I was prepared to break out my camera in hopes of capturing memorable footage of angry rivals. Unfortunately, Alabama's fair-weather fans have not sustained the rich tradition of literary invention found throughout the south; their cheers consisted mostly of several hundred iterations of the 'Roll Tide' call and response chant, which were parried weakly by War Eagle chants that grew more dispirited as the afternoon wore on.

But! I did find out this very interesting fact. Did you know Pam Tebow travels the south speaking at a variety of pro-life events every year, telling her inspiring story of how Tebow wasn't even supposed to happen? This probably isn't news to fans of 40 Days For Life, or the volunteers at Necole's Place, but I wondered if Tebow Nation was up to speed on Mom Tebow's extracurriculars. There's even a no-trade clause with God, which is why Tebow has to call his work against Bama today "preaching" and quite possibly why he won't make it to the combine.

So I've been up to my elbows in pro-life propaganda all day trying to find if I was breaking big news or just retreading something reported and tossed years ago. AND THEN THE GAME STARTED. I'd been thinking all day it was at 7 (yeah, yeah). So, hastily, here is the best prognostication blogging's Illuminati can provide: Alabama will jump out to an early lead. Rock on with your SEC Championship Open Thread.

This is 99, btw.

[Image: Tom Landry's Evangelical Comic (courtesy YM's awesome resident graphic novelist Eli Valley)]

In the ultimate irony of college football, wouldn't we all like the sport better if we outsourced the college football playoff to Las Vegas? Yes, yes we would.

1. Virginia Tech wins their second ACC title in a row over Boston College. Leading to this great celebration punch that we linked yesterday but you have to see it again.

Wouldn't this be a perfect move if you actually hated the coach? Wait for a big play, sidle up to him, and wreck him with a sideways punch while celebrating? No way he can call you on it. Especially if you were a fifth-year senior like Cory Holt, didn't have a single catch all season, and sort of regretted the fact that you never were used much on offense. I'm just sayin'.

2. Navy beat Army for the 7th consecutive time. Worse for Army, they've been outscored 274-71 during this string of losses. Last winter I visited West Point for a couple of days, attended classes, and hung around with some of the Army football team. They hate Navy. Beat Navy is spelled out on the bleachers surrounding their parade ground. Yeah, this one hurts. But not any more than the previous 6. It's a good thing Navy complained so much about Caleb Campbell getting to play in the NFL under a special exemption. They're clearly disadvantaged on the field.

3. Oklahoma destroyed Missouri 62-21. This was one of those games where your non die-hard college football fan is shocked it's taking place. Enter my wife. As Oklahoma scored to go up 38-7, she entered the room, looked up at the television and said, "Missouri? Why isn't Oklahoma playing Texas in the Big 12 Title game?"

4. Florida beat Alabama by double digits. Like they've beaten everyone else all season except for Ole Miss. That Ole Miss win over Florida is going to become one of the most difficult Aflac trivia questions at some point twenty years from now. Verne Lundquist will still be calling games for CBS at the age of 148.

If Tim Tebow beats Oklahoma to win his second national championship in three years there's no doubt he's the greatest player of the BCS era. But where does he rank in the past twenty-five years? That's roughly the amount of time I've been following college football and I feel comfortable saying he's the best player I've seen during that time frame. Who's better? A step further — is Tebow the greatest college football player of all-time? And if Tebow wins another national title, another Heisman Trophy, and he comes back for his senior season after spending another summer doing missionary work can we elect him to replace Florida's retiring Senator Mel Martinez (exempting him from the Senate age requirement of 30 in the process) and put him in charge of ending the recession instead? I'm halfway convinced that Tebow's anti-recession strategy of running up to bankers, pumping his arms wildly, and screaming would bring interest rates down, free up corporate lending, and restore consumer confidence.

5. Did anyone else notice Bob Davie sighing wistfully about how good looking the girls were during the Arizona-Arizona State game? This was part of his digression about why going to school in Arizona makes pretty good sense. I hate to say this, and this might mark me as a horrible person deserving of death, but Bob Davie is starting to grow on me as an announcer. (Which is completely different than Notre Dame fans—where Bob Davie is starting to grow on them as a coach.) Maybe it was the beers or the break in the action before the De La Hoya-Pacquiao fight started, but I actually found myself thinking, "You know, Bob Davie's not that bad of a guy."

6. Admit it you giggled a bit when Gary Danielson kept calling Tebow the "snake-handler." That's okay, we all did. Is it time for CBS and ABC to employ a double-entendre guard to clear the analogies beforehand. Like, some random 8th grade boy hired to sit in the booth and tell them that "You can't say snake-handler. Go with scorpion wrestler instead." Especially after Musburger kept calling the Missouri defense Sam Bradford's "cock mitten."

7. Odds Percy Harvin sat out the SEC Championship Game just so he could stand on the sideline and show off his biceps? Gotta be like 50%. Every time the cameras cut to him, he was flexing. There's probably a decent chance he's going to be out for the BCS Title Game with bicep cramps.

8. How great was it that Dr. Pepper somehow got Gary Danielson and Verne Lundquist to do play-by-play during the $100,000 scholarship contest? In case you missed it two girls in matching black jeans and Dr. Pepper jerseys stood in front of giant Dr. Pepper cans and threw passes at a giant hole. The girl from Florida was actually pretty hot. At least she threw the footballs like she knew she was never going to have to work a day in her life. That didn't stop Danielson from exhorting: "She ran out of footballs!"

Musburger and Herbstreit may have also called the action in the Big 12 Title Game's version of this contest but, like everyone else, I'd already stopped watching by halftime. This was after Musburger gave a detailed story about his old buddies who used to work as rodeo clowns. Every time I hear Musburger tell his heartwarming stories I think he should be America's Secretary of State. Can't you just see him sitting down across from Ahmadinejad (without preconditions!) and saying, "Mahmoud, buddy, we can work this thing out. I know Pele. This one time Pele..."

Conference championships also lead to the absurd concept of divisions. Which leads to the even more absurd concept of divisional championships. Often (as with this year's Big 12 South and many years of the SEC East) the divisions arbitrarily divide the strong and weak teams. If the two or three best teams all come from the same division then you have a pointless match-up of one good team and one weaker team. By virtue of geography or whatever other arbitrary system of division exists (I'm looking at you ACC), the bst teams don't even play. Even better is the conference championship rematch—when one team that has clearly been superior all year gets to play the team everyone knows they're better than yet again. Only they have everything to lose and the team they're playing has nothing to lose. And all of this doesn't even consider the end of rivalry games that used to be huge. For example when I was growing up Tennessee and Auburn was a classic contest. Now? It's relegated to the dustbin of rotating divisional opponents. On to the previews.

USC (-33) at UCLA- I know, I know, the Pac-10 teams play nine conference games so they shouldn't have to play a conference championship game. I disagree. Either every league should play them or none should. But the ninth game is why the Pac 10 has an entire conference slate this week while most conferences are already finished. The most enticing aspect of this game is the red jersey for one timeout trade that Pete Carroll is working. What's astounding to me about this entire gambit is that there's an NCAA rule about this. You could have given a hundred intelligent college football fans the NCAA rulebook and none of them would have thought of what the penalty should be if one team wears the wrong color uniform. Ever. Yet the NCAA, in their infinite wisdom, has considered this eventuality and the penalty that should ensue if this rule is broken. Score one for the NCAA! Determine an adequate way to crown a champion? Fail. Discipline a team for wearing the wrong color uniform? Pass. That's awesome.

Cincinnati (-7.5) at Hawaii- Top sign you never expected your team to advance to a BCS bowl game. Or, perhaps, any bowl game at all: You schedule a trip to Hawaii as your final regular season game. Can you imagine being a Cincinnati fan, giving up six months of going out to bars in northern Kentucky for a good time, and then finding out that you've blown all your money on a trip to Hawaii when you could have saved up and watched your team in the Orange Bowl?

Missouri v. Oklahoma (-17)- I'm hoping Missouri wins just because I think Texas deserves to play for the championship. Which they would have been doing under the SEC tiebreak rules. (Instead of rewarding the division championship to the team that is highest ranked in a three-way tie, the SEC team has to be more than five places ahead of the team that they lost to in the final BCS standings.) Of course now the Big 12 is going to take the time to reexamine their own rules. In the meantime Oklahoma plays Missouri. Question, what if this game was awful and Oklahoma won by a point on the final play of the game. Is there anyway that Texas could re-jump Oklahoma without playing? If so, wouldn't this be perfect?

Boston College v. Virginia Tech- It's truly rare that you get a straight pick'em in a championship game. So embrace this game for what it is, an evenly matched game for a trip to a BCS bowl. Where the winner will lose to someone. This is a rematch of an October game between the two teams which Boston College won 28-23. It's also a rematch of last season's conference championship game won by Virginia Tech. Which was itself a rematch of a regular season game in 2007. Confused yet? All of that to say the teams have now played four times in a 14 months. Boston College leads 2-1 but lost the all-important conference championship game.

