Freshly hired Tennessee head coach Lane Kiffin is apparently leaving Knoxville to take over at USC. Kiffin was 7-5 in one season with the Vols, though it should be noted that he was on staff at USC for 2001-2006.

The brand-new Coach’s Trophy for the 2009 BCS Championship will of course be put on limited public display upon its arrival in Tuscaloosa.

Said display will be at a selection of local Wal-Marts.

Colt McCoy’s Unusually Tragic Boyhood Dream Comes True. Ouch.

Roll Tide.

This isn’t how I wanted them to win — granted, to build one’s team on a single player is folly — and I’ll certainly celebrate it, but Alabama didn’t beat the Longhorn’s best game. At the same time, though, a win is a win. At this level of football, you have to be able to play, and play well, after losing starters. Gilbert eventually came around, but not soon enough.

The 2009 national title game is an object lesson in the old saw about defense winning championships. McElroy had a crappy night, and depended largely on the running game — which is by definition less productive than today’s high-flying, high-scoring passing attacks. The forced turnovers, though, sealed Texas’ fate.

The final note is this: The SEC remains undefeated in BCS title play at 6-0:

• ’98 Tennessee over FSU
• ’03 LSU over Oklahoma
• ’06 Florida over Ohio State
• ’07 LSU over Ohio State
• ’08 Florida over Oklahoma
• ’09 Alabama over Texas

The Big XII has played for the title more times (7), but only brought home the trophy twice (OU over FSU in ’00, and Texas over USC in ’05).

The SEC has also sent more teams to the title game (4: Tenn., LSU, UF, UA) than any other conference. Again, the runner-up is the Big XII (OU, UT, Neb.).

Outside the SEC-Big XII sphere, things drop off quickly: No other conference has sent more than one winner, and only one (Big East) has even sent more than one team (they’re 1-2; Miami won and lost, and VaTech lost). The much-ballyhooed Pac10 has only ever sent USC, and it doesn’t look like that’ll happen again soon. The Big 10 has only ever sent Ohio State, who (prior to this year) appeared largely content to lose in the postseason.

Roll Tide. Hail Saban. Praise Ingram. See you in August.

Calif. School Team’s Success Linked to Snoop Dogg.

Apparently, Snoopp (real name: Calvin Broadus) has created a youth football league in urban LA. And it’s a success.

Broadus, 38, launched the league in 2005 with $1 million of his own money after noticing that much of urban Los Angeles had no football for boys ages 5 to 13. He’s since invested about $300,000, Wadood said. The league now has 2,500 kids enrolled.

A guest has managed to actually rattle Stephen Colbert. Watch thru to the end.

Christ Turns Down 3-Year, Multimillion Dollar Deal To Coach Notre Dame:

SOUTH BEND, IN—Jesus Christ, the Son of God, Savior of All Mankind, and current defensive coordinator at Middle Tennessee State, said Monday that He would not accept Notre Dame’s 3-year, $5.6 million offer to coach the Fighting Irish. “I love Notre Dame and respect their football legacy, but no matter what you’ve accomplished before coaching there, once you’re a Golden Domer, the expectations, frankly, are unrealistic,” said Christ, whose family has been involved with the university since its founding. “I’ve had people turn on Me before, and it really put Me through hell. But even more importantly, I’ve made a commitment to stay with the Blue Raiders through 2015.” Christ denied asking Notre Dame to remove His likeness from the building overlooking their stadium, saying He liked a good joke as much as anybody.

With all due respect: Suck it, Tebow.

Also, I’m not one to talk smack, but: WTF, UT?

I’m surprised it’s taken them this long, but Charlie Weis has been fired at Notre Dame. Contrary to ESPN’s Forde, though, I don’t think they’re one good coaching hire away from national relevance again. Their clear inability to recognize what’s working (n.b. that it was the fired Willingham’s recruits that buoyed Weis’ early years; when they graduated, Weis tanked) will lead them to many more years in the wilderness, and probably more expensive buyouts.

I watched this happen with Alabama in the pre-Saban, post-Stallings era, and it wasn’t pretty; I think it’s likely to get uglier in South Bend given their perhaps even more unrealistic expectations. And, from the Alabama perspective, I’m sorry they’re firing him. He’s clearly not head coach material, but keeping him around would ensure the Irish continue to spiral the drain in perpetuity. Oh well.

In other news, there are also sources saying that Bobby Bowden is reitiring at FSU, which is a long time coming, but there are conflicting reports on other sites. This is something he should’ve done a while ago, but it creates another hot-seat job opening that is probably far, far more appealing than the Notre Dame job. Whups.

The Saints are now 11-0 after Brees and the rest put thirty freakin’ eight points on New England tonight with a dominant, blowout performance on either side of the ball. Final score: 38 to 17.

