It was announced today that the Iowa - Iowa State game will kick off at 2:30 and be aired on ABC (Regional) & ESPN2. This announcement came with a list of 4 other Big Ten games that will air on the ABC/ESPN family during the first 3 weeks of the season. This is just the second time ever both teams are coming off of bowl victories (the 2005 season followed wins by Iowa in the Capitol One Bowl and Iowa State in the Independence Bowl) , so there could actually be some legitimate (though probably small) interest outside of the state of Iowa.

As a fan I think this is great. I've repeatedly said that my favorite start time is 2:30 and regional ABC games have excellent coverage (much, much better than the Versus or FSN coverage for games in Ames).

In much less exciting news, the start time for the Eastern Illinois game was also announced today. It will be an 11:00 AM kickoff and aired on the Big Ten Network. No surpises here. We now know the start time for 5 games of the first 6 games on the Iowa Football Schedule:
  • Eastern Illinois - 11:00 (BTN)
  • Iowa State - 2:30 (ABC&ESPN2)
  • @ Arizona - 9:30 (ESPN)
  • Penn State - 7:00 (ABC/ESPN/ESPN2)
  • @ Michigan - 2:30 (ABC)