Blanket Coverage: Bet on Vegas

Thirty years ago, in the midst of the college football season, Sports Illustrated ran a cover in which it posed one player from each of the five most prominent remaining teams with perfect records (Alabama, Florida State, Houston, Nebraska and Ohio State). The headline read, "Who's Really No. 1?"

Inside, the author, Douglas S. Looney, revealed that oddsmakers in Las Vegas put their stock in a sixth team: USC.

The Trojans' record was stained by an inexplicable tie to an unranked Pac-10 opponent, Stanford (Does any of this sound familiar?), yet Looney noted that Jimmy "The Greek" Snyder and Mort Olshan, publisher of The Gold Sheet, had USC as their prohibitive No. 1.

"We feel USC would be favored over any team in the country if the game were played right now," said Olshan.

Cutting to the chase, those Trojans, featuring such all-timers as Marcus Allen, Ronnie Lott and Anthony Munoz (as well as that season's Heisman Trophy winner, Charles White) wound up facing No. 1 Ohio State in the Rose Bowl. John Robinson's team, a 7-1/2 point favorite, beat the Buckeyes, but undefeated Alabama, playing in the Sugar Bowl, won the national championship.

The point is, Vegas knows. Vegas always knows. Let someone else follow the AP poll or the coaches' poll or the BCS standings. But in Vegas, there's too much money to be lost by being wrong.

So who does Sin City like? Here are the current odds on the top five teams, according to VegasInsider.com, with their season-opening odds in parentheses

Florida -- 6/5 (2/1)

Texas. -- 5/2 (11/2)

Alabama -- 3/1 (15/1)

USC -- 5/1 (6/1)

Boise State -- 25/1 (75/1)

As you can see, all five programs have lessened their odds since September 1st, with the Tide becoming five times a surer thing than they were before they beat Virginia Tech. Boise State has decreased their odds by a factor of three.

Looming like it's 1979, though, are the Trojans and their Tebow 2.0 quarterback, Matt Barkley. The freshman may not have Tebow's "Braveheart" streak, but he is every bit as precocious and charismatic and, hey, is already a better passer. The greatest impediment facing Barkley's Trojans has a lot to do with the old Woody Allen adage: "Ninety percent of success is just showing up."

If the Longhorns remain unbeaten -- big "if" there -- it will be nearly impossible for USC, No. 4 in the BCS rankings, to pass them. But should Texas falter the door opens wide for the one-loss Trojans. And with Pete Carroll's history in Pasadena in January (yes, we remember Vince Young), you'd have to think that USC versus either SEC contender would be, at worst, even money.

ATL= All (Virginia) Tech Losses

With its 28-23 loss at Bobby Dodd Stadium, Virginia Tech is now 0-for-Atlanta this season. And 5-0 everywhere else. The Hokies lost their season-opener to No. 1 Alabama inside the Georgia Dome and on Saturday lost at Georgia Tech, located a mile or so north up I-75.

In the event that Frank Beamer's team does advance to the ACC championship game--believe it or not, Virginia (Yes, Virginia!) is atop the Coastal Division -- the good news is that it takes place in Tampa. The next possible visit to the ATL for the Hokies, though, may just be the Chick-fil-A Bowl, which always takes an ACC school.

Boise, Oh

We hear it most often from the SEC precincts concerning Boise State's credibility. The line goes something like this, "Why don't you schedule an opponent with claws?" Great question, although it may be a case of nobody with claws desiring to have anything to do with Chris Petersen's Broncos.

Yes, the Broncos did venture to Athens, Ga., four years ago (pre-Petersen) and got shredded by the Dawgs, 48-13. It was worse than that score. But that was then. Do the Broncos, No. 4 in the BCS rankings, belong in the BCS championship game should two of the three schools above them lose? In short, are they one of the two best teams in the nation?

No. Why? The Broncos allow too many points (21.25 per game over their last four games) and too much yardage. Still, it's worth noting that sophomore quarterback Kellen Moore is now No. 1 in the nation in passing efficiency. More impressively, Boise State has now played six games, or 360 minutes, and in all that time they have trailed just 4:25. That happened last Wednesday after Tulsa ran a halfback option pass -- straight out of Petersen's playbook -- for a 53-yard touchdown midway through the first quarter.

On the ensuing drive, Boise not only scored but made a two-point conversion. Why did the Broncos go for two, down 7-6 in the first quarter? Because they could.

What the Hail Mary?

You will never see a more wide-open wideout on a Hail Mary pass than Arizona State's Chris McGaha was versus Washington. The Sun Devil wideout had missed practice all week with the flu, and had yet to catch a pass when he lined up in the right slot at midfield with 0:13 remaining and the score tied 17-17 in Tempe.

McGaha ran a go route and well, no one in the Husky secondary followed. McGaha only had 141 career receptions before the play, so one can understand how easy he was to ignore.

Folks in the Grand Canyon state may consider this justice, as one week earlier the Huskies beat Arizona on what is now being called the "immaculate interception".

Tracking Your '08 Heisman Finalists

It ain't 2008 any more, and nobody knows that better than the three quarterbacks who visited New York City last December.

Tim Tebow was sacked six times and committed four turnovers in No. 1 Florida's narrow 23-20 win against Arkansas. Colt McCoy's best play was his touchdown-saving tackle after tossing an interception in Texas' 16-13 win against Oklahoma and as for his counterpart, Sam Bradford, he reinjured his right shoulder on a takedown eerily similar to the one that took place versus BYU. That play, too, occurred in Dallas.

What Atlanta is to Virginia Tech, Dallas is to Bradford.

Speaking of deja vu...