Alabama v. Florida (-10)- We got into a discussion the other day about whether an undefeated team from a power conference who was ranked number one in the country had ever been a double-digit underdog on a neutral field. I couldn't think of anyone. Let me know if you can. Basically what this means is that Vegas is going to favor Florida over anyone. (Yes, even Oklahoma or Texas.) As well they should. Florida hasn't won by less than 28 since their loss in the final week of September to Ole Miss. Meanwhile, interestingly enough, Alabama and Florida have only played twice this decade. So there's not a lot of history to go on between these two teams. Could this, please Lord, be Tim Tebow's final SEC game? Has Percy Harvin already played his final SEC game? Time will tell. Until then, I'll be throwing up before this game starts. And really drunk by kickoff. The only thing worse than your own team going 5-7 is your two most hated rivals going 23-1 on the season.

Oklahoma beat Oklahoma State late Saturday night 61-41. This score was enough to vault the Sooners ahead of Texas in the BCS Standings and, as a result, send them into the Big 12 Title Game against Missouri courtesy of the fifth tiebreak. (The sixth tiebreak was, in a nice nod to BCS totalitariianism, "Who does Kim Jong-Il think is better?") In raising Oklahoma the BCS computers managed to solve the quandary that left human pollsters uncertain: which of three tied teams deserves the opportunity to compete for a national championship? Of course this only mattered because Texas Tech stormed back to defeat Baylor before Oklahoma even kicked off. If Tech lost that game, then the Oklahoma game wouldn't even have mattered. and Texas is playing for the title. This all makes an awful lot of sense, right?

Basically, Texas got messed with. And here's why, this is a decision between Texas and Oklahoma. In our infinite wisdom we've discarded Texas Tech based on the sound defeat they suffered at the hands of Oklahoma. (Even if, like me, you think Texas Tech deserves a shot in the playoff.) That means there's only one game to consider: the neutral site 45-35 Texas win over Oklahoma. Nothing else matters. Both teams have one loss and Texas won the head-to-head game on a neutral field. If every game counts, then you have to count the only game between the two teams that your're deciding between, right? Otherwise you're proving what college football playoff proponents already know, every game is equal but some games are more equal than others. Welcome to the Orwellian world of college football championship rationales. On to the round-up.

1. Florida and Alabama proved they are the best two teams in the SEC. Which, in the wake of the SEC East's performance against the ACC, might mean nothing at all. In case you missed it Georgia Tech put up 45 on Georgia (who now owns the most disappointing 9-3 season in Bulldog history), Clemson continued their domination of Steve Spurrier and South Carolina, and Wake Forest beat Vandy (who despite reaching a bowl this year finished off their season with a Vandy-like 1-6 conclusion). What does all of this mean?

2.Oregon State's dream of making their first Rose Bowl since 1965 went crashing into Oregon. In the end all of Corvallis cried as one as Oregon hung 65 on Oregon State. Who was happiest about this aside from Oregon and USC fans? How about undefeated teams in Boise State and Utah? Who saw one of the BCS spots that would have been claimed by USC open up thanks to the USC advancing to the Rose Bowl with the win. Who else was happiest? The bastards at the Rose Bowl. Instead of an Oregon State-Penn State rematch, they get USC-Penn State. Which, to be fair, is shaping up as the second best BCS bowl game.

3. Paul Johnson's offense works in BCS conference football. Last week Johnson's team rushed for 472 yards. And no one really noticed because it was a Thursday night football game. This week they rushed for 409 yards against Georgia. While only passing for 19 yards. So it doesn't really matter if you're one-dimensional if that dimension is so dominant you don't even have to consider throwing the football. This is even more jarring when you consider that Georgia led 28-12 at the half.

4. Virginia Tech and Boston College are meeting again in the ACC Championship Game. At least the game is in Tampa. Which should be somewhat warm. The Charlotte games always looked miserable.

5. Kansas beat Missouri to salvage their season and make Baby Mangino squeal with joy. Meaning Missouri fans can join Georgia fans who are upset over the worst 9-3 season in school history. Of course, unlike Georgia, Missouri can erase everything with an upset win over Oklahoma this week. Regardless, somewhere John Brown is smiling. Even though he's mouldering in the grave.

6. Miss. State's offense put up 33 yards against Ole Miss. That was on 56 plays. Futility this epic deserves to be noted. It's why no one was crying in Starkville when Sylvester Croom resigned. Don't you have to be fired if you're Croom and make the school buy out your contract? You don't see Charlie Weis resigning, do you?

Back to Oklahoma-Texas and the BCS mess, I got a lot of emails after saying that 99.9% of college football fans want a playoff. Many were from college football fans who said they didn't favor a playoff. I don't think these fans are fools, I just think they've made a Faustian bargain with their own souls. Like the girls who claim they're still virgins but have anal sex. Basically, if you're a college football fan who favors a playoff you're the 16 year old girl getting banged in the ass to protect the sanctity of your hymen. Congrats on that. Y'all have to live with results like this. And if Florida beats Alabama this weekend? Are we just going to decree by fiat that Florida and Oklahoma are the two best teams in the country? Even though Texas and USC and Utah and Boise State and Penn State all have pretty good claims that they deserve a shot too? You betcha. (Odds that the Palin daughters contemplate the anal sex virginity protection gambit? High, very high...except the eldest.) Something's rotten with any athletic event that requires this much logical inconsistency and debate, really fucking rotten.

By the way, hate the BCS? Root for this implosion to occur. Oklahoma State beats Oklahoma. Sending Texas Tech to the Big 12 Title Game. Oregon State beats Oregon meaning the Beavers win the Pac-10. Florida State beats Florida who then beats an undefeated Alabama in the SEC Title Game. What happens in this scenerio? Three different one-loss teams that didn't win their own conference are all competing for a shot at the BCS Title. Even more interesting two of them might play for the national title. All would be ranked higher in the BCS than the teams that did win their conferences. Meet the Texas, USC, and Alabama one-loss derby. I know we've seen it before with Oklahoma but can you imagine if three of the top five contenders for the national title didn't win their conference? (The other two teams contending for the national title that did win their conference would be Texas Tech and Penn State.) Anyway on to the most intriguing games of the weekend.

Fresno State at Boise State (-21)- Can Boise State close out their season 12-0 with a win over Fresno State? Yeah, it's looking like it. Little known fact, since taking over Boise State from Dan Hawkins (who I believe is now working as a bike valet in Boulder) Boise State head coach Chris Petersen is 34-3. Seriously, 34-3. Including, of course, a BCS bowl win over Oklahoma. How is Petersen not an extremely hot coaching candidate? Why wouldn't, say, Washington mortgage their soul to get him? And, be honest, you had no idea he was 34-3, did you?

Georgia Tech at Georgia (-8)- Georgia's defensive gameplan: Try and keep Georgia Tech from rushing for over 300 yards. This Paul Johnson offense is way too gimmicky to work in a major conference. Right? Meanwhile, Georgia fans will silently weep at the end of this game over the presumed exit of Knowshon Moreno and Matthew Stafford. That redshirt year on Knowshon really worked out well.

Virginia at Virginia Tech- Win and the Hokies are your Coastal Division champs. Lose and Georgia Tech advances to the ACC Championship. At least there's no animus between Virginia and Virginia Tech fans. These guys love each other. By the way, is Al Groh really safe for another year? Has Virginia just given up on ever being good at football? It's fine if they have but I feel like they owe it to their fans to hold a press conference and allow the AD to say, "I know there's been a lot of question and rumors surrouding this football program. Let me be clear: we are not ever going to be very good. If you're hoping for more than 8 wins in a season, you should root for another team. Like Virginia Tech or Richmond. We just aren't about winning football games here. We're going to focus on law school softball championships, instead. That's all. Go 'Hoos."

Kentucky at Tennessee (-4)- Tennessee has beaten Kentucky more consecutive years, 23, than any team has beaten another team in the country. Once, when I was a kid, I witnessed one of UT's coaches running off the field after a win over Kentucky screaming, "Go to hell Kentucky, now you can have your damn basketball season!" Why do I feel like a Kentucky coach could say the same thing at the end of tomorrow's game?

Syracuse at Cincinnati (-22)- - Win and Cincy is BCS bowl bound. Lucky for Cincinnati there's no history of a twenty-plus point underdog Syracuse team going on the road and winning a game no one anticipated they could win. Nope, this one is going to be completely easy.

Florida (-16.5) at Florida State - Hopefully this is Tim Tebow's final regular season college football game. If only so we can spend the next three months hearing Mel Kiper and Todd McShay incessantly debate Tebow's draft status. Here's a guess, one guy will think he's a stud and the other guy will think he isn't. Then they will repeat these positions 4 billion times until the draft arrives. Then, on draft day, a team will select him and, guess what, they'll debate about Tebow again. If there's any irony in the world, Tebow will get drafted by the Titans. My wife will deliver our second son, I'll go down to the nursery and Tebow will be circumcising babies on his day off.