Bonus: In the process, Brees posted a perfect passer rating of 158.3; doing so puts him in the company of such gridiron luminaries as Doug Flutie, Kurt Warner, the Manning brothers, Ben Roethlisberger, and his opponent tonight, Tom Brady.

The BCS stooges have launched a pro-BCS, anti-playoff web site presumably designed to quell the rising tide of protest about their bullshit system. We wonder if their new mouthpiece, Ari Fleischer, is somehow involved; that’s right — these goons have hired the former Bush press secretary to help their case. We’re sure that’s going to end just as well as it did for Bush.

Aimee Mullins’ guest columns at Gizmodo continue with an excellent discussion of the use of prosthetics in competition.

Basically, she points out that it was totally kosher for people like Oscar Pistorius and herself to compete in regular track-and-field events — right up to the point where they might win, at which point they were DQ’d for having an unfair advantage despite the fact that even advanced prosthetics pale in comparison to the real thing. So far.

Mullins also points out where we may be going: What if paralympic sprinter times are lower than regular, able-bodies sprinter times?

Three Tennessee Volunteer players — including a highly touted WR and starting safety — have been charged with attempted armed robbery.

The good news is that jail uniforms are frequenly orange, so at least the clothes will be familiar.

First, obviously, Roll Tide. By quashing LSU, Bama ensures its place in the SEC title game, and therefore a path to the championship if we can get past Florida. Even better: the new BCS puts Alabama back in the #2 spot, behind Florida and ahead of Texas. The gap between the top 3 and the next 7 is large, with virtually no chance of TCU, Cincy, or Boise powering up high enough to challenge a lossless Texas or lossless SEC champ for a Pasadena berth. (And upset for Bama or the Gators prior to Atlanta might change that, but it’s not a given.)

Second, jumping ahead to Sunday and the pros, the Saints are 8-0 for the first time EVER, firmly atop the NFC South (actually, the whole NFC) and one of only two remaining perfect squads in the NFL — the other is the AFC’s Colts.

Third, say goodbye to any title hopes from previously perfect pretenders Iowa (dropped by unranked Northwestern) and Oregon (who lost in a shootout to unranked Stanford 51 to 42; does nobody out west play D?), and also to USC given their loss to now 2-loss Oregon looks even worse today than it did on Halloween.

The icing on the cake, though, is Notre Dame’s 2nd loss to NAVY in three years. At home, even. The Irish’s hopes of a BCS berth floated away as they found themselves unable to beat a Midshipmen team they outsized and outproduced. That’s some fine coaching there, Charlie. I sure hope the ND faithful rally to keep him, because I love this coach.

The best damn Tim Tebow Halloween Costume EVER.

You know, we Tide faithful are pretty happy so far — no losses, top of the rankings for two years running, by all accounts you’re delivering at a level appropriate to your appalling salary.

But some fucking red zone touchdowns would be nice.

Also, Cody 4 Heisman.

WHO DAT? Saints over Giants in a convincing rout: 48 to 27, and it wasn’t that close. The Saints rise to 5-0 and hand the Giants their first loss.

New Orleans joins only Minnesota (6-0), Denver (5-0), and Indy (5-0) as the only undefeated squads on the NFL.

Roll. Damn. Tide.:

The Crimson Tide jumped Florida and landed at No. 1 in The Associated Press Top 25 on Sunday.

The unbeaten Gators had been in the top spot since the preseason, but the Crimson Tide has been gaining ground for weeks by winning more convincingly than the Gators.

The final surge came after Alabama beat South Carolina 20-6 and Florida needed a field goal in the waning seconds to beat Arkansas 23-20 at home.

The Crimson Tide, which received 10 first-place votes last week, got 39 out of 59 from the media panel. Florida received the other 20 first-place votes.

Texas is No. 3, followed by Southern California, Cincinnati and Boise State at No. 6. The Broncos dropped a spot.

USC, however, is still absurdly overrated. Number four? Really? They rise after barely escaping the notoriously helpless Irish? Whatevers.

If the unranked and Weis-coached Irish can get that close to the Trojans, then it’s proof that the Trojans are just as sucky as the Irish, not evidence that both teams are anything like elite.

Despite all my yammering about football, it just took me three calls to three different hotels for me to figure out why I couldn’t get a hotel room in Dallas tomorrow night.

The dust has settled from yesterday’s contests, and the AP rankings are out — and Alabama has jumped Texas to take the #2 spot behind Florida (and got the only other first-place votes, 10 vs. Florida’s 50).

During the LSU-Florida game, the commentators were saying openly that the BCS championship will absolutely include the SEC champ, even if it’s a one-loss champ — IOW, if LSU wins all the rest of its games including a Florida rematch for the conference title, the Tigers will play in the big game despite dropping to #10 in this week’s poll. Obviously, if Florida and Alabama win out and meet for the SEC title, that winner will go to the BCS game undefeated and LSU will have to be happy with Sugar.

