UNI-Iowa a rare FCS-FBS matchup that doesn’t stink

Northern Iowa's football team skews Iowans' opinions about FBS-FCS football matchups.

FBS, by the way, is Football Bowl Subdivision. The big boys. FCS is Football Championship Subdivision. The next-biggest boys. But the difference in scholarships between FBS and FCS is 22. That's a lot.

Year after year, FBS teams from the five major conferences carve up FCS opponents. Last year, there were only a few FCS teams that made waves against the FBS.

North Dakota State 24, Kansas State 21. Georgia Southern 26, Florida 20. Northern Iowa 28, Iowa State 20.

The three winners are rock-solid FCS programs. Well, Georgia Southern was one. It has moved up to FBS this year. It beat Florida because the Gators were banged up, and it was a late-season game in a long, losing year. That was the first time an FCS team beat an SEC club since 1992.

North Dakota State is the 3-time defending FCS champion. It won by two touchdowns at Minnesota in 2011.

UNI's Panthers were two blocked field goals in the last several seconds from beating Iowa in '09. They won at Iowa State two years earlier, and dropped 1-point games in Ames in 2006 and 2011. They lost by just 26-21 at Wisconsin in 2012. The Badgers went on to win the Big Ten.

But there's a reason FBS-FCS games need to be phased out, and Big Ten Commissioner Jim Delany has decreed it should be so. Namely, they're usually routs.

Here are some of last year's doozies:

Ohio State 76, Florida A&M 0

Georgia Tech 70, Elon 0

Miami 77, Savannah State 7

South Carolina 70, Coastal Carolina 10

Oregon 66, Nicholls State 3

Baylor 69, Wofford 3

Auburn 62, Western Carolina 3

Oklahoma State 59, Lamar 3

Utah 70, Weber State 7

Utah State 70, Weber State 6

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This week alone, we'll be 'treated' to these 'contests':

Indiana State (1-11 last year) at Indiana

Northern Colorado (1-11) at UNLV

Elon (2-10) at Duke

Weber State (2-10) at Arizona State

Stephen F. Austin (3-9) at Kansas State

Idaho State (3-9) at Utah

South Dakota (4-8) at Oregon

That's right, South Dakota at Oregon. That's NG. No Good.

With Northern Iowa-Iowa and North Dakota State-Iowa State in our state Saturday, we'll be the nation's hub of FBS-FCS games that aren't hubris. That and the presidential caucuses pretty much makes us the center of the world.