Maryland at Boston College (-6.5)- Beat Maryland and BC is in the ACC Championship Game. Lose and that honor goes to Florida State. Has anyone else noted that it's possible the ACC regular season is going to end without any team winnning 9 games? Has this ever happened in a major conference before, where the best team only has 8 wins? Especially now that there are 12 regular season games.

Auburn at Alabama (-14.5)- Auburn has beaten Alabama six consecutive years. If they find a way to march into Tuscaloosa and win again, Tommy Tuberville, the original beaver pelt trader, Alabama fans are going to come undone. I don't know what will happen but I feel like I'll turn on the television and the entire state of Alabama will look like Jonestown, Guyana.

Oregon at Oregon State (-3)- The final obstacle to Oregon State's first Rose Bowl since 1965 arrives. I've never been to a rivalry game in the Pac-10, but I've heard this game is the one to attend above all others. think if you're a college football fan, you have to be rooting for Oregon State to go to the Rose Bowl, right? Can you imagine what odds you could have gotten on this when Oregon State was 1-2 (with a loss to Stanford and a blowout loss to Penn State) and about to play USC on Thursday night back in September?

Oklahoma (-7) at Oklahoma State- The over/under on this game is 72. Meaning, if you have a hearbeat, you should be watching come Saturday night. Oklahoma State hasn't beaten Oklahoma since 2002. Is this the game where people finally sit around and realize that Sam Bradford has 42 touchdowns against 6 interceptions? I think the Heisman is his to lose today. Either that or all the Big 12 voters will conflict with one another and Tim Tebow will snag another one. We'll see. Personally, my vote is for the Oklahoma girl at the top of the preview.

Already Obama put some dents in the Republican South by winning North Carolina, Virginia, and Florida. Southern states like Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia, Arkansas, and Louisiana went for Bill Clinton and have demonstrated that they will vote for southern Democrats. Neither Obama nor his Vice President is Southern, but, and this is key, they do hate the BCS. An opinion that is shared, conservatively, by 99.9% of all Southerners. (The only thing we're more in favor of down here is pre-marital abstinence for everyone but yourself.) Keep attacking the BCS and pretty soon those favorability ratings are going to climb in Tennessee and Georgia and Alabama. Not to mention Mississippi and Louisiana. Even Texas and Oklahoma. Anyway, something to think about when there isn't much to think about after this week's status quo round of games. Obama is already crazy like a fox. If he brings down the BCS, no Republican on earth is beating him in 2012.

1. Florida beat Spurrier and South Carolina 56-6. This is the worst loss of Steve Spurrier's coaching career. Prior to this game South Carolina's defense was number 3 in the nation and the most points they'd given up all season was 24. Remember when Tim Tebow cried and said no one was ever going to work harder after the Ole Miss loss? And you and all your friends made fun of him for crying? Yeah, he was right. And it pains me to say this but no one is beating Florida for the reason of the season. And it's possible no game will be close.

2. The long march towards the ACC Championship remains steeped in confusion. Miami now holds the Coastal Division lead at 4-2 but has two road games (at Georgia Tech and at N.C. State remaining). If Tech wins then we're all set for our four-way 5-3 tie. Meanwhile, with their win over North Carolina, Maryland — Maryland! — has surged into the lead of the Atlantic Division. But I almost feel like even writing about the ACC race is steeped in futility.

3. After their Friday night win over Louisville all Cincinnati has to do to win the Big East is beat Pitt next week and then close out with a road win over Syracuse. But if Pitt wins then the Big East would come down to the West Virginia-Pitt game on the final week of the season. Can you imagine the television ratings that a Cincinnati-Utah BCS game would get? The Fox network might assassinate Brian Kelly. Thank god we've got the BCS to put together four games that no one cares about.

4. Remember a couple of weeks ago when Tulsa was undefeated and in the top 20. Then they lost to Arkansas? Yeah, Houston just dropped 70 on them on Saturday. Including 63 in the first three quarters. Also, don't look now but Rice is now contending to win their division in Conference USA. The nerds are inheriting the football turf.

5. Oregon State continued their run towards the Rose Bowl with a win over Cal. Now they have a game at Arizona and close out at home against Oregon. Win both and they're in for the first time since 1965.

6. Vandy is bowl eligible for the first time since 1982 thanks to their win over Kentucky. (Talk about a bad weekend in the Bluegrass...the Wildcat basketball team lost to Stonewall Jackson's VMI.) This ended the longest bowl drought from a big 6 conference school. Baylor, without a bowl since 1994, the football made of feces is now in your hands. Vandy's D.J. Moore is the best player you've never heard of. He scored two touchdowns at receiver and intercepted two passes. You're going to want your team to draft him when he comes out early this fall. Now the 'Dores have opened as a 3.5 point favorite over Tennessee. Meaning the end of the world is truly nigh.

7. Alabama, Texas, Penn State, and USC all held serve. Meaning nothing changed in the BCS rankings. Oh, and Utah is 11-0 and Boise State is now 10-0. But no one's really paying attention to either team. For now there is one game and one game only, Texas Tech at Oklahoma. Let the planning begin. Personally, I'm watching Texas Tech-Oklahoma without any pants. Which is completely normal.

Cincinnati (-4) at Louisville- The Bearcats win the Big East if they can win on the road tonight at Louisville and then next week at home against Pitt. Yeah, Cincinnati might be in a BCS bowl. Prior to this the best bowl Cincinnati has ever been in is the PapaJohns Bowl. What's more they've only been to 10 bowl games in their history. Should be interesting to see how the team responds.

Miss. State at Alabama (-22)- Chances are you had no idea that Miss. State has beaten Alabama two consecutive years. And that in those two years Alabama hasn't scored an offensive touchdown. But they have. So that means Alabama probably isn't overlooking this opponent one week after they clinched the SEC West. Except, you know, this game is slotted between LSU and Auburn. Of course State also hasn't won a road game yet this season but, even still, this spread seems a bit high. Right? Especially since Alabama hasn't beaten any SEC team by more than 20 since the middle of September. But that's not stopping the Houndstooth twins, Maegen and Ashley Bailey, from remaining steadfast in their support.

Texas (-14) at Kansas- The year after their magical season the human blimp that is Mangino has returned to earth. At just 6-4, Kansas has lost every big game they've played this year, including 3 of their last 4 overall. Now Kansas has Texas and Missouri left on the schedule. Could Texas be ripe for the upset in Lawrence? If Kansas is going to have any kind of season worth remembering they have to win one of these final two. Otherwise they'll slink into a bowl at 6-6 and fans will have to convince themselves that 2007 actually happened. Don't worry, it did. We have the picture to prove it.

Meanwhile, Texas can't just win. They've got to slaughter Kansas and then sit back next weekend and root for Oklahoma to beat Texas Tech by 1. So it all comes down to the BCS standings to see who represents the Big 12 South in a three-way tie.

South Carolina at Florida (-23)- Steve Spurrier's headed back to the Swamp for the second time. In 2006, it took a blocked field goal on the final play of the game to preserve Florida's chance to play for a national championship. Now the Gators look unstoppable. But doesn't that line seem a bit high considering South Carolina has the best defense in the SEC? I think so. But then, Florida's offense has looked truly unstoppable for the past month. What would the over/under be in a hypothetical Florida/Big 12 Champion be? 85? Maybe.

Notre Dame (-4) at Navy- Remember way back when Notre Dame signed Charlie Weis to a 58 year contract extension and a few people questioned whether that was smart? And then Notre Dame fans got all upset and ripped anyone who didn't want to buy the lard from Charlie's gastric bypass surgery on eBay? Yeah, good job picking your battles. Weis's coaching record is worse than Bob Davie's. Navy has a winning record and is coming off a win at Notre Dame last year. Could Notre Dame really lose to Navy twice in a row?

Utah (-30) at San Diego State- As soon as they win this game Utah will be 11-0 and only have a home game remaining against BYU to complete a perfect regular season. Admit it, you don't care because they aren't in a Big 6 conference. God, you suck. Almost as much as San Diego State sucks. But not quite.

Ohio State (-9.5) at Illinois- One year after Ron Zook took Illinois to the Rose Bowl, he's got to beat Ohio State or Northwestern to be bowl eligible. Since September 13 Illinois has alternated wins with losses. Last week they lost. Can they take down Ohio State for the second year in a row?

Cal at Oregon State (-3)- The conspiracy to refuse to acknowledge that Oregon State remains on track to win the Pac-10 continues for yet another week. Oregon State has three games left and is standing at 5-1. Win out and they win the Pac 10 for the first time since 1965. Yet no one is paying attention to this. Except Beaver fans. Which should be everyone but Vince Young.