For the Gators, playing in the weaker SEC East, the only real challenge left will be the conference title game — that, and staying focused through the rest of the regular season. Their slate includes Arkansas, who played well against an inept Auburn yesterday, as well as Spurrier’s Gamecocks who are playing poorly despite a #22 ranking. The Gators round out the season with their traditional grudge match, but FSU isn’t really even in the same league as Florida at this point. It’d take flukes and mistakes for Florida to drop even one of these games, and even if they do they’ll still play for the conference title. That’s as close to a lock as you get in early October.

The Tide, fresh off a dominating win over Mississippi, face Spurrier next week, followed by the Tennessee grudge match. Neither are sources of concern if they continue to execute, especially on the defensive side of the ball. #10 LSU could be a spoiler, but probably not. Auburn has shown its mettle (or lack thereof) already. Predicting the future is a mug’s game, but if Florida’s essentially a lock on the East, Alabama is only a little bit less wired in for the West. Look for a hell of a game, again, when the two squads meet.

Texas’ picture is less obvious, owing to the Big XII’s tendency to back-load their schedules. Next up for the Horns is a two-loss Oklahoma, newly rejuvenated with Bradford back in the lineup. After that, the only ranked squads on tap for the Longhorns are #16 Oklahoma State and #17 Kansas. If Florida is a 95% lock to play in the conference title game, and Alabama a 90%, then give Texas an 85% to win out and end the year with a ticket to play the SEC champ for all the marbles. (I’m less good at handicapping outside the SEC, so actual chances may vary.)

If all this happens, we’ll have ourselves a football game come January.

NFL Scientists Postulate Theoretical Down Before First Down:

NEW YORK—Citing the extremely low level of entropy present before a normal set of football downs, scientists from the NFL’s quantum mechanics and cosmology laboratories spoke Monday of a theoretical proto-down before the first. “Ultimately, we believe there are an infinite number of proto-downs played before the first visible snap,” lead NFL scientist Dr. Oliver Claussen said during a press conference, adding that the very last yocto-down is a by-product of leftover fourth downs from this universe, as well as those from a theoretical universe running along an arrow of time concurrent to our own. “It is our goal to isolate this microscopic down using a highly volatile electron beam with a physical isolation resolution of 500 angstroms or better. If all goes well, we can make this down available, and NFL teams will have one more chance to attain additional yards, a new set of downs, or even score.” Claussen later stated that those in the field who talk of a fifth down after the fourth are only encouraging the practice of bad science.

Washington 16, USC 13.

Also, today, we are all Gators. Suck it, Kiffin.

Now, if only Michigan State could stuff ND — as of now, about 4 minutes left, and the Spartans are down by a field goal.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

If only Ohio State could’ve held on against USC, it would’ve been a perfect weekend.

It was ugly and full of mistakes, but the #5 Tide opened with a real win over 7th-ranked Virginia Tech — this while other “contenders” were opening with creampuffs (hello, Florida? I’m looking at you.).

MORE fun was how supposedly-strong Ohio State only barely escaped Navy — in a game that involved a Buckeye intercepting a 2-point conversion throw and running it it all the way back for a . . . two point conversion. (That’s your football trivia for this week.)

Oh, and Oklahoma? Done, and Bradford is out for several weeks. I expect the Big XII to be all about Texas now.

Plaxico is going to jail. His plea deal nets him 2 years in the pokey.

Congratulations, Plax, you dumbass.

In need of caffeine, I went down to the lobby just now for a coffee; they had the soccer on, to which I paid little attention until I caught a few key facts out of the corner of my eye:

• A graphic informed me that Spain had not been beaten in 35 games — they’re 33-0-2.
• This afternoon, Spain is playing the US.
• The US led 2-0 in the 89th minute of play.

After three minutes of stoppage time, it was over. The US shocked top seed Spain in the Confederation Cup semifinal. The Americans advance to their first FIFA final ever, at any level.

(There will, undoubtably, be more coverage later. This is, I take it, 1980 Olympic hockey territory.)

Plaxico released by the Giants.

In re: the previously reported dumbassery of the freshly-hired Tennessee coach: SEC To Kiffin: Shut up, dumbass.

University of Tennessee football coach Lane Kiffin was issued a public reprimand by Southeastern Conference Commissioner Mike Slive for accusing Florida’s Urban Meyer of a recruiting violation during his pursuit of Pahokee, Fla. wide receiver NuKeese Richardson.

During a recruiting celebration banquet Thursday morning, Kiffin alleged that Meyer repeatedly called Richardson while he was on his official visit to UT.

[…]

However, that’s not an NCAA violation, or against SEC rules, but Kiffin’s comments were.