Just like in 2005, USC converted a dagger-to-the-heart pass on 3rd- or 4th-down for 60-plus yards against the Irish when Anthony McCoy got behind the secondary. That play, as with Matt Leinart's 4th-and-nine pass to Dwayne Jarrett four years earlier, led to the game-winning touchdown.

Here's the kicker: Pete Sampson of Irish Illustrated notes that the Notre Dame defender who dragged down Jarrett and McCoy from behind on both plays -- and not with ease -- was wearing No. 22. In '05 it was Ambrose Wooden and on Saturday it was safety Harrison Smith.

Minne-snow-ta

Unless they're making snow angels, recent Friday afternoon walk-throughs cannot be much fun for Minnesota. Seven inches of snow blanketed Happy Valley on the eve of the Golden Gophers' visit to Penn State. The week before, an inch or so of snow fell on the Twin Cities on the eve of Minnesota's home game versus Wisconsin. With two outdoor home games awaiting them in November followed by a season finale in Iowa City, Minnesota's snow days are not likely behind them. At least they were wise enough to schedule that visit to Syracuse on Labor Day weekend.

Wide receiver Eric Decker, by the way, has not acclimated to the climate (or perhaps opposing defenses have learned how to key on him). Decker had 43 catches in his first five games (8.6 per game) but has just four catches in his last two.

Tough Times in Terre Haute

Last week Indiana State head coach Trent Miles decided to remove the decals from his Sycamores' helmets to remind his players of the importance, in his words, of "team over self". One can understand Miles' gesture, as Indiana State entered its game with Illinois State with the nation's longest losing streak, 32 games. Alas, it did not work as the Redbirds rolled to a 38-21 win over their FCS foes and extended the Sycamores' winless drought to 33 games. At Indiana State, "33" used to be a magic number, not a tragic number.

Stay Classy, Trojans

Courtesy of Deadspin, here's USC tight end Blake Ayles performing a "knucklehead" move during pre-game warm-ups in South Bend.

Dr. Phil, you're needed in Columbus

It may be that the best thing about Terrelle Pryor being at Ohio State, at least for Buckeye fans, is that at least he isn't in Ann Arbor. It isn't all Pryor's fault, last Saturday's upset to a Purdue squad that had lost five straight, but we haven't seen chemistry like this since Michael Jackson smooched Lisa Marie Presley at the MTV VMA's.

The sophomore dual-threat quarterback's highlight moment, through 20 games, likely remains the fourth-quarter touchdown pass that he caught in January's Fiesta Bowl loss to Texas. Where to they go from here in Columbus? Hard to say, but you watch Pryor's body language and you see that he's a thousand miles from happy. And not just last weekend.


Must-See TV, Beyond the BCS

The most interesting game this Saturday takes place in Provo, where No. 10 TCU (6-0) visits No. 16 BYU (6-1). The Horned Frogs, who are in the top ten nationally in both scoring defense (10th) and total defense (4th), take on a quarterback, Max Hall, who is in the top ten in both passing efficiency (4th) and total offense (8th). If TCU can defeat the Cougars and then a ranked Utah on Nov. 14th in Fort Worth, they would likely overtake Boise State in the BCS rankings. Winning at BYU, though, will be about as easy as findind a Starbucks in Provo (there aren't any).

On the opposite end of the non-BCS spectrum, 0-7 Ball State visits 0-6 Eastern Michigan. The Cardinals have now lost eight straight after having won 12 in a row to begin the 2008 season.

Road Games, Truly

Remember a few weeks back when a lot of folks were linking last season's Emerald Bowl participants, Cal and Miami, as BCS darkhorses? That was then -- at least for Cal --but this week the Golden Bears and Hurricanes did truly have something in common. Both bussed to their road games. No.9 Miami traveled 3 1/2 hours up the Florida Turnpike to Orlando to face Central Florida, while Cal saved the state's beleaugered school system at least $100,000 by making the six-hour drive down I-5 to face UCLA. Both the Canes and the Bears won.

Stats Incredible

-- Texas limited Oklahoma, the school of Billy Sims and Marcus Dupree and Adrian Peterson, to minus-16 yards rushing on 22 carries.

-- Okay, it occurred in a deluge, but Virginia punter Jimmy Howell's rugby-style kick traveled minus-three yards in the Cavaliers' 20-9 win against Maryland.

-- Cal's Jahvid Best had a 93-yard touchdown run at UCLA, but only gained nine yards on his seventeen other carries versus the Bruins in the Bears' 45-26 win. Best, an early-season Heisman tout, is now the third-leading rusher in the Golden State (102.7 yards per game, 20th nationally) behind Fresno State's Ryan Mathews (the nation's leading rusher at 162.3 yards per game) and Stanford's Toby Gerhart (No. 5 at 124.1).

-- Michigan played its first-through-fifth string quarterbacks in the 63-6 "nothing to see here, keep moving" win against FCS opponent Delaware State, who pocketed $550,000 for their troubles. Delaware State, not the Wolverine QBs.

-- Arizona State freshman linebacker Vontaze Burfict, the cornerstone of a Sun Devil defense that is No. 7 nationally in total defense, had three personal fouls in the first half of ASU's win over Washington.

-- Kentucky, playing at Auburn and minus injured quarterback Mike Hartline, defeated the Tigers for the first time since 1966 (not that the two have played every year). The Wildcats entered Jordan-Hare Stadium having played and lost three consecutive games against Top 25 opponents (Florida, Alabama and South Carolina).

Jasper Howard

There is nothing to say about the death of the Connecticut cornerback other than that it was utterly tragic and a horrible waste. As the younger brother of someone who, when in college, was stabbed in the abdomen during a fight and fortunately survived, I can only imagine how my life would be different today had it turned out tragically.

All you can do is offer your prayers and support to Howard's family and to the UConn team.