Georgia (-10) at Auburn- Tommy Tuberville has to beat either Georgia or Alabama to be bowl eligible. Who saw this coming? Tennessee's collapse has sort of sucked the air out of the national story surrounding Auburn. They couldn't really fire Tuberville could they? Last week Matthew Stafford saved the state of Georgia from the most dispiriting autumn since 1864. But there are still a couple of minefields remaining. This is one. Usually, anyway.

North Carolina (-3) at Maryland- Won't someone please win the ACC? In typical ACC fashion this year two new teams control their own destiny this week. If North Carolina wins all they have to do is beat N.C. State and Duke and they win the ACC's Coastal Division. That's simple enough. But if they lose? Who the hell knows. Same thing with Maryland, win their next three games and they win the Atlantic Division. Lose and we're back to being confused. What a mess.

Vandy at Kentucky (-4)- Remember back when Vandy was the feel-good story of college football and had won five games in a row? Yeah, now they've lost four consecutive games when a win could have made them bowl eligible for the first time since 1982. In two of these games, against Duke and Mississippi State, they've been favored to win. They have three games left to get that win. Can it happen in Lexington? If it doesn't you might be witnessing a pretty epic choke job.

1. Mike Leach is Blackbeard. This is how the negotiations should go to make him Tennessee's next coach. a. Rent a dumptruck b. fill dumpruck with cash c. drive dumptruck to Lubbock d. dump money in Leach's front yard. e. repeat until contract is signed. Right now Mike Hamilton should be on eBay trying to buy Blackbeard's sword and then offer to dip it in the blood of a virgin (hint she won't be a Tri-Delt in Knoxville) for signing.

There should be a stat for how often Leach's receivers score touchdowns without being touched. It's uncanny. In fact, I'm making it up right now. Le Leach. That's French for "the Leach." People in Lubbock are very worldly, they'll love this. Here's Le Leach giving the weather.

It's always sunny in Knoxville, Mike, always.

2. Iowa's Daniel Murray hadn't made a field goal since the first game of the season. Then he drilled a 31 yarder to beat Penn State by one. Credit to Iowa's coaching staff for accepting the holding penalty on the next-to-last play for Penn State. They'd stopped Penn State on third down but elected to give them another shot after moving them back ten yards. I was cursing the stupidity of this decision when the Penn State wide receiver came wide open in the middle of the field, but Darryl Clark airmailed it for a pick. Meanwhile, please tell me Daniel Murray didn't play it cool after he made this field goal. I'm hoping he showered, went straight to the sorority house and started clambanging. If he didn't, can we rescind the win?

Right now, you should definitely be thinking to yourself, this guy just clarified the BCS? Yeah, he did.

3. Florida destroyed Vanderbilt. The only time Florida didn't score on their first 7 drives was when the refs inexplicably missed a Percy Harvin touchdown and ruled that he fumbled. You know in horror movies where the villian of the film suddenly realizes he's even more powerful than he ever thought he was? This is Urban Meyer right now. Somewhere there's a hero that can slay him, but I'll be damned if I can find one.

Be honest, if you had to pick a team to win the national championship today, you'd pick Florida, wouldn't you? In later years the fact that Hailey and Hanna Nutt's dad went to Gainesville and won with this Ole Miss team is going to seem even more remarkable than it does now. As for the Alabama-Florida SEC Championship Game, I've got the feeling the folks in Miami are upset their BCS Title game is going to be upstaged a month early.

4, North Carolina is going to win the ACC's Coastal Division...maybe. The Tar Hells smacked around Georgia Tech 28-7. At least that seems somewhat likely. We'll have a better idea after Virginia Tech and Miami play on Thursday night. Win and Virginia Tech will have the tiebreak over North Carolina should both win out. But given the clusterfuck that is the ACC this year, who knows?

5. How has LSU's Jarrett Lee gotten a pass on being the worst quarterback in college football? Lee has 14 interceptions. 14! What's worse than this? 6 of those picks have been returned for touchdowns. God, if only Ryan Perrilloux were still eligible. Only, Perrilloux has 12 interceptions while playing for the Jacksonville State Gamecocks.

On the exact opposite score, how good is Alabama's Julio Jones going to be by the time he's a junior. The NFL mandate that guys stay for at least three years in college makes players like Jones into Gods. Seriously, who is going to cover this guy next year or the year after? If Julio could leave after this season he'd already be a first-round pick. At least there's no history of Alabama receivers getting injured because they couldn't leave early.

And with this hat selection, the number of children born in Alabama named Julio will increase 14,000,000%.

6. Cincinnati goes into Morgantown/Deadwood and wins 26-23 to take the inside track to the Big East's BCS bid. Beat Pitt at home on November 21 and get past Louisville and Syracuse and Cincinnati will be in the BCS. I know, ridiculous, right? Let's be honest, how many years is Bill Stewart going to be at West Virginia? Two years at most?

7. Tennessee lost to Wyoming. I know, I know, I'm really questioning a lot of things about my life right now. One of them is this, say UT's players called every play on offense from inside the huddle by the quarterback sketching the routes on his hand. Could we score more than a touchdown in a game? I'm thinking yes. That offensive coordinator money has been really well spent this year and the Clawfense is appropriately named if only because I'd rather claw my eyes out than watch it any longer.

To help clear the palate, here are two more pictures of Hailey and Hanna rocking the football uniform.

Ohio State (-11) at Northwestern- Who's rooting harder for Ohio State to finish the rest of the season without a blemish than Penn State fans? The answer is no one. Back in 2004 Northwestern upset Ohio State. Fresh off their road upset of Minnesota can Northwestern pull off another shocker? A noon kickoff probably helps. But having intelligent football players probably hurts. Damn.

Georgia Tech at North Carolina (-4)- The ACC is a swamp of mediocrity. Every team in the Coastal Dvision of the ACC already has two losses. The loser of this game will definitely be eliminated from contention. I think. But who really knows? A win and UNC has their first winning season since 2001. Tech's quarterback, Josh Nesbitt, may not be able to play. Enjoy.

Alabama (-3.5) at LSU- - Coming soon, a congressional inquiry into how LSU fans are capable of figuring out football player's cell phone numbers. Two weeks ago Knowshon and Stafford responded to their cell phone numbers being leaked with their best games of the season? Can JPW do the same? Who knows? Better question, how many people in Alabama commit suicide if Bama loses to LSU and then finds a way to lose to an awful Auburn team for the 7th year in a row, meaning they don't even win the SEC West. Over/under is 15. Including the always eloquent Cowboy.

Kansas State at Missouri (-27.5)- The over/under on this game opened at 74. That's truly unbelievable. Well, that and the fact that everyone has written off Missouri as a factor in the national scene. Am I the only one who sees Missouri upsetting the Big 12 South winner in the Big 12 title game? Yeah? Oh well.

Florida (-24) at Vandy- Since losing to Ole Miss 31-30 Florida has outscored their past four SEC opponents 201-43. Included were two top ten wins over Georgia and LSU. That's an average of 50-10. Now they get Vandy. A team that scored 7 points against Duke to lose their third consecutive game. This is going to be incredibly ugly. It's a good thing ESPN picked up this game for national broadcast.

Penn State (-7) at Iowa- Can Penn State stop Iowa's tailback Shon Greene from running? If so, they'll blow Iowa out. If they can't, this game might give Joe Paterno heartburn. That's provided, of course, that he actually realizes what the stakes are for his team that remains slotted at BCS #3. Earlier this week Paterno was confused whether it was BCS or BSC. This is Penn State's last road game.

Arizona (-41) at Washington State- In their last two games Washington State has been outscored 127-0. That's bad. What's worse? In their last five games WSU has been outscored 284-30. WSU's defense averages giving up 49.4 points a game. Is there any doubt that the Washington-Washington State game is going to be the most futile "rivalry" game in the country this year? 1-10 vs. 0-10. I can't wait.

Oklahoma State at Texas Tech (-3)- If you don't really have a rooting interest, don't you have to favor Mike Leach in the BCS Title game? Most coaches are circumspect and reserved. Leach is an insane lawyer who graduated from Pepperdine and, wife and child in tow, took a coaching job for $7,000 a year . By the way, if you haven't read Michael Lewis's profile piece on Leach from three years ago in the New York Times, now is the time to do it. One of the best profiles I've ever read. Sample line: Each off-season, Leach picks something he is curious about and learns as much as he can about it: Geronimo, Daniel Boone, whales, chimpanzees, grizzly bears, Jackson Pollock.

Cal at USC (-22)- Do you ever get the feeling that no matter how much the linemaker installs USC as favorites by the line is going to move higher? And USC is still going to find a way to cover. I'm picturing some sallow-skinned man sitting in front of a bank of computers slowly pulling out his red hair while game film of Pete Carroll strutting down the sideline plays on a constant loop. Yep, it just happened again. USC opened as 17 point favorites and now they're up to 22.