“œCoach Kiffin has violated the Southeastern Conference Code of Ethics,” Slive said in a release. “œSEC Bylaw 10.5.1 clearly states that coaches and administrators shall refrain from directed public criticism of other member institutions, their staffs or players.

“The phone call to which Coach Kiffin referred to in his public comments is not a violation of SEC or NCAA rules. We expect our coaches to have an understanding and knowledge of conference and NCAA rules.”

Dumbass.

…but apparently just moving to Knoxville makes you a douche. Freshly hired Tennessee coach Lane Kiffin is accusing Florida coach Urban Meyer of recruiting violations before he’s even coached a down, and for no apparent reason.

Precis: Kiffin signed a sought-after Florida prospect (Nu’Keese Richardson) that Meyer was also pursuing. Kiffin is sore that Meyer called Richardson while he was on an official visit to Knoxville, but that’s no violation. Kiffin’s just wasting no time in making sure everyone in the SEC knows he’s a whiner even when he wins, so at least he’s got that going for him.

Florida AD Jeremy Foley:

“There was no rule violation and we have confirmed this with Southeastern Conference. It is obvious that Coach Kiffin doesn’t know that there is not a rule precluding phone contact with a prospect during an official visit on another campus during a contact period. His allegations are inappropriate, out of line and, most importantly, totally false. It is completely unfair to Urban Meyer, our coaching staff, our football program and our institution. The appropriate action at this time in my opinion is for Coach Kiffin to make a public apology.

Nice one, Rockytop. Can’t wait to whip your sorry butts again next year.

(via Edgar.)

The SEC’s Florida Gators showed Oklahoma what for last night as Urban Meyer and Tim Tebow bagged their second national championship in 3 years, this time quashing Oklahoma and this year’s Heisman winner Sam Bradford (Tebow, of course, already has one of those). Final score: 24 to 14, but it wasn’t that close.

For their part, the Sooners extended their run of big-game chokes; this is their third consecutive bowl loss for the Sooners (after back-to-back Fiesta Bowls, losing to West Virginia last year and, more memorably, Boise in the 2007 game). In point of fact, the Sooners have only won ONE bowl since their 2003 Rose Bowl win (over Oregon in the 2005 Holiday Bowl; OU’s lone BCS title was in the 00-01 season, over FSU).

Meyer is now the first coach to pick up two BCS-era championships, and raises the SEC to 5 and 0 in the title game (2 each for LSU and Florida; one for Tennessee; unless I’m wrong, Tebow is now the only college QB to play in and win two title games as well.) No other conference has a winning record in this game; in fact, the 2nd place conference has only 2 wins (Big XII, with Texas and Oklahoma) vs. 4 losses (3 x OU, 1 Nebraska). We still contend that the Longhorns would’ve been a better choice for this game, but Big XII rules kept that from happening.

(To round out the BCS tally: The Big 10, ACC, and Big East are all 1-2 in championship play, and the Pac 10 is 1-1. In all, eleven teams have played in the title game, a stat that tells the same story of SEC dominance with a side of Big XII contention: 3 are SEC, 3 are Big XII, 2 are Big East, and 1 each from Big 10, ACC, and Pac-10)

All this, of course, hasn’t escaped journalistic notice.

Final AP standings mirror, sort of, what we’d expect; we find no argument with it based on what we can know for certain in a no-playoff universe:

1. Florida
2. Utah
3. USC
4. Texas
5. Oklahoma
6. Alabama

See you next year. Aside from draft-related commentary, Heathen now returns to a much more pure-geek-and-lefty-politics mode until next August.

Over at Salon, King Kaufman has an amusing take on the mess that is the BCS Championship this year; for those not paying attention, the only undefeated squad left is Utah, who beat usual SEC powerhouse Alabama in the Sugar Bowl. Bama very nearly played for the championship; they lost of Florida, who will play Oklahoma for all the marbles tonight.

Kaufman:

This column has already crowned its national champion. With its background in the boxing world, this column believes if you’re not going to have a fair championship system, the best alternative is to crown the guy who beat the guy who beat the guy.

That guy is Tulane.

The Green Wave went 2-10 this year, but they made those wins count. One of them was over Louisiana-Monroe, so I think you see my point.

No? OK: Tulane beat Louisiana-Monroe, who beat Troy, who beat Middle Tennessee, who beat Maryland, who beat Wake Forest, who beat Mississippi.

Aha! Mississippi!

What do you mean, so what? Ole Miss beat Florida. But that’s not all. The Rebels also beat Texas Tech, who beat Texas, who beat Oklahoma.

There’s a direct line of losing from both teams in the BCS Championship Game to Tulane. That’s what makes Tulane, last seen losing 45-6 to Memphis, your 2008 national champion.

“Hotty Toddy” & etc. Ole Miss (BCS 25) destroyed the 7th-ranked Red Raiders in the Cotton Bowl to the tune of 47 to 34, and it wasn’t that close. Will everyone please shut up about Texas Tech now?

