Read Mike Poorman's previous analysis of Penn State's bowl chances here.

Over the past few days, Joe Paterno has been working the phones, talking to representatives from as many as five different bowls.

The Nittany Lion legend, who has been to 35 bowl games as a head coach and won a record 23 of them, is an old hand at making things happen behind the scenes as well as on the field. (He’s the only coach to have won the Rose, Fiesta, Sugar, Cotton and Orange Bowls.)

He has to keep his options open in part because of what happened on Sept. 26. That’s when Iowa defeated Penn State 21-10 under White Out yet rainy conditions in Beaver Stadium. That gives Iowa (eighth in the BCS standings) the head-to-head edge over No. 11 Penn State when the BCS bowl berths are announced on Sunday.

But that stuff doesn’t matter all that much, as Bowl Championship Series expert Jerry Palm, proprietor of CollegeBCS.com, told my Penn State class yesterday.

“Missouri beat Kansas head to head two years ago, but Kansas jumped ahead of Missouri when they started selecting teams and was invited to a BCS bowl -- the Orange Bowl,” where Kansas beat Virginia Tech 24-21. That year, Missouri beat Arkansas 38-7 in the Cotton Bowl, which is not one of those pricey BCS bowls. “It happens every year; a team is picked before someone it lost to earlier in the season.”

A large alumni base, a hefty fan group that travels well and spends money, a proven history with TV ratings, a nationally-known head coach not named Kirk -- they also matter.

With those intangibles in its pocket, Penn State is trying to tilt the scales in its favor. In addition to Paterno’s personal telephone calls, the PSU promotions people have been preaching the Penn State gospel to media and bowl reps alike. In that vein, Guido D’Elia, the branding czar for Nittany Lion football, has overseen the production of a two-minute, 22-second video touting that “Our Fans Love” bowls, “Follow” (to bowl games), “Watch” bowl games and “Take their bowls seriously.”

THE IOWA POINT OF VIEW

Even out in Iowa, they’re not so sure what’s going to happen.

“Right now,” Tom Kakert, publisher of HawkeyeReport.com, wrote on his blog today, “I would say that Iowa's chances are about the same as Penn State, 50/50. Over the weekend I was just about ready to throw in the towel and change my guess, because that's all it is, to the Nittany Lions.

Don’t forget the Paterno factor. Kakert hasn’t.

“As much as we all might love the Hawkeyes, Penn State is an East Coast team that has a more national reputation and Coach Paterno is the all time leader in coaching victories,” Kakert said. “He is a legend and he moves the TV needle. Iowa has some very solid TV numbers as well, but the casual college football fan knows Joe Paterno and you can capture those folks fairly easily when you pit a legendary coach and his nationally respected program against an upstart unknown like Boise State, who is the likely opponent in the Fiesta Bowl.”

Check out Kakert’s full story here.

SQUEEZING OUT THE ORANGE BOWL

The Orange Bowl is off the table for Penn State and Iowa. Why? Because Oklahoma State lost to Oklahoma, fell out of the top 14 of the BCS rankings and can’t be selected by the BCS bowls. They would have filled one spot for the Fiesta Bowl and given the Orange crack at the Big Ten first.

Now, the Fiesta is thinking Big Ten first. Then the Orange Bowl selects -- either TCU or Boise State. Fiesta then gets the “leftover” team.

“There’s no way the Fiesta Bowl would put itself in a position for a TCU-Boise State game,” Palm said. “And that’s what would happen if the Fiesta didn’t pick Iowa or Penn State first.”

Two match-ups you can forget about:

1.) Texas Christian vs. Boise State. Been there, done that, as pointed out by HawkeyeReport.com. The two met in last year’s San Diego County Credit Union Poinsettia Bowl, which TCU won 17-16. The game, played in San Diego, drew a crowd of 34,628 and featured a payout of $500,000 per team. Hardly a precursor of what the Fiesta Bowl is seeking.

2.) Clemson vs. Texas Christian, as noted by Palm. This is given the unlikelihood that underdog Clemson beats Georgia Tech on Saturday in the ACC Championship Game in Tampa, Fla. If the four-loss Tigers win, they would earn a spot in the Orange Bowl. And that would effectively shut out Texas Christian from playing the Tigers since that’s already happened in 2009. TCU traveled to Clemson, S.C., and beat the Tigers 14-10 in a non-conference game in September.

WHERE WILL THE LIONS GO?

Palm is predicting that the Nittany Lions are picked first by the Fiesta Bowl and return to the Arizona bowl, where it has won six times (1977, 1980, 1982, 1987, 1992, 1997) and never lost.

Over at ESPN.com, both Mark Schlabach and Bruce Feldman have Iowa playing Boise State in the Fiesta Bowl, Georgia Tech-TCU in the Orange Bowl and Penn State-LSU in the Capital One.

If Iowa is indeed snagged by ether the Fiesta or Orange bowls, that leaves the Nittany Lions in the Capital One Bowl, which is played at 1 p.m. on Jan. 1 in Orlando, Fla., and will be televised by ABC.

Back on Nov. 22, more than a week ago, I asked Ivan Maisel, the national college football writer for ESPN.com, where he thought Penn State would land. Here’s what he had to say then (remember, lots has transpired in the eight days since, to be fair to Ivan -- but his point remains):

“Penn State's only hope is that a bowl will find the presence of JoePa more captivating than criteria such as, oh, what happened on the field. Iowa and Penn State have the same record. Iowa beat Penn State. Iowa is higher rated in the BCS. Why is a head-to-head comparison important? Each conference is allowed only two BCS bids. Ohio State gets an automatic one.”

He then predicted Penn State would land in the Capital One Bowl, with the caveat “I have been wrong before.”