Hlas: Iowa's last Rose Bowl was in a far different time

LOS ANGELES —The days fly by, and the next thing you know, you've gone 25 years between Rose Bowls.

Well, not if you're Wisconsin or Michigan. They've gone to six Rose Bowls apiece in the last quarter-century.

But for Iowa, this is its first appearance in 'The Granddaddy of Them All' since New Year's of 1991. Which makes this an even bigger deal than normal, not that there's ever anything normal about going to the Rose Bowl.

This game fills a void felt by Hawkeye fans who deeply appreciated the two Orange Bowl trips Iowa made under Kirk Ferentz's watch, but were born and raised knowing the Rose Bowl is the game you want to reach if you're a Big Ten team. It's Bowl Game Mecca.

Assuming you can't make it to the College Football Playoffs, that is.

So much has happened and so much has changed since the 1990 Iowa team lost 46-34 to Washington. For instance:

No player on Iowa's roster was alive the last time the Hawkeyes were in Pasadena.

Current Hawkeyes offensive line coach Brian Ferentz was 7 years old. His father was the first-year head coach at Maine.

There was no Facebook or Fitbit, no iPad or iPod, no Yahoo or YouTube. There weren't websites. People read things called newspapers and magazines. They were made of actual paper, and were actually popular.

Only the weirdest of the weird took selfies.

Brent Musburger was two years from doing his first play-by-play of a Rose Bowl on network television. This game will mark his 12th such telecast.

Kirk Herbstreit was a sophomore on Ohio State's football team 25 years ago. He had the same number of kickoff returns (1) as pass attempts that season.

This Rose Bowl will be on ESPN. There was an ESPN on New Year's of 1991, but no ESPN2, ESPNU, ESPNews, ESPN Deportes, ESPN Radio, ESPN.com or ESPN The Magazine.

There also was no Big Ten Network, SEC Network, NFL Network, Food Network or Oprah Winfrey Network.

O.J. Simpson was known for being an actor, a broadcaster, an all-time great NFL running back, and a former Rose Bowl Player of the Game. He was five years from being acquitted for a double murder in southern California and 18 years from getting a 33-year prison sentence in Nevada for multiple felony charges in an unrelated crime.

The Big Ten had 10 teams playing football, and the Pac-10 had 10. The Big Eight had eight. Math was simpler back then.

Twenty-six Division I-A (now FBS) teams weren't in conferences, including Penn State, Miami, Florida State, South Carolina and Rutgers.

Nebraska didn't know it would have undefeated, national-championship teams in 1994, 1995 and 1997. Or maybe it assumed it would, and perhaps more.

Tiger Woods was 15 years old, Tim Duncan was 14, and Tom Brady was 13.

There were no Memphis Grizzlies or Minnesota Wild or Miami Marlins.

Those Marlins have won two World Series since Iowa's last Rose Bowl. The Chicago Cubs have been to none in that time.

No one had heard of Bartman 25 years ago, either.

There was no GPS to help a poor schmuck from Iowa navigate his way around southern California 25 years ago. But I'll still find a way to take the wrong turnoff this week and end up at the La Brea Tar Pits instead of Beverly Hills.