Cornell's Iowa Conference swan song comes against Coe

CEDAR RAPIDS - Sayonara, Simpson. Bon voyage, Buena Vista. Lots of fun playing you, Luther and Loras.

Cornell College's football run in the Iowa Conference concludes today. The Rams' final game is against their biggest rival.

Cornell and Coe play for the 121st time, renewing the oldest college football rivalry west of the Mississippi River. The Kohawks have won 11 in a row in this series (which began in 1891) to elongate their all-time advantage to 65-51-4.

Beyond the history between these two Linn County schools is the added intrigue of Cornell playing its last IIAC game. The school will rejoin the Midwest Conferencein 2011 after 14 mostly unsuccessful seasons.

“I'm looking at it as one chapter ends, another begins,” Cornell Coach Vince Brautigam said. “The Iowa Conference has been fun to compete in. It's a great league.

“Now we're on to the Midwest Conference, and our goals are still the same. We want to build toward being a winning program. All I know is on Saturdays, we're going to continue to play somebody. To me, it doesn't matter who it is.”

Brautigam, in his second year, has at least returned some hope to Cornell. The Rams are 3-6 heading into their finale, the most wins they've had since 2003.

They'll still be decided underdogs against Coe (5-4), which saw its dreams of an IIAC championship end last week in a 49-42 heartbreaking loss to Dubuque. This is the final game for prolific Coe quarterback Brad Boyle, a two-time IIAC MVP who has set virtually every QB record at the school.

“In order for this to be a rivalry, we've got to make it one,” Brautigam said. “That's part of our rebuilding process.”

Looking ahead, don't get too worried about this game going away. Coe and Cornell are scheduled to meet in Week 2 next season in Mount Vernon and back at Coe's Clark Field in 2013.

Past that ...

“From our end, it'll continue,” said Coe Athletics Director John Chandler. “As long as I'm the AD here and John Cochrane is the AD at Cornell, we'll play.”

The only thing that could change those plans is the Midwest Conference. The league consists of 11 schools but there is no full round-robin league schedule.

If that changes, there is a possibility the Coe-Cornell game would go away. Next year will be the first time the schools won't be in the same conference since they joined the MWC together in 1921.