Courtesy of a certain longtime Heathen, I attended the Texas Bowl this evening with a cadre of Rice alums I haven’t seen in some time — most of them have moved to Austin (or, worse, the suburbs) in the 14 years since we all used to drink too much at the Marquis, so it was a fun group to watch a game with no matter what was going to happen.

However, what actually DID happen was pretty great, as the Rice Owls (astoundingly 9-3 going into this) trounced Western Michigan (also 9-3 pre-game) 38 to 14 — and it wasn’t that close. Both the WMU TDs came well after the game was mathematically over. Rice, for its part, bags its first bowl win since the 1954 Cotton Bowl, when they beat a certain western Alabama team all right-thinking Heathen know and love.

To say the accumulated Owl faithful were gobsmacked by the win — and the dominance of the performance — is to understate by several orders of magnitude. “Rice kids” from 18 to 80 stood outside the stadium watching the postgame fireworks, slackjawed at the spectacle of it all. I feel bad for the WMU folks (nobody likes getting routed), but their day will come; Cubit’s a good coach, and he’s doing good things up there. Rice, though, has been waiting a long, long time, and I’m glad I was there to see it.

Saban named AP Coach of the Year.

From a friend and fellow alum, who says “this will never stop being awesome:”

The University of Alabama is set to honor Mobile native James M. Fail by placing his name on a prominent fixture at Bryant-Denny Stadium. A donation by Mr. Fail to the Crimson Tide Foundation will result in the visitors’ locker room being officially named “The Fail Room.”

Rep. Joe Barton of Texas has introduced a bill essentially mandating a college football playoff:

He said the bill — being co-sponsored by Reps. Bobby Rush, an Illinois Democrat, and Michael McCaul, a Texas Republican — “will prohibit the marketing, promotion, and advertising of a postseason game as a ‘national championship’ football game, unless it is the result of a playoff system. Violations of the prohibition will be treated as violations of the Federal Trade Commission Act as an unfair or deceptive act or practice.”

This whole Plaxico thing just reeks of boneheadedness, which is painful for Heathen Central to admit given our affection for the Giants generally and Plaxico specifically (Burress has been our favorite player for a while, an honor that is predicted predominately on “which productive NFL player on a team we like has the funniest name.” (The runner-up is Atari Bigby in Green Bay)).

Consequently, the light this event shines into Plaxico’s fucktardery is, well, disappointing to us. The entire affair is error on error on error in a chain that could have, at any moment, been broken and thereby prevented the near-certain incarceration endgame.

So, in the order he probably committed them, a brief survey of stupid Plaxico tricks:

1. “I’ll wear a shit-ton of jewelry worth tens of thousands of dollars to a loud and chaotic night club where snatch-and-run type thefts are easy to perpetrate, and I’ll do this on the off chance that someone around me may of missed the fact that I make a fuckload of money by being one of Eli’s favorite targets, and — oh yes — I caught the winning TD in the Super Bowl last year.” Stupidity rating: 3. Lots of people, especially people who come from below the upper-middle-class, have a tendency to suffer from Wife of Bath syndrome in an effort to show everyone how well they’ve done. Pro athletes are particularly vulnerable, and it’s hard to completely condemn the practice for this reason. However — and I say this as someone dumb enough to have regularly stumbled home drunk from Egan’s wearing my dad’s Rolex — wearing flashy jewelry in a club like that is just silly.

2. “Because I have to wear such fancy jewelry to illustrate my station in life, I must also carry a gun to protect same.” Stupidity rating: 6. Plax jumps a lot here, since he’s making a bad assumption based on a bad assumption which compounds the whole affair. Carry a gun because you HAVE to go someplace where you don’t feel safe, sure. But creating a situation you perceive as dangerous (wearing the jewels into the club) and then compounding that danger by carrying a gun as well makes you pretty stupid. Better to avoid the danger in the first place, but therein you see how the chain develops.

3. “I have no reason to bother with registering this firearm.” Stupidity rating: 8. Carrying a loaded gun without a permit in NYC is a felony. Dude, you’re rich as metric FUCK; hire a security service if you need to wear 30 pounds of gold out in public. Carrying just tempts fate, and fate can be a bitch.

4. “I’m going to pick a gun to carry based on popular culture and not on my specific carry needs.” Stupidity rating: 5+ (see below; this plays into point 6, below). This is inferred, but at least a few reports suggested that Burress was carrying a full-sized pistol; there appears to be no dispute that it was a Glock in .40S&W. All Glocks, even the small ones, are double-stacked — meaning they’re much wider than many more carry-appropriate guns. You can get a 9mm or even .40 that’s far slimmer, and that will fit neatly in one’s pocket; when you’re carrying on the sly, concealability is paramount, and absent a proper carry rig, being able to slip it in your pocket securely is pretty important.

