Thursday Hawkeyes Reading Room - Shock! Someone doesn't want Iowa in the BCS title game

Believe it or not, Hawkeye fans, someone doesn't want your team advancing to the national-title game.

Dave Curtis of The Sporting News has Iowa vs. the SEC champion or Texas as one of five possible BCS title matchups he would least want to see.

"This has a little bit to do with the Hawkeyes and a lot to do with recent history," Curtis writes.

He didn't mention Iowa vs. Cincinnati, or Iowa vs. Boise State, or Iowa vs. TCU.

For Curtis' five fears, click here.

Indiana is coming to Iowa City Saturday with a head coach who has job security.

“If the question is whether or not Bill Lynch will be back as our coach next year, my answer is ‘Of course,' '' Indiana Athletic Director Fred Glass said Wednesday. “He's in the second year of a four-year contract (that expires after the 2011 season), and like I said last November, contracts need to mean something again at Indiana University."

For the complete Indianapolis Star article on the matter, click here.

The Hoosiers say they've put last Saturday's 29-28 loss at Northwestern behind them.

Maybe. How you forget a debacle in which you surrender a 28-3 lead (and perhaps your chances of going to a bowl game) so soon is hard to fathom.

Indiana senior offensive tackle Rodger Saffold: “As soon as practice started on Monday, I was done with Northwestern and focusing on Iowa.”

Said Lynch:

“What I don't want to see is people hanging their heads and moping around. There are too many people in this world who are negative, and I don't want to see our players be that way.”

Click here for Terry Hutchins' full story.

John Decker of Hoosiernation.com (How many of these nations are there, anyhow?) has the three key matchups in the Indiana-Iowa game.

My favorite is this one:

Indiana OT James Brewer vs. Iowa DE Broderick Binns – There's a lot to like about Iowa's defense, but one of the things that stands out the most is the defensive end tandem of Binns and Adrian Clayborn. IU senior left tackle Rodger Saffold will have his

hands full with Clayborn, who leads Iowa in sacks, tackles for loss, forced fumbles and quarterback hurries. But it's the Binns vs. Brewer match-up that might be the most concerning for the Indiana coaching staff. At 6'2” and 255 pounds, Binns will pose some real challenges to the 6'8”, 331-pound Brewer in obvious passing situations due to his quickness and athleticism. He also has long arms, which allows him to bat down his share of balls at the line of scrimmage. While Clayborn gets more of the notoriety, Binns has also been highly productive this season with 39 tackles, 6 ½ tackles for loss, four sacks and seven passes broken up. Brewer will have a nearly 80-pound edge on Binns and if he can get him engaged he can have some success. But getting a “helmet on a helmet” in this match-up will be a chore for Brewer as he tries keep himself in between Binns and IU quarterback Ben Chappell and running back Darius Willis.

For the other two, click here.

Sports Illustrated's Stewart Mandel gives his response to a question on if the 2009 Hawkeyes resemble Ohio State's unbeaten team of 2002. Writes Mandel:

Iowa still has a long way to go to before being mentioned in the same breath as that Ohio State team -- in fact, before that can happen it will need to beat Ohio State on the road on Nov. 14 -- but the parallels certainly exist. Much like these Hawkeyes, those Buckeyes played an old-school, often unsightly brand of football. Like Iowa, Ohio State endured an inordinate amount of last-minute escapes. But here's the most important shared trait of all: A large majority of the county refused to believe they were the juggernaut their record indicated. They were "the Luckeyes," and not until that final Ken Dorsey pass fell incomplete in Tempe did most deem them legitimate. (Except in Miami, where referee Terry Porter will forever live in infamy.)

When Ricky Stanzi completed that last-second pass to Marvin McNutt against Michigan State last Saturday night, it actually reminded me of a similar moment from that '02 Ohio State season: Craig Krenzel's 37-yard touchdown pass to Michael Jenkins on a

last-minute fourth down to win a 10-6 game at Purdue. Compare the two teams' schedules and you'll see a lot of similarities: Both needed a last-second defensive play to survive a heavy underdog early in the year (Iowa over Northern Iowa, Ohio State over Cincinnati), both scraped out low-scoring wins over Penn State in which the key play did not come on offense and both overcame second-half deficits at Wisconsin.

There are, however, some pretty notable differences.

To read what those differences are,

click here for Mandel's full essay.