ULM quarterback Kolton Browning edged the Warhawks past Arkansas and into history. (Wesley Hitt/Getty Images)

Our weekly highlight show of lesser FBS luminaries. Non-AQs and independents, be welcome.

• HAIL TO THE SUN BELT, SURE IS A FUN BELT, RA RA RA! What could top Utah State’s thrilling Friday night victory over Utah? Nothing short of Louisiana-Monroe taking a top 10 SEC team to overtime, on the road, and pulling out the win on a fourth-down quarterback dash. Said quarterback, Kolton Browning, has since been named Davey O’Brien Quarterback of the Week and a Walter Camp National Player of the Week honoree. Browning accounted for 481 of ULM’s 550 yards of offense, and four of the Warhawks’ five touchdowns. The Warhawks have their first win over a ranked team since leveling up to FBS, and to round out the weekly awards, have been named Week 2′s Tostitos Fiesta Bowl National Team of the Week. Last week it was Ohio. (A moment of cynicism: We love the attention being bestowed on non-AQs more than just about anybody right now, but this Tostitos shout out is pretty adorable considering how nigh-impossible it would be for the Bobcats or the Warhawks to actually make it into the Fiesta Bowl.)

• It is barely Week 3 and we are already out of poll puns. Idle in Week 2, Boise State is unranked in both major polls for the first time in four years. BYU is the only ranked team in this week’s AP Poll at No. 25, with Boise State, ULM (whee!), Ohio and Utah State also receiving votes. The Aggies’ lone vote is the program’s first since 1966; the Warhawks’ 23 are their first in team history. We hesitate to even mention the Coaches’ Poll for fear of helping its continued legitimacy, but teams receiving votes from disinterested voting SIDs include Boise State, BYU, Louisiana Tech, Ohio, Nevada and ULM.

• EA Sports loves USA, after all. EA Sports personnel have been spotted in Mobile, making preparations to incorporate South Alabama into the next edition of NCAA Football.

• The best news. Tulane’s Devon Walker is reportedly “alert and responsive” following spinal surgery. Tulane has set up an assistance fund in his name; for more ways to support the Walker family, click here.

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Louisiana-Monroe quarterback Kolton Browning scrambled for the game-winning TD in its first overtime possession. (AP)

Snap Judgments from the evening Week 2 slate. For more coverage, check out our early Snaps, midday Snaps, coverage of Florida-Texas A&M , LSU-Washington, Georgia-Missouri and complete Top 25 review. 

• Louisiana-Monroe 34, No. 8 Arkansas 31 (OT). We have called him “John-El Smith” for so many weeks now that we were reaching for an “ugh, more like John ‘L’ Smith” joke before remembering that is his actual name. This is about the best we could do, and for that we are very sorry:

his name isn’t John W Smith, guys #omens

— Holly Anderson (@SIHolly) September 9, 2012

Arkansas lost two starters to injury over the course of the evening. Quarterback Tyler Wilson did not return for the second half after suffering what was initially reported as an “above the shoulder injury.” Starting corner Tevin Mitchel was carted off the field after a helmet-to-helmet contact with a teammate. The Razorbacks also suffered a hit to their fullback depth with Kody Walker sustaining a left leg injury. (Starting fullback Kiero Small was already out indefinitely and scheduled for foot surgery.)

The Warhawks scored three unanswered late touchdowns, including a 23-yard touchdown pass by Kolton Browning with less than a minute to play in the fourth quarter, to force overtime. Arkansas attempted an answering drive, but Wilson replacement Brandon Allen was intercepted at midfield.

A 37-yard field goal put the Razorbacks up in overtime, right up until ULM went for glory. Browning kept the ball on fourth-down and darted 16 yards, squeaking in past the pylon for the winning score. War damn Warhawks, y’all. [BOX | RECAP]

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• Important things first. We will get to the part featuring teams expected to finish with winning records and play in the postseason momentarily, but for right now, please just bask in the radioactive glow of a Kent State player recovering a fumble and taking it 58 yards in the wrong direction. The announcers aren’t really enjoying this thing as much as they should, so maybe mute this and have the same spirited discussion with your coworkers that we had in our living room last night: Who’s the best/worst here? Andre Parker, the disoriented runner? The Towson players who tackled him even though a muffed punt can’t be returned (even in the wrong direction)? Or Parker’s Kent State teammates blocking for his wrongward journey? We love all three equally. We missed you, MACtion. (Kent State did manage a win, 41-21.)