5. “Wait, you mean you can get carry rigs that work in just about any set of clothes, from inside-the-waistband holsters to full shoulder clutches to fanny-pack setups?” If you’re gonna carry, SECURE THE MOTHERFUCKING PIECE. Plax did NOT do this; he was apparently trying to carry a double-stacked Glock in the waistband of his sweatpants. WTF, man? Stupidity rating: 9.

6. “I’m gonna go ahead and keep one in the pipe just in case despite lacking a real safety or a real carry rig.” Stupidity rating: 10. Most folks who carry probably DO keep a round in the chamber, but they’re probably using real gun leather, or a pistol with a more affirmative safety mechanism than the Glock has. Plax dropped his gun and, in fumbling for it, pulled the trigger. The Glock’s safety is IN the trigger, which one source of criticism for the pistol’s design. There’s no click-on, click-off safety at all. This means carrying a Glock with a round in the chamber without a secure rig is really, really, really stupid; had he picked a safer gun, a real holster, or carried without a round in the chamber, none of this would have happened. (I.e., if Plax had just dropped the gun and avoided shooting himself or anyone else, nobody would have ever known.)

7. “Now that I’m at the club, wearing loads of jewelry, and carrying a gun, I’d better go ahead and get drunk.” Stupidity rating: 10. In Texas, by the way, carrying a gun EVEN WITH A PERMIT into a place that makes more than 51% of its money selling booze is also a felony. This is NOT a bad law. Carrying when you’re drunk is a bad, bad idea — no good can come from it.

Plax is going to jail. What he’s really going to jail for is being a fucking idiot, given how many choices he could have made differently in this sequence. “Skip the jewels, so I don’t need the gun” would’ve been a great start, but even “get a real holster” or “carry something with an affirmative safety” or “don’t fucking keep one in the chamber” would’ve also saved his career and kept him out of the loving arms of New York State.

Word is that Auburn head coach Tommy Tuberville is out in the wake of a disappointing season and a stunning shutout in the Iron Bowl. This is almost certainly a mistake; in 10 years at Auburn, Tuberville has produced consistently, taken them to a bowl every year since 2000, and posted winning seasons every year but his first and this one. He’s the only Aubur coach to ever beat Alabama six years in a row. His 85-40 (68%) record isn’t better than Bowden (73%, fired in 1998) or Dye (71%, forced out in an rules violation scandal in 1992), but it’s close — and n.b. that neither of those guys left voluntarily, either.

If this is true, it means four of the six teams in the SEC West will have coaches with less than 2 years tenure at kickoff next August: Mississippi State, Arkansas, Auburn, and Ole Miss. (I’d make a joke about Saban scaring them all off, but when you factor in Nutt’s move from Arkansas to Ole Miss it’s really only 3 who shuffled out of the SEC — and there’s at least some chance Tuberville might go to Starkville.)

MSU isn’t going to do better without Croom. I find it hard to believe Auburn will do better without Tuberville. Nutt might do a little better at Ole Miss than he did at Arkansas, but even that would be inconsistent. Longtime Heathen Third-Party Contract Oil insists that Petrino’s Louisville roots mean Arkansas will become an offensive power in a couple years, but even if that’s true it still means lots of rebuilding in the SEC West, which is bad for everybody because of perceptions of weakness in strength of schedule.

(Sorry, Lindsey.)

Notre Dame’s AD says Weis will be back next year.

BCS is out, and despite having BEATEN Oklahoma, this goofball system we have put Texas BEHIND Oklahoma in the rankings, which means it’s the Sooners that will whip Mizzou in the Big XII game and play the SEC champion in Miami.

Of course, we here at Heathen know that the SEC will prevail, and our home conference will enjoy its third title in a row. But suppose they don’t, and Oklahoma wins. Texas sits out the big game despite having beaten them, and the champs know there’s a team better than them down in Austin.

This whole things just stinks.

I’d have been happier with 40+ points, but a 36 to zippo shutout of Auburn ends the regular season for both teams. Auburn’s difficult year ends at 5 and 7, a game shy of a bowl slot, which suits us just fine. Tuberville may have a year left — his six-game Iron Bowl streak will probably buy him some time — but something tells me that next year won’t be much better, and the Auburn faithful aren’t likely to be very patient at that point.

Alabama, of course, improves to 12-0 and will continue to the SEC championship game in Atlanta next Saturday against one-loss Florida. Meyer’s Gators are hot, and have played very well since their shocking loss to Ole Miss, so the game is likely to be quite a brawl. The winner there will for certain go to the BCS game in Miami, meeting whomever ends up on top of the Big XII South. All three contenders in that division won their games this weekend, though only Texas‘s 49 to 9 over A&M was truly authoritative; Texas Tech needed a big late-game rally to escape Baylor, and Oklahoma allowed 41 points in their 61-point win over Oklahoma State. (Frankly, the confusion may actually be all hype: after the drubbing from Oklahoma and the scare from Baylor, smart money says Texas Tech is out of the running for good — and Texas has already beaten Oklahoma in the regular season, which ought to get them into the Big XII game ahead of the Sooners.)

