of their last three games and with a starting quarterback on crutches after surgery - would slide into the Orange ahead of Penn State despite Iowa having won their head-to-head meeting.

QUOTE OF THE DAY: Coach Jim Tressel on how many shots he's given problem-child WR/KR Ray Small over the years: "More than LeBron takes."

RETICENT LINEMAN: DE Cameron Heyward, the Big Ten's defensive player of the week, said Tuesday that he is not comfortable being in the spotlight and had received some coaching from his girlfriend before showing up for interviews.

"Yeah. I hate talking," he said. "I just want to play. I don't really like answering all these questions, but I just love playing football."

HEALTH CHECK: J.B. Shugarts, who was sidelined during the Penn State game with a lower-body injury, is expected to work out with the team starting Wednesday and will be evaluated to play on Saturday.

QB Terrelle Pryor is still bruised and sore but will play.

After the victory at Penn State last Saturday, Tressel expressed concern over the health of RB Dan Herron, but the coach said on Tuesday that Herron's name did not appear on a list of injured players.

And OL Mike Adams is expected to return to full-time duty this week, along with NG Dexter Larimore who saw limited action against Penn State.

TRESSELESE: An unedited transcript of Tressel discussing the impact of Iowa losing starting QB Ricky Stanzi: "Well, I would say this, it's a lot harder in the middle of the road to, when you lose someone like that, it has to be an unusual situation for you to just shake that off. I think when you have some time to prepare and get a mindset and so forth and say, hey, here's the hand we've got, sometimes in the middle of a game that's harder. So, again, because of how solid they are, I wouldn't - I told someone earlier on the Big Ten call or whatever that with Iowa you don't even need to put jersey numbers on, just put their black jerseys or white this week and they're going to be - doesn't matter who it is, they're going to be lined up where they're supposed to be, doing what they're supposed to do and you're going to see if you're good enough to compete with them."

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