• No. 9 South Carolina 17, Vanderbilt 13. The 2009 South Carolina-NC State 7-3 slog remains our gold standard for queasy Thursday night openers, but this game was a valiant attempt to carry on that legacy. Andy Staples was on the scene, and writes from Nashville: “Did South Carolina look like a top-10 team in its 17-13 win at Vanderbilt? Not even close. Did the Gamecocks look like a team capable of competing for an SEC — and, using a logical leap informed by the results of the past six years, the national — title? Nope. Did South Carolina leave Vanderbilt Stadium 1-0 overall and 1-0 in the SEC East? Yes. For opening night, that’s enough.”

• BYU 30, Washington State 6. We expected Mike Leach’s unseasoned band to have a rough go of it in Provo. We did not expect Washington State to not be able to score a single touchdown. Stewart Mandel was there to take it all in: “The outcome shouldn’t be entirely surprising. BYU, perhaps unduly overlooked by preseason voters (the Cougars garnered just 10 points in the same Coaches’ Poll that ranked them 25th to end last season), trotted out a senior quarterback, Riley Nelson, who went 6-1 upon taking over the starting job last season, along with seven returning starters from a top 15 defense. Wazzu, nine years removed from its last bowl trip, started a senior quarterback, Jeff Tuel, who’s experienced seven wins in his career (most while injured on the sideline), and a defense that returned three of the front seven from last year’s 82nd-ranked unit.”

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Washington State coach Mike Leach, seen here pondering a heart-healthy start to his day. (AP)

• Let’s start our week off correctly, shall we? With some heart-healthy legumes and a quote from Mike Leach!

At a Pullman restaurant, Leach ordered a cup of lentil soup and fish tacos, prompting him to weigh in on lentils.

“I don’t know what a lentil is,” he confessed. “Actually, despite not having a great deal of expertise on lentils, I did know there was a lentil festival here. I’ll have to get to the bottom of this lentil stuff.”

Good morning!

• You’re doing it wrong. We continue to shake our heads at the entities preventing The Longhorn Network from reaching more homes. We have said this before, but isn’t it always best, as a species, to err on the side of More Football?

• Here is a photo of Nick Saban in an outdoor location that is not a football stadium or golf course. Still sort of baffled that this SEC beachgoing thing actually happened.

• Penn State update. The person identified as Jerry Sandusky’s “Victim 1″ is suing Penn State.

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Here is an Eastern Michigan cannon being fired during a game against Ball State, which is as close as we’re allowed to get to the joke we really want to make. (ZUMAPRESS.com)

• By all means, enjoy yourselves. And just like that, less than a week before the season, we have a new leader in Favorite Offseason News Thing. Good hustle, Ball State!

This will cause some locker room jokes. #Ball State players Jonathan Newsome, Toney Williams tried to shoplift “male enhancement pills”

— Doug Zaleski (@DougZaleski) August 24, 2012

Ball State, as you may know, is named “Ball State.” This’ll be fun.

• #Menphis things afoot. We’ll let Matt Stevens and Kyle Veazey catch you up, but real quick: Joe Schad says Mississippi State receivers coach Angelo Mirando resigned while under NCAA investigation; Dan Mullen does not care for Joe Schad, and the investigation in question leads back to Memphis (the city), which is already under NCAA scrutiny for Jovon Robinson-related reasons. Hey, Tim Brewster! Neato?

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USC tops the preseason AP poll, which means we get to use this photo of Lane Kiffin again. (AP)

• Ow. Ow. Ow. Ow. Hey, American Gladiators is on! Ow. The Associated Press preseason Top 25 has been released, for whatever that’s worth. And while we’re on the topic of whatever that’s worth, a gentle reminder: Preseason polls are worth a good time-killing argument, plus a bonus argument over the usefulness of the poll’s actual existence in the case of the Coaches’ Poll, and that is all. Would you like to hear our argument? It’s a good one! Here goes: We think there’s a better than even chance Ohio goes undefeated this year (that’s the Ohio Bobcats, because would you look at that schedule), and not a single poll voter gave the Bobcats a single poll vote. (We do not have a vote, and that is a good thing, because these rankings would take forever to do well and we would rather be making jokes. If you would like to peruse the votes of the folks who actually do this thing, here they are.)

• Starkville down a top Dawg. Mississippi State wide receivers coach Angelo Mirando announced his resignation Sunday night for non-specified personal issues, which the Clarion-Ledger’s Brandon Marcello reports are not issues of the legal type.

• Those Ds were his Ds. Julius Peppers speaks out on the unfortunate publicizing of his college transcript.

• Back to school. Chris Brown has written many words on the Sluggo Seam that you should read.

