Wednesday Reading Room: Iowa in the 2011 Meineke Car Care Bowl of Texas???

Stewart Mandel, Sports Illustrated's venerable college football go-to guy, was asked in his latest mailbag if having conference-title games would help the Big Ten and Pac-12 slow down the SEC's dominance in BCS title contests.

Part of Mandel's answer is this:

The SEC's path remains exactly the same, but the Big Ten and Pac-12 just made theirs that much harder. ... five straight championships has earned the SEC so much mileage with voters that it's hard to envision a scenario where the SEC's champ would not win a tiebreaker with any other league's champion for a No. 1 or 2 ranking (presuming the contenders both carry the same record).

Meanwhile, Big Ten teams will enjoy far fewer unintentional scheduling breaks, like last year's, when 11-1 Ohio State and Michigan State did not play each other. ...  By the time they get to their respective title games, Big Ten and Pac-12 teams could be pretty beaten down, increasing the chance of, say, 12-0 Ohio State -- coming off an emotional win over Michigan -- falling to 9-3 Iowa in Indianapolis. (Though Auburn faced a very similar situation last year and promptly beat South Carolina 56-17.)

For the entire answer, and other questions and answers, click here:

None of CBS' NCAA tournament announcers were as popular or as talked about as Gus Johnson. But now he's off to Fox to do college football.

"To steal a line from LeBron James, I'm taking my talents to Hollywood," Johnson said.

Johnson will continue to do basketball for the Big Ten Network, however. That is not Hollywood.

Jon Miller of HawkeyeNation.com dug this up today. It's the 2011 Big Ten bowl projections of a Big Ten blog called Off Tackle Empire.

Here's what I know about May bowl projections: They seldom come true.

Nonetheless, here's what OTE says:

Wisconsin in the Rose. And that's it for Big Ten teams in BCS bowls. Even with the addition of Nebraska to the league. Even though the league regularly sends two teams to BCS games.

But, the league is expected to be a bit down this year. And who knows if Ohio State will even be eligible for the postseason by this winter. What am I saying? Of course it will. Big Ten teams don't get put on those kind of sanctions. Do they?

OTE has Nebraska in the Capital One, Ohio State in the Outback, Michigan in the Insight, Penn State in the Gator, Iowa in the Meineke Car Care Bowl of Texas (yes, that's a real bowl), Michigan State in the TicketCity, Purdue in the Little Caesars, and Northwestern taking a Big 12 spot in the Pinstripe.

Uh, if it's all the same to the Big Ten, I'd just as soon have Iowa sent to the Pinstripe instead of the Meineke Whatever. Houston has a better football stadium and better weather than New York, but I don't care.

But the Big Ten will have two teams in BCS bowls, so these predictions won't stick. You'll see.

The I-Club spring banquet circuit reached Marshalltown Tuesday night, and the Marshalltown Times-Republican's Travis Hines was there.

Iowa defensive coordinator Norm Parker was on the dais, and offered this joke to the crowd:

A Michigan graduate and an Iowa graduate both join the army. While serving, both men were captured by the enemy and sentenced to death by firing squad. Each man was granted a last request.

“Before I die,” said the Michigan man, “I want to hear the beloved fight song of the University of Michigan, ‘The Victors,' played.”

Upon hearing the Michigan grad's final request, the Iowa man issued a simple demand.

“Shoot me first.”