"Finally, we'd like to point out the Facebook effort "Jort-Out Georgia." People think that by looking like white trash, they'll perform better on the field. Trust us, not even kryptonite can stop Knowshon Moreno." But you know what can stop you from having sex? Writing editorials for your college newspaper. Anyway, Jort-Out Georgia is alive and well on facebook here. And I have to say, as lame and gay as the blackout was at Georgia, the jort-out is close to genius. Or close enough to genius to be equated as such when it comes to SEC football. (Note: literacy and ability to count to one-hundred also suffice.)
On to the games.

West Virginia (-4) at UConn- Are the Mountaineers poised to regain their rightful place at the top of the Big East standings or will UConn hang the first conference loss on West Virginia? Right now UConn is 2-1 with the tiebreak over Louisville and West Virginia is the only team undefeated in conference. In the wake of last night's South Florida defeat the Big East race has now been sliced to a six-team affair. West Virginia has won 4 in a row since bad road losses to mediocre East Carolina and Colorado football teams. But all those wins were in Morgantown/Deadwood. Can they step outside of conference and pull off a win? If you're like the rest of us you'll be waiting with bated breath. (Note, by waiting with bated breath, I mean not noticing at all.)

Northwestern at Minnesota (-7)- Who's about to become the hottest coach you've never heard of in college football? Minnesota's Tim Brewster. That happens when you can bring a top 20 recruiting class in despite a 1-11 record and when you start the next season 7-1. Minnesota in the Rose Bowl for the first time since 1966? Don't stop believing Gophers, don't stop believing.

Michigan at Purdue (-2)- Did you know that Purdue was 2-6? I didn't either. This is a high school girl's slapfest. One of these teams is going to finish 2-10. Which one? The one that doesn't win this game.

Miami at Virginia (-2)- All hail your coastal division champion Virginia Cavaliers. Stop laughing. I wrote last week that this was going to happen. Now it's even more likely. Oddsmakers are starting to take note of the Al Groh resurgence; the line moved from Miami favored by 1 to UVa by 2.

Auburn at Ole Miss (-6.5)- Tommy Tuberville limps back to Oxford with a 4-4 record and is almost a touchdown underdog to Ole Miss. Auburn fans are sharpening their knives to lop of off Tubs's oversized ears. Is this in any way justified with his past success? No. Can Auburn attract a better coaching candidate? No. Will this stop them from calling for his head if they lose to Ole Miss? Nope.

Pittsburgh at Notre Dame (-5)- Isn't it amazing how all the criticism of the media love affair with Notre Dame has finally taken hold? There's been virtually no mention of Notre Dame's five wins and they aren't ranked. Wannstedt has had a week to get over the 54 points his team gave up to Rutgers last week. This is just the sort of game Pitt has won under Wannstedt. Or lost by 50. Meanwhile Notre Dame has still not beaten a team with a winning record.

Arizona State at Oregon State (-14)- Is there a media conspiracy that doesn't want to point out that if Oregon State (currently 3-1 in the Pac-10) wins out, they win the Pac-10? You didn't realize they hadn't lost a Pac-10 game since they swamped USC either, did you? The world will be up in arms if Oklahoma slides into the BCS Title game without winning the Big 12. But if USC does it from the Pac-10? No one will even notice.

Tulsa (-7) at Arkansas- The Imma kick the shit out of you former-Arkansas coaching staff victory tour will continue another week. Last week Houston Nutt rolled into Fayetteville and beat his old team. This week Gus Malzahn, Tulsa's offensive coordinator, gets his shot. Tulsa's got the best offense you haven't heard of. They're averaging 625 yards of offense per game and 56.6 points. Averaging. David Johnson, their quarterback, has 32 touchdown passes already. If Malzahn doesn't get a head coaching job sometime soon, there is no justice in the universe.

Oregon at Cal (-3)- Two of the other one-loss Pac-10 teams are playing. What's going to give, Oregon's 278 yard per game rushing attack or Cal's defense that's allowing less than a 100 rushing yards a game. Will this game feature the most weed-smoking per capita on the season? I think so.

Florida (-6.5) v. Georgia- All you need to know about this game comes from ESPN:

Tired of struggling to find enough teachers to staff its classrooms on the Friday before the annual Georgia-Florida football game, the Clarke County (Ga.) School District — which includes Athens, home of the University of Georgia — decided to cancel school altogether.

According to area media reports, 137 teachers last year called in sick the day before the big game, and the district was able to find only 113 substitutes.

School administrators studied the absences over the years and found a pattern — almost twice as many teachers call in sick the Friday before the annual game in Jacksonville, Fla., about 360 miles away, than on an average school day.

Yeah, I can't wait to see this game either. Fuck reading and writing.

Washington at Southern Cal (-47)- The line opened at 43 and quickly moved to 47. Seriously, shouldn't there be a rule that if you're favored by more than 35 over a fellow conference foe that the team you're favored over has to leave the conference for a year?

Texas at Texas Tech (-3.5)- If you're not rooting for Mike Leach to win this game, then you're a communist. If Leach the piriate wins he might get on the team bus, drive to Athens, and allow his team loose to plunder the city. Honestly. I'm just hoping it comes down to the walk-on kicker from 30 yards to win or lose the game. Remember how I keep saying that the winning quarterback of this game has the Heisman locked up? This time I mean it. Colt McCoy has 21 touchdowns, an 81.3 completion percentage, and has thrown for 2285 yards. Graham Harrell has thrown for 28 touchdowns and 3147 yards. In case you've been living under a rock both teams are undefeated. Let the scoring begin.

1. Texas is your new consensus number one. Which will surprise a lot of people who haven't been paying attention to the season thus far because Texas lept all the way from number five to claim the top spot. One Shakespeare, William memorably summed up the college football universe by stating "uneasy lies the head that wears the crown." And in the current age of college football this is always applicable. But even more so for Texas. The Longhorns next three games? Missouri, Oklahoma State, and at Texas Tech. So in four consecutive weeks Texas plays the number 1 team (Oklahoma), the number 11 team in Missouri (who last week was number 3), the number 8 team in Oklahoma State, and the number 7 team in Texas Tech. What's that all mean? In one month, Texas plays 4 of the top 11 teams in the country. As if that weren't enough they still have number 16 Kansas hanging out there at the end of their schedule plus a Big 12 Title Game. If Texas wins all these games to get to 13-0 they shouldn't even have to play in the BCS Title Game.

2. What's even more important than losing? Everyone still thinking you're good after you've lost. That's the only way to explain how Florida is already back to number 5 in the country two weeks after a home loss to a below average SEC team in Ole Miss and how Oklahoma is still number 4 in the country after a loss to Texas on Saturday. Oklahoma's next four games are significantly easier than the schedule Texas faces. So if Texas loses one of these games does Oklahoma jump them in the polls or does Texas fall one or two slots only?

Meanwhile, it's looking as if Florida and Georgia will play an elimination game at the Cocktail Party. But if you're a Georgia fan don't you have to scratch you head about the polls now? You were ranked higher than Florida prior to your losses and lost to the number 2 team in the country. Florida lost to an unranked team with no other SEC wins. Both were home losses. Yet Florida is number 5 now and Georgia is number 10? I've argued that Georgia was overrated early in the season, but I don't see how anyone can justify Florida jumping six places after a win over LSU. Basically the Ole Miss loss is already being tossed aside as if it didn't happen. Why? Because the pollsters are all convinced Florida is that good. Even if they lost.

3. Four of the top 11 teams in the country are now in the Big 12 South. Meaning, for at least a season, the Big 12 South has eclipsed the SEC East as the toughest single division in college football. Here's a mess for you, what if Texas wins the South via a tiebreak over Oklahoma then loses the Big 12 Title to a two-loss Missouri team. It could easily happen. Then Oklahoma doesn't win their own division title and leapfrogs not only the conference champion but also the division champion to play for the BCS Title? Yeah, absurd.

4. The fevered dream of Northwestern and Vandy in the BCS title game went down to an untimely defeat with the Dores loss at Mississippi State and Northwestern's loss at home to Michigan State. Sing a sad song with me. I suggest Wonderwall.

5. Overheard from a player on the UT-Georgia sideline, "At least we're not Michigan losing at home to Toledo." Fortunately Toledo is not on the UT schedule this season.

6. Some of you took my lock advice Friday and laid money on Texas Tech as a 20 point favorite. Yeah, that didn't work out so well. As Deadspinner Jason emailed late on Saturday night, "You, sir, make a lousy financial advisor. I'm going to hire Ferdinand Williams to break your kneecaps."

(For those of you who don't know, Ferd Williams was a GW basketball player in the 1996 and 1997 season. Judging from his career shooting percentage, it's very likely he'd swing a hammer to break my kneecaps and instead hit himself in the lower lumbar region.)