Elsewhere, LSU continued their downward slide with a 31-30 loss to Arkansas, which we’re certain will give the Tiger Boosters a bit of heartburn considering what they’re paying Les Miles.

Next door in Mississippi, the Egg Bowl turned into a 45 to nothing slaughter that also ended Croom’s career there. I hate seeing the preppie bastards in Oxford win that game, but you can’t argue with 45 unanswered points and Houston Nutt’s near-immediate success in his first year there.

On the other end of the coaching spectrum, as always, is Notre Dame’s Charlie Weis. Just a year after an embarrassing 3-9 season, and only a week out from a collapse for the ages against 8-loss Syracuse, the Irish gave up 38 points against the USC Trojans in a pathetic excuse for a game that has pundits all over calling for Weis’ head. The bad news for the ND athletic department is that apparently Weis’ contract buyout is friggin’ huge. Look for several more years of Irish mediocrity with or without Weis; their lackluster performance goes back further than Weis’ tenure.

To say people viewed the Oklahoma – Texas Tech game with interest would be a wild understatement. Pretty much nobody outside of Lubbock has been happy to see Leach’s boys get this far with no losses, and Heathen Nation has been right there with ’em. Smart money said that if the Raiders could get past the Longhorns, then the only team likely to stop ’em would be Oklahoma — but pretty much everyone also expected a fairly hard-fought game.

Well, on that point at least, pretty much everybody was dead fucking wrong, as the Sooners managed to steamroll Texas Tech like a farm league team. Nothing the Raiders did worked; Oklahoma could do virtually no wrong, and by halftime it was very, very clear that Tech was no longer in the running for any championships — Big XII or national. Final score: 65 to 21, and it wasn’t that close. Tech’s final TD came with the Sooners’ bench on defense, and the Sooners’ played without starting QB Sam Bradford for the final quarter. Oklahoma improves to 34 and 1 under Stoops in home games, which is quite a stat.

This old-skool ass-whippin’ was utterly unforeseen, as we said; smart money said that if Tech lost, it would create a three-way tie in the Big XII South, leading to wailing and gnashing of teeth as folks tried to figure out who best deserved a shot at Miami. By folding up like a cheap suit, Tech eliminated themselves — and Texas beat Oklahoma already. By the time the BCS rankings came out last night, nobody outside of Norman was expecting anything other than what we got:

1. Alabama
2. Texas
3. Oklahoma
4. Florida
5. USC

Yeah, some west coast nerd had to shove the Trojans in there. Tech drops to 7. Penn State’s a slot behind them at 8. Still-perfect Boise and Ohio State round out the top ten. (Amusingly, the AP poll puts Florida at #2, followed by Oklahoma, Texas, and USC; USAToday sees 2-5 as Oklahoma, Florida, Texas, and USC — but neither poll matters.)

Texas still has to beat unranked A&M and get to the Big XII game against Mizzou to play in Miami, but it’s not that simple; the Longhorns don’t exactly control their own destiny. Ties in this conference are broken by BCS standings, and that’s where things get woozy.

Should Oklahoma win convincingly over their 9-2 cross-state rival Oklahoma State, they’ll get lifted in the BCS model — but Texas’ last remaining game is against a helpless 4-7 Aggie squad, and beating them won’t impress anyone. The BCS gap between the two is small enough that even a slight increase in Oklahoma’s rating relative to UT could push them into the #2 spot and the conference game. The only certain thing is that it’s the Big XII South vs. the SEC in Miami; the North division hasn’t won since Kansas State in 2003, and Mizzou isn’t gonna break that streak (they already lost to Texas once this year, back in October, to the tune of 56 to 31).

Elsewhere, a couple other lovely things happened. Well, I say that, but when Ole Miss and LSU play, I really sort of wish both could lose. This time around, though, it was the Rebels winning big over a Tiger team clearly on tilt after some rough losses, but still ranked #18 going into the game. After the 31 to 13 drubbing, though, LSU’s nowhere to be seen — and Ole Miss popped up at 25 on the AP.

And where would a Heathen football comment be without some Notre Dame hate? We’ve got you covered: the Irish managed to suck out against coachless Syracuse, 24 to 23 at home in South Bend. This is a collapse of almost Texan proportions, as the Irish led 23-10 in the fourth quarter.

