Our college football season doesn’t start for two more months.  Bowl season doesn’t start for about five months.  But the all-powerful, all-knowing ESPN just came out with their 2008-09 Bowl Predictions.  Because, hey, nothing unforseen ever happens during the College Football season.

ESPN recently had placed us as the24th best team in the nation, between Fresno State and Notre Dame, so their bowl prediction for us is hardly unforseen.  ESPN thinks that we’ll be in the Outback Bowl, playing Tennessee.  Been there, done that, beat them.  And if it seems like deja vu for us, imagine how Tennessee fans would feel playing in the same bowl game for three straight years.

It’s not that the game is a giant slap in the face.  The Outback Bowl has traditionally been a very good bowl featuring nationally exposed teams, like us, Florida, Georgia, Wisconsin, Michigan, and Ohio State over the past few years.  In fact, over the past five seasons, only two 4-loss teams made the bowl (one of which was, of course, Penn State in 2007), and traditionally two-or-three loss teams have played in the Outback Bowl.  Frankly, given our schedule, going 10-2 or 9-3 would be a pretty impressive accomplishment.  But again, with the difficulty of our schedule, that might be enough to place us in the top 10.

What annoys me about the rankings are where we place, according to ESPN, in the Big Ten.  ESPN has Ohio State in the championship game against Georgia, which seems to be a trendy pre-season pick.  Wisconsin is projected to reach the Rose Bowl and play USC, but if we can beat them I imagine we could take their place.  Wisconsin is a team that we traditionally have had success against, and is ranked (disclaimer: by ESPN) as only eight places ahead of us, so provided that Ohio State makes the National Championship Game, that Rose Bowl game is up for grabs.  Wisconsin is a team that has had some very successful seasons over the past few years of Barry Alvarez’s tensure and into Bret Bielema’s.  PJ Hill is a great running back, and considering that we’re playing under the lights, at Wisconsin, I’d have to think that Penn State loses that one.  Illinois is in the Capital One Bowl against Florida, which, like the Outback Bowl, is also a New Year’s Day Bowl.  They consider that a little more prestigious, I suppose, ranking it above the Outback Bowl.   I would like to think that we are better than Illinois at the least, because they were heavily reliant on Rashard Mendenhall last year.  Juice Williams is a fine quarterback, but that team is a few pieces short of a New Year’s Day Bowl Game, if you ask me.

Filling out the rest of the Big Ten, ESPN think that Purdue will reach the Insight Bowl and play Nebraska, Michigan State will be in the Alamo Bowl against Kansas, Michigan will face Florida State in the Champs Sports Bowl, and Iowa will play Ball State in the Motor City Bowl.

So what do you think?  Are we being disrespected by “The Man?”  Just enough?  A little overhyped?  What bowl do you think we’ll make?  Comments are welcome.

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