7. One month ago I got several emails from people who were racist against the state of Utah about how ridiculous my hyping of the BYU-Utah game was. Still feel that way? BYU is up to number 8 in the Harris Poll. Anyone looking at the top ten and betting on an undefeated team emerging from the Big 6 conferences is a fool (or a Penn State fan since they have by far the best shot). Could an undefeated BYU with a top ten win over Utah on the final week of the regular season really not get a sniff at the BCS Title Game?

8. Mike Gundy has Oklahoma State as a player on the national scene. I have no idea what's going to come of this but it can only be good things. Prior to this you'll recall that Gundy is A.) a man and B. 40. Now he's also in the top ten. Does anyone else get the feeling that the interview process for head coaches at Oklahoma State doesn't even include words? Head coaching candidates just walk into the room, pull down their pants, and throw their gigantic balls on the AD's desk. That's the only way to explain how a school can follow up hiring Les Miles with Mike Gundy.

(Because this never gets old.)

9. Ohio State is not going to play for the national championship no matter what they do the rest of the season. They're still pegged in at number 12. There are 5 one loss teams ahead of them and 6 undefeated teams. In the Harris Interactive poll (which is the one that counts in the BCS), Ohio State actually fell to 13. Consider this the retroactive punishment for 2007 and 2008 losses. Come hell (the return of or high water (an 11-1 finish), Ohio State is not playing for the BCS title.

10. Which team has lost the most based upon an upset loss to a mediocre team? How about Virginia Tech? Beat rapidly fading East Carolina (they've lost three in a row) and worst-case scenerio they're number 4 in the country now. Ouch.

11. Finally, in case you missed the Miami-Central Florida game (which, to be fair, we all did), Central Florida brought their own versions of the Ibis to the house. Miami managed to survive the double-fingered bird salute and triumphed 20-14.

Texas v. Oklahoma (-6.5)- According to Texas fans Colt McCoy is the white Vince Young. Their stats are comparable but it's yet to be determined whether their big game heroics and sanity are equally similar. Although rumor has it that Colt has been rolling into Austin bars shirtless and swilling Patron for months. Make of this what you will.

Meanwhile Sam Bradford of Oklahoma has already thrown 18 touchdown passes. Seriously, 18. Colt only has 16. Both men have thrown 3 picks. So their combined touchdown to interception ratio is 34-6. This would be more impressive if either team had played a legit top 25 opponent yet. But they haven't.

Both the Texas and Oklahoma offenses average over 45 points a game while each is giving up less than two touchdowns. In a stroke of mathematical precision that has yet to be noted by anyone in either Texas or Oklahoma both teams average margin of victory is 35.8. So something has got to give. (Brent Musberger made himself a legend by intoning the previous cliche with the proper measure of respect.) Just be careful, this game is set for 12 eastern. Set the damn alarm.

South Carolina (-3) at Kentucky- It's rare you see a line move four points. This one has. After opening as one-point favorites the Cats now find themselves three-point home dogs. I have no idea what this signifies. Except somehow I think Stephen Garcia is behind the magically moving line. I'm expecting him to go all Achilles on us and decapitate Kentucky's quarterback Mike Hartline during warm-ups. Word is he blames Hartline for killing Patroclus. Remember where you heard it first. Unless you're a police officer then...ha...lucky guess.

Nebraska at Texas Tech (-20)- It's even rarer I give gambling advice, but right now take all of the money that you've got left in stocks, cash out (go ahead and take your tax losses), and put it on Texas Tech to cover the 20 point line. Seriously, do it. Nebraska has the defense of a southern Theta at a Dave Matthews concert. Which is to say none. Back the truck up at the sports book. Do it now. Do it. (Not that you still subscribe to peer pressure anymore but if you don't do this then I'm telling everyone that you slept with special sheets to keep your mattress from getting soaked when you still wet your bed at the age of 16.)

(Mike Leach will make you one rich ass dude. Trust me.)

Tennessee at Georgia (-12)-- As you're reading this I'm somewhere in the backwoods of Georgia on the Tennessee team bus. If the Vols allow a punt return for a touchdown you'll probably be able to hear me squealing on the television contest. In what might be a Deadspin first, email me if you're driving back from Athens to Nashville. I don't have a ride home since the team is returning home via plane. This is not a joke.

Oklahoma State at Missouri (-14)- This is one of three games that Missouri could potentially lose in the regular season. The other two are at Texas and against Kansas on the final week. They probably won't lose this game but it should be entertaining as hell. Oklahoma State's under the radar. If they can score in the 40's, they won't be after this weekend. Regardless, Chase Daniel and Warren Buffet's album is so going platinum when it drops next week.

Arkansas at Auburn (-17)- How bad is Arkansas? Auburn hasn't scored more than two offensive touchdowns in the SEC this year and they just fired their offensive coordinator, yet they're favored by 17. I'm really just mentioning this game so I can link Tony Franklin clearing out his office. Which they filmed in Alabama. Well, of course they did.

Penn State (-5.5) at Wisconsin- Sooner or later Wisconsin's fans are going to turn on the band and blame their sexual misconduct for all the team's misfortune. But that's in the future. Six quarters ago Wisconsin fans believed they were headed to the Rose Bowl. Now, they're just hoping not to end up in the Motor City Bowl. Yeah, the college football tides turn in a hurry.

Meanwhile this is game 2 of Penn State's march to the BCS Title game. Win and it's looking like their road game at Ohio State will decide the Big Ten title. Lose...and it's still looking like their road game at Ohio State will decide the Big Ten title.

LSU at Florida (-6)- Just once I'd like to see the world through Les Miles colored glasses. Nothing in life is uncertain to Les Miles. He's the least doubting man in America. As a consequence he's fearless. That's the only way to explain his success. Hemingway said, "The world breaks everyone and afterward many are stronger at broken places." I disagree, the world has never broken Les Miles. And it never will.

Conversely, the world breaks Tim Tebow after every game. He cries, he mopes, he swears fealty to an angry God. Last year LSU fans got Tebow's phone number, this year, they're gunning for his football life. Which they cleverly informed the referees. Meaning LSU gets flagged for at least two late hits in the first half. The resulting points from those drives will probably be enough to make a difference.

a. Guard Ramon Foster picks up his arm to turn around and try to hear what audible Jonathan Crompton is calling. My best guess as to this audible? Watch me throw it really hard into the ground.

b. Tennessee kicks to Brandon James allowing him to return a punt for a touchdown against us for the third consecutive season. (The 2006 return was negated by a phantom block in the back call). Think about how amazing this is. Next year he’s going to become the first player in history to return a punt for a touchdown in four consecutive seasons.

c. Jonathan Crompton decides to run for it on 3rd and 21 after facing modest pressure.

d. Despite there being no one lined up over the center (meaning even I could have scored from one yard out on the quarterback sneak) Crompton goes play-action.

e. The Arian Foster fumble montage aired by CBS. I got more emails about this than anything.

Also, after his third quarter touchdown to Percy Harvin, Florida had outscored UT 58-0 since the third quarter of last year's game. And I'd seen all those points in person. This is no rivalry anymore. Here’s a round-up of 11 other notable things in college football this week after the jump:

1. Scene: Knoxville bar on Thursday night. Guy in West Virginia baseball cap has his back turned to the game during overtime of the Colorado game that his team would lose 17-14. Leaving aside the questionable decision to roll solo to a bar for a game night, how are you actually clad in team gear and not watching while your team is in overtime? Anyway, good hire on Bill Stewart. The guy knows his clapping.

2. The Terrelle Pryor Experience has officially begun. Four touchdown passes and 66 yards running in the 28-10 win over Troy. Are Ohio State fans starting to do the BCS math on 11-1? Former starting quarterback Todd Boeckman ran two plays and was booed mercilessly by the crowd. Prompting this response from defensive lineman Lawrence Wilson:"Hey, we're just kids. We're not professionals. There's no way that adults should treat us that way." News flash, you’re also adults. People younger than you get killed in Iraq every day. But at least no one boos them.

3. Wake Forest over Florida State for the third consecutive year. Third. Think about this, prior to the 2006 season what odds could you have gotten that Wake was going to be beat FSU three times in a row (and twice at Doak-Campbell)? Would there have even been a line? What if you’d shown up at a Vegas casino with a truck of cash and asked them to come up with the odds for you? You’d own the Strip now. In other news, FSU still sucks at quarterback. This level of futility is mind-boggling. Year after year FSU knows they suck at quarterback, everyone (including dozens of blue-chip quarterbacks) know they suck at quarterback, and yet nothing is changing. Chris Weinke is going to end up with a bronze statue outside the stadium soon.

4. Charlie Weis and Notre Dame took a beating from Michigan State. In the process, the horribly named Laptopgate arose because Notre Dame had a laptop in the press box. Fortunately Charlie Weis shot down the problems with that. "The last thing I ever want to do is lie," he told the AP. Of course, why would we ever think otherwise?