The Orange improve to 3 and 8; it’s the first time EVER for ND to lose to an 8-loss squad. They’ll still be bowl eligible at .500 assuming they lose, as expected, to USC in their season closer — which sets the stage for the Irish to extend their (NCAA record) winless streak of bowls to an even TEN. The 2007-2008 two-year span also boasts the most losses of any such span in program history (14, and they haven’t played USC yet). But keep Weis up there, Irish. Really. We’re sure this is gonna work out just fine, and don’t worry about the restless natives:

The Irish players were pelted by snowballs on the sideline for much of the first quarter by fans sitting on the student section. Defensive end Ethan Johnson was struck on the left cheek and several other players also getting hit by snowballs despite three announcement urging fans to stop.

The Irish were booed several times during the game, including Clausen on Notre Dame’s next-to-last possession when third-and-8 the Syracuse 31 he missed a wide open David Grimes.

Weis is at 28 and 20 over 4 seasons, or batting about .583; ND aced the last two coaches in that statistical neighborhood, but Weis still has 7 years left on his contract.

Oh, and the historic multi-year collapse of ND is actually showing up on non-sports blogs now. This pleases us at Heathen Central, as do a couple stats from the article the blogger links:

• ND has beaten only one team with a winning record this year: perennial powerhouse NAVY.
• The combined record of the teams ND has beaten this year is 18-46.
• Under Weis, the Irish are 12-17 against teams with winning records.

Another Saturday has come and gone, and it is more or less as it was. Florida continued its domination by handing Spurrier his worst loss EVER and drubbing to the tune of 56 to 6. Alabama played badly for the first half, but still stuffed Mississippi State 32 to 7. The only remaining real test for either squad is now each other in the SEC champtionship game, the winner of which will almost certainly play the Big XII champ in the big game come January.

The almost-surprises were downballot, so to speak. LSU very nearly fell to Troy State; the Tigers were outscored 24 to 3 in the first half. Miles must’ve kicked some serious ass at halftime, though, as the final score was 40 to 31.

It’s not a surprise in either case, but it does please us that both Ole Miss and Vanderbilt are bowl-eligable with their wins on Saturday. The Rebels blanked Louisiana-Monroe, 59 to zip, to improve to 6-4, 3-3 SEC. Vandy beat the SEC’s other football whipping boy, Kentucky, in a close one (31-24), and in so doing rise to 6-4, 3-3 SEC — and head to a bowl for the first time in 26 years. (More fun: Vandy could actually beat a demoralized Tennessee next Saturday.)

Texas won (35 to 7 over Kansas), and Texas Tech was idle, so don’t expect much if any movement in the BCS. The finalization of the Big XII could get complicated, since we may see a 3-way-tie in the Big XII South if Oklahoma can deflower the Red Raiders on Saturday. On the other hand, if TT wins out, there’s no drama at all, and they’ll meet the SEC champ in Miami.

President-elect Obama has endorsed an 8-team college football playoff system:

When asked what change he’d make in sports during last week’s Monday Night Football broadcast, Obama said “I think it’s about time we had playoffs in college football. I’m fed up with these computer rankings and this that and the other. Get eight teams — the top eight teams right at the end. You got a playoff. Decide on a national champion.”

That the money-grubbing BCS presidents disagree is unsurprising.

Roll Tide. Saban went home to Baton Rouge and just barely escaped with the win in OT. Rivalry games can frequently get unpredictable, but the way the Tide played for much of the game was just embarrassing. Still, a W is a W, and the results solidify Alabama’s number 1 BCS position. Other weekend events kicked PSU out of the elite club, leaving the top 5 40% SEC and 60% Big XII; an all-Southern championship game is now almost a given. Florida and Alabama will meet at the SEC title game in Atlanta, and the winner there will likely play the Big XII winner for all the marbles in Miami come January.

Received in email from the Jackson Office, from a friend of his, in re: the North Carolina results:

From: xxxxx Sent: Thursday, November 06, 2008 4:57 PM To: Jackson Heathen Subject: Love this Fark headline

Apparently worried about its “strength of schedule” the Obama Campaign is trying to improve its BCS ranking by running up the score, adding 15 more electoral votes today

Fulmer is resigning at Tennessee. Frankly, we’d have preferred he hung around a bit more; with him at the helm, UT could’ve stayed an impotent backwater indefinitely. Tennessee is 3-6, 1-5 in the SEC, and lost a blowout to South Carolina on Saturday.

More at ESPN.

1. Alabama 9-0
   1. Texas Tech 9-0
   2. Penn State 9-0
   3. Texas 8-1
   4. Florida 7-1

What’s obvious, at least to me, is that Alabama, TT, Texas, and Florida would all absolutely demolish Penn State. They’ve got no business in this list.

While we await BCS, chew on this: AP has it Bama, Texas Tech, PSU, UF, Texas; USA Today sees it Bama, PSU, Texas Tech, Oklahoma, Florida, USC, Texas (WTF?); the fan poll is worthless.

(That same link will eventually show BCS, too.)