• Injury report story hour. Utah quarterback Jordan Wynn is scheduled to return to practice today … Michigan defensive tackle Ondre Pipkins is up and about after a spinal injury scare … Iowa defensive lineman John Sawhill is giving up football due to injury concerns … Iowa presents another injured running back, right on schedule … and Tennessee’s tight ends are already lined up over a haunted burial ground of some sort, so just try not to jinx the rest of the Vols’ offense.

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In three weeks and two days, we will go from zero Bowdens running FBS football programs to one Bowden running an FBS program, and if you say you knew all along it would be Terry or that he would be at Akron you are a LIAR. 

23 days.

Unlike baseball, college football is actually supposed to have an opening weekend. (REUTERS)

All this chirping about based ball’s Opening “Day” just makes us pine for five months from now, when college football will accomplish in five days what baseball crams into nine or so. Is it too early to start making out our Week 1 mayhem wish list? Probably!

Thursday, August 30

• South Carolina @ Vanderbilt. James Franklin taunts Jadeveon Clowney after the Commodores pull off a late go-ahead touchdown, and the ensuing fracas manages to convince SEC officials to suspend the South Carolina stalwart. Seeking revenge, Steve Spurrier departs Nashville with five or six of Franklin’s scholarship quarterbacks, to feather his depth-chart-fiddlin’ nest back in Columbia. No one is truly satisfied, but no lessons are learned.

• Minnesota @ UNLV. TCF Bank revokes Golden Gophers’ stadium sponsorship after team refuses to pay $5,000 in ATM fees following return from Vegas.

• UCF @ Akron. Zips win, and Terry Bowden gets free jousting privileges at all Medieval Times locations for life.

• UMass @ UConn. In their FBS debut, the Minutemen rout the Huskies, relegating Connecticut to the MAC by a previously unnoticed realignment provision. All involved parties agree this is probably in everyone’s best interest.

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Isaiah Crowell's 2011 Signing Day announcement has yet to be topped, but should be an inspiration for all future recruits. (AP)

The fact that we’re still discussing Isaiah Crowell’s puppy-bearing 2011 Signing Day announcement a year later proves that, no matter what turns the running back’s career in Athens might take, the moment was a smashing branding success for the University of Georgia. This year’s haul of signing ceremonies has been light on pageantry, although one Mississippi State commit did involve an actual human baby in his announcement. So wags the world away. In a fit of wishful thinking, we got to fantasizing about blue-chip athletes swanning about campus with jars full of stinging insects and elite high school prospects piloting heavy machinery through school property, and before too long we had this list of schools whose commits we would very most like to see follow in Crowell’s footsteps and introduce a wee young mascot at their Signing Day ceremonies. Those  Top 25 teams are as follows:

25. Big Cat Schools. Your Wazzus, your FIUs, your LSUs. Perhaps unfairly dinged because there are just so many Big Cat schools, and if this becomes a trend we’ll soon have a Signing Day entertainment market saturated by baby lions and bobcats. Any LSU prospect bringing along a white tiger with purple eyes to match the Bayou Bengals’ latest Pro Combat unis, however, will receive an instant and much-deserved rankings boost. (This being LSU, we estimate this is at most three years from happening.)

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Where Bowdens coach, hilarity is sure to follow. (AP)

Just a quick flurry of news reading before I board yet another plane:

• Fresh coaches, bought  and sold! Of ALL THE DAYS to be traveling during business hours! To miss this Terry-Bowden-to-Akron bombshell! That brimstoney scent on the wind is the aroma of a thousand blog sniping engines spinning up to life, for where there is a Bowden in a head-coaching gig, administrative mayhem and general hilarity are sure to eventually follow. Bowden leaves behind an island of misfit toys in Florence, Ala., only to join up with an abominable snowman: His new AD, you’ll recall, fired previous coach Rob Ianello over the phone while Ianello was driving to his mother’s funeral. Elsewhere on the carousel: Wisconsin’s Paul Chryst to Pitt, and Houston’s Tony Levine to Houston! Huzzah!

• Keep your thoughts with College Station: The worst sort of news out of Texas A&M: Senior offensive lineman Joseph Villavisencio died in a car crash Thursday, on his way home for winter break. He was 22 years old. Our sincere best wishes and condolences to his family and the A&M football community.

• Roster blotter: Matt Barkley, noted Christmas tree impersonator and fine football player, will give it one more round with the Trojans. Just remember where you heard Matt Leinart’s opinion first. Charlie Weis re-ups on quarterbacks. Four Bruins are out for the bowl game, as is FSU’s Jermaine Thomas. And Virginia Tech kicker Cody Journell is in a world of trouble, arrested for felony breaking and entering.

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