5. Vandy is in the top 25 for the first time since 1984 after a 20-17 road win over Ole Miss. No one saw this game because it wasn’t televised anywhere but it featured the inexplicable (a fumble into the end zone as Ole Miss prepared to score and take the lead), as well as four picks from Jevan Snead and a winning team that put up half the offensive output as the losing team. Regardless, the Vandy win has some Auburn fans saying they’re more scored of the ‘Dores in two weeks than they are UT next week. This is ominous. What’s best of all for Vandy about the timing of their ranking? They have a bye week this week so they’ll be ranked for two consecutive weeks. Meaning they’ll set a new record since the 1984 ranking only lasted for a single week. There hasn't been partying like this on campus since the AP test results came back. A 4 in English Composition. Score!

6. Miami stomped Texas A&M 41-23. Admit it, you didn’t know this game was happening either, did you? Miami is still floating under the radar, but I think there’s a decent argument to be made that Randy Shannon has got them on the way back up. As for A&M? Wow. Things aren’t turning so quick. Maybe that two-day coaching search was a bit abrupt?

7. Oregon goes down to Boise State 37-32 meaning USC is already the only remaining unbeaten Pac-10 team. I have lots of Pac-10 readers at Oregon. This makes perfect sense. So, soon after Brandon James’ punt-return for a touchdown, I get this text message, “It could be worse, you could be losing to Boise State.” I think my situation is worse. I’d rather lose to Boise State once than have Brandon James return a punt for a touchdown against my team for the third consecutive year.

8. UCLA’s continuing demise. For two weeks the question was whether UCLA was good or UT was bad. The latter has been confirmed. Since the UT win UCLA has been outscored 90-10: 59-0 by BYU and 31-10 by Arizona. This means UCLA is almost more painful than the Florida loss. Almost.

9. The Big 12’s top teams continue to avoid one another and all remain in the top 10. Texas Tech puts on a 56-14 beat down of UMass. (This would have been a better basketball game. Maybe.) Texas beats Rice 52-10, Missouri beats Buffalo 42-21, and Oklahoma has a bye week. In the Missouri game Chase Daniel completed 20 straight en route to 439 yards passing. Yet, every time I see him, Daniel looks fatter. You too, right? He’s definitely gorging on giant drum sticks. I picture him living in an old house off campus with only one large room. It’s just got a giant chair-throne in the shape of an M that also doubles as a bed. He has a remote control that raises him up to eat and then lowers him back down when the groupies arrive to service him. Occasionally he has sex while eating the giant drum stick.

So it’s probably fortunate that Missouri doesn’t get Oklahoma or Texas Tech on the regular season schedule this year. If they can both get past the Texas game (Oklahoma also gets Texas Tech), it really looks like a Big 12 title game between Missouri and Oklahoma could be a match-up of undefeated teams. At least the Big 12 has a title game. If this was the Big Ten and the teams didn’t play we’d all be subjected to a month’s worth of Herbstreit telling us why the two teams should be given co-national titles without playing.

10.The best game of the day was LSU-Auburn. LSU comes from down 14-3 at the half to win 26-21 on the road against one of the best defenses in the country. Meaning that, at times, it remains more important to have a confident coach than an intelligent coach. Credit to Les Miles for dialing up the trick play score and the ballsy (as if that’s a surprise by now) late touchdown pass on the final drive (although not nearly as late this year).

Question for ESPN: Why did we need shot after shot of a clearly disoriented Andrew Hatch on the sideline? Yeah, it sucks he had a concussion, but this was borderline making fun of his injury. Imagine if someone had a hurt knee, would they keep showing him sitting on crutches while making fun of the fact that his leg wasn’t working? Why do that with Hatch when a head injury is clearly much more dangerous than a leg or arm injury would be?

Credit to redshirt freshman Jarrett Lee bouncing back from the worst interception of the year to lead LSU on the comeback. After he threw the first pick, there was zero faith among LSU fans that he could seal the deal after the Hatch injury. Well done by Lee. I can’t help but think that Miles being insanely confident rubs off on his team. Sometimes insane confidence is better than intelligence. Just ask George W. Bush.

11. There are six non-BCS teams ranked in the top 25. Three from the Mountain West (BYU, Utah, and TCU.) If anyone but USC wins the Pac-10, the Mountain West should take out a newspaper ad on the west coast and proclaim their top team the Pac-10 champion as well. East Carolina hung in despite finding a way to lose to N.C. State and Boise State joined Fresno State, who survived after their crazy overtime win, in the top 25.

1. ESPN's love affair with Tim Tebow is well established. Hell, America's love affair with Tim Tebow is well established. But, even still, did Gameday really need to bring us multiple segments featuring a shirtless Tim Tebow working out? I didn't think the day would ever come where I'd want more footage of Tebow performing circumcisions but, yeah, it did. It's time Vegas starts offering odds on what Tim Tebow's dark side actually is. I'm convinced it's something seismic. Like ESPN is going to do a story from Tebow's apartment where a shirtless Tebow will be reclining on his couch when suddenly 28 little naked Filipino boys keep walking into the room. Speaking of which, how overwhelming was the sexual tension when Erin Andrews interviewed Tebow after the game. Like televised viagra. Is ESPN going to have to pull Andrews off Gator games soon?

2. When did Houston Nutt get fat? The guy has put on about 20 pounds since he joined Ole Miss. Is this because he's not sending as many text messages to hot reporters now? Or does expecting to get fired burn many more calories than having job security? Also, starting quarterback Jevan Snead is white? I'm going to have to really reconsider how many third down conversions he's picking up when the pocket crumbles.

3. Riley Skinner and Sam Swank are Wake Forest football stars. They also have the greatest gay porn names this side of Vince Young. What's the over/under on number of inappropriate posters that are getting confiscated at rival ACC stadiums connected to Skinner's naked photos? Better question, name a BCS team that you would eliminate from contention to win the ACC this year. There isn't one. Vanderbilt would have a chance to win the ACC this year. Seriously, they would.

4. The Bill Stewart honeymoon is over; The Skip Holtz derby is going to be fascinating. Couple of questions about this game. First, what percentage of people turned on West Virginia at ECU and said, "Why is West Virginia playing at ECU?" Any college football fan with a pulse is the answer. This still makes no sense to me. Second, how many more awkward Lou Holtz and Skip Holtz interviews are we going to be subjected to? This thing made The Hills look inspired and fresh. Finally, in the wake of the latest double-digit underdog loss, I'm picturing bodies stacked like cordwood in the ditches surrounding Morgantown/Deadwood. All day Monday there are funeral processions marching up the hills which will end in a wooden cross being stabbed into the bare dirt. Then no one will ever question what happened to the dead. Which reminds me, who made the decision to cut Deadwood yet greenlit an HBO show about southern vampires? Meanwhile, right now, some poor fan base is going to pay Skip Holtz millions of dollars a year to take over their football program after this season. Tough luck.

(This man above will break your spirits. Eventually. But at least his nipples will be as sharp as razors.)

5. Jake Locker has to be the most frustrating quarterback in the country to coach. You have zero clue what he's going to do from one play to the next. His performance on the final drive of the game crystallized this fact. On three consecutive downs he missed wide open receivers. Leading a Utah native I was watching the game with to say, "See, this is when starting white cornerbacks starts to catch up with BYU." Then on 4th and 10 he drops back to pass and rushes for ten yards for the first down. Then, you've all seen it, he scores with 2 seconds left and promptly gets flagged for tossing the ball over his head. What I love about this is how everyone immediately rushes to the rule book to confirm that by rule this is excessive celebration. No shit.

But referees aren't hired to merely enforce the rules without any self-awareness. If they were every college football coach in America would be kicked out of the game for entering the field and arguing a call. What we ask referees to do is show discretion in applying the rules. Consider the situation, consider the intent, and consider the implications of your call. And the ref showed none in this case. Making a call like this isn't unheard of. The same thing happened to Vanderbilt against Florida in the 2005 season. Vandy scored to tie the game and their receiver did a shimmy of sorts. He was immediately flagged and Vandy had to make the ensuing extra point from a great distance. Vandy's coach said they would have gone for 2 and the win rather than play for overtime.

Finally, on Locker, whoever was calling the game for Fox Sports said that Locker would be the best running back in the Pac-10 if he played running back instead of quarterback. This is an insanely stupid comment, right? I'm not an expert on Pac 10 football but this can't possibly be the case.

6. Ohio State survived against mighty Ohio. Yeah, yeah. Is there any college football fan in the country who doesn't root for Ohio State that doesn't want USC to beat them 50-3? That was a couple of double negatives there and might have gotten confusing. Rephrased, unless you're a Buckeye fan the entire country wants to see you utterly destroyed come this weekend. Also, after the game we're traveling to the state and stealing all of your attractive women. All 14 of them.

7. What's up with Jimmy Clausen's hair? He looks like a lame French bus boy from 1963. "Quelle horreur, le JFK!" Was this a penalty for losing the Beer Olympics? Or is he just trying to enjoy having hair before the Clausen genes click in an he follows in the footsteps of Rick and Casey and loses his blond hair? I'm going with the latter. Nice win for the Irish hanging with the plucky San Diego State team that lost to a Div. II school last week. Great moxie. Put them in the top 25.

8. Can we get a referendum on no one else being allowed to be referred to as Tim Tebow-esque? Dave Rowe (who has moved from JP/LF/Raycom to Fox Sports; did he see the ax coming?) constantly referred to Central Michigan quarterback Dan LeFevour as Tim Tebow-esque. Same thing with Jake Locker. As much as I hate the Gators, find another comparison. LeFevour is Jonathan Crompton-esque at best.

9. Did you see Randy Shannon's reaction when Urban Meyer kicked the field goal to cover the spread—this made the score 26-3 and covered the 22 point spread— late on Saturday night? Shannon was cursing Meyer to the high heavens. Which led to the shortest post-game handshake between the two men this side of Bill Belichick. Also, Gators fans, back me up on this, leaving Tebow in until the end of the game was incredibly stupid, right? Why is Meyer doing this? What's more, why is he dropping Tebow back to pass with a unassailable lead and less than five minutes to play? Especially when Tebow had been decked a ton of times in this game. Miami's defensive line absolutely dominated Florida's offensive line for about 50 minutes of the game. Steve Spurrier used to catch an awful lot of crap for running up the score but Meyer does it more than any coach I've seen of late. Of course this might be because Steve Spurrier's teams can't score anymore, but, still, there were lots of Gator fans pissed that Tebow was still in the game, right?

10. I just finished Wille Morris's book, The Courting of Marcus Dupree. It's an amazing book that tells the story of Marcus Dupree, the top recruit of the 1982 football class who happens to be from Philadelphia, Mississippi—the town made infamous by the murder of the three Civil Rights workers in 1964. The book is over 25 years old but is one of the best sports books I've ever read. Insightful, compelling, and if you're like me and had never heard of Marcus Dupree before, incredibly compelling. Fairly often people email me wanting tips on sports books to read. Read this book. I sort of feel like LeVar Burton now.

11. And, lest we end with the literary, Central Florida fans threatened to kill Matt Grothe's father after they got ahold of his cell phone number. Meaning Grothe's father was under police protection for the entire game between South Florida and Central Florida. Ahh, college, such sweet and harmless prankery.

If you don’t care about college football, leave. This being Deadspin, I’m sure every other reader or so has a “MEH” or “kol-ledge foot-bawl?” comment preloaded and ready to go. If this is you, I implore you: go fuck yourselves with a petrified cockatiel. (Edit: A live cockatiel would do, too. It will struggle, thus giving you the full anal torsion you crave! Like mother, like commenter.)

I’m sure Busted Coverage has some “Chick you’d vault onto your pole,” or “pictures of a girl who wouldn't fuck you ever,” or something else that will keep you amused for the three minutes it will take you not to read this. Take that deathless witticism ready to spring from the mental toaster oven like a shit-filled Hot Pocket, and go have that snack by yourself, anger ninja.

Also unwelcome would be any of Clay’s shit about Florida girls having fat arms, us all wearing jorts, or “America’s Wang.” Oh, you watched the Simpsons between 1988 and 2000! How erudite you are without being effete! And the fat arms! No fat chicks! RUMSFELD, brah!!! It's awesome that every chick on the internet would fuck you, but you won't give it to them because YOU HAVE STANDARDS, BRAH!

For the assholes left in the room, one half-assed review of Florida coming up, presented by a cut-rate bizarro Dwight Schrute. Note: NOT Dan Shanoff.

STRENGTHS

Our ability to recruit bulky, hopelessly evangelical middle-class white quarterbacks. Tim Tebow was described as “a fullback at quarterback” before he threw for 3286 yards and 32 TDs last year. Now he is being touted as “the best 9-4 quarterback who ever won the Heisman” by grown men who are afraid of their pastors, namely Georgia fans. Cockatiels, petrified and live, in double doses for them all.

He’s good, you’ll hear too much about him, and ESPN will assign a stalker female reporter to shadow his every move. We’re hoping it’s Erin Andrews. I don’t read enough about her on the internet, though the guys at http://yetanothercreepyphotofErinAndrews’clearlyoutlinedlabiayesyesnodude.com are doing a fine job filling the void in this sorely needed coverage.

Our coach, who had his soul removed in a surgical procedure known as the “Parcells Excision”, feels no joy, and has sat his windowless office all offseason texting recruits, watching film in the dark, and running through hallways full of hired thugs with a hammer to unwind.

Any of these is possible, since after three years no one knows anything about Urban Meyer other than that he has no fingerprints, occasionally "revises his statements" made to recruits during the recruiting process, and that he considers Bill Belichick a friend. Given this last fact, he is either an imbecile, or a vampire, or both.

Our speedy types like Percy Harvin et al. Percy Harvin has missed four games over the past two years due to a wide array of injures including tendonitis of the knee, cancer of the eyebrow, and pellagra. He’s sure to miss time this year with even more exotic injuries, something not as devastating as it may appear with receivers Louis Murphy, Riley Cooper, TE Aaron Hernandez, and running backs Emmanuel Moody and Chris Rainey flashing “viable” in the options menu.

Rainey in particular bears notice. He used the word “dang” in an interview and all but admitted taking illegal benefits in high school. He is a self-described “white-girl man.” He also runs a 4.2ish 40 and appears in one of the three Youtube videos of college football highlights not set to Saliva’s “Click Click Boom.”

We’ll be fine on offense as long as Chris Rainey gets the vanilla quim brulee he craves, and Tim Tebow hears nothing of it.

WEAKNESSES

The secondary and the heart of the defensive line. Florida was 94th in the nation last year in pass defense with freshmen at both corners and at one safety position. The other safety, Tony Joiner, got caught in the middle of the season attempting to steal his car from a towing company’s impound lot. This constituted the most successful attempt Joiner had at a takeaway all season long.

The secondary is now a year older at the corners, but has gotten younger but more talented at safety with the addition of ballyhooed recruit Will Hill, who if he follows sophomore safety Major Wright’s example will display his eye-boggling talents by not just misreading developing plays, but by misjudging them in spectacular, occasionally disastrous fashion.

As for the defensive line, Florida is so thin up the middle that they’ve considered adopting a 3-3-5 look. The coaches also reinstated Ronnie Wilson, a former offensive lineman originally kicked out of the program in early 2007 for discharging a semiautomatic weapon in the middle of downtown Gainesville, and then moved him to defensive tackle.
If he brings the gun onto the field, we’ll be wildly successful. If not, it promises to be a merely mediocre defensive season, which would be a pleasant but marginal improvement over 2007.

The possibility of ESPN’s suffocating, all-crushing love descending on us.

ESPN’s love is herpes for the fan of any team: once acquired, it never really goes away, and though contracting it is a sign that you did something right, it also burns and flares up when one least expects it. Also, for the uninitiated, it causes pus-filled cankers to break out on your junk, or at least that’s what you’ll tell your significant other when that kind of thing happens.

I caught it from Jeremy Schaap’s Thursday’s profile piece on Tebow. I swear.

It’s a curse USC and Texas fans know well—ESPN’s slobbering, we mean, not herpes. (That’s an LSU specialty. We mean that in as complimentary a way as possible.)

INSERT RIVAL HERE, YOU SUCK

At the moment, it’s Georgia, a fan base who combines the monosyllabic brain of the Ohio State fanbase with the spicy proud dumb of your standard SEC fan. I’ve written about this before, but to restate: they have a single phrase answer to everything, and this answer does not vary one nit from Valdosta to Augusta.
Florida fans: JORTS!
LSU fans: CORN DOGS!
Anything else: GAY!

They’re the helpless, bleating seals of the SEC Animal Kingdom, and like seals should be clubbed from time to time and sold for their baseball caps with the pre-frayed bills—which they all invariably have. They also all wear red Dickies, which make you impervious to punches!

Or not!

As if Florida weren't competitive enough, the Orlando area is among the most competitive in all of Florida. Don't worry about politicians stealing your excitement football fans; there are 59 other pages of football analysis. On the negative side, 25 of them are about Tim Tebow.

Barack Obama & John McCain keys to latest in football and political memorabilia — the Orlando Sentinel's preview section [SportsStuff]

This 911 call is priceless. My favorite quote: "Two black males in the front, one with an extra, extra large white t-shirt and gold teeth on the bottom." What's amazing about this 911 call is how calm the caller stays throughout. Even when he thinks a large, angry football player is getting out of the car in front of him with a baseball bat. And even when he realizes it's a semi-automatic weapon as opposed to a baseball bat. That, and how the 911 dispatcher keeps saying,"Okay, I would go ahead and drive," as if people call from the University of Florida's campus while confronted by guys with AK-47's all the time. Hell, maybe they do.

Despite firing an AK-47, Florida's Wilson allowed back on team [SI.com]