Temple mascot Hooter and the Fighting Hedwigs are in talks to join the Big East in all sports. (Main image: US PRESSWIRE; inset: Warner Bros.)

Temple’s return to the Big East, if it goes through, will elevate an owl mascot to the AQ level for the first time since the school’s 2004 ejection from the conference. It’s a natural fit for the league of Squibs, but as the move is rather last-minute from a conditioning standpoint, you may find yourselves falling behind, winded in an effort to make Harry Potter jokes during league play in 2012. Below, a few basic maneuvers you might find useful, during an imaginary conference schedule that assumes the Fighting Hedwigs join up with the Ever-Increasingly Accurately Named Big East by fall:

October 6, 2012. Temple @ UConn. “Accio passing game, you guys! Amirite??”

October 13, 2012. Syracuse @ Temple. “Addazio’s offense without Bernard Pierce is deader than Dumbledore.”

October 20, 2012. Temple @ Pitt. “I tell you what, this Owls front seven has put Tino Sunseri in Azkaban.”

October 27, 2012. Rutgers @ Temple. “And what a coming-out party for Matt Brown! He blasted through the Scarlet Knights’ line like a Dementor! A Dementor on a Firebolt!”

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This guy came within a tiebreaker of going to the Orange Bowl instead. (Icon SMI)

The 2011 Liberty Bowl is just a day away. We’re sure you have so many questions. We’re here to help. (For an Xs and Os breakdown, check out Bill Trocchi’s game preview.)

• What’s all this, then? The Liberty Bowl retains its Memphis location for the 53rd year and has held onto its AutoZone sponsorship since 2004, making it a very grown-up bowl game indeed compared to your TaxSlayers and TicketCities.

• Where will this game be played? Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium, current home field of the Memphis Tigers and former turf of the XFL’s Memphis Maniax.

• Maniax? It might have actually been ManiAX, now that we remember. Don’t say you’ve already forgotten one of the greatest graphical endeavors in upstart football league history!

• The NFL would be a lot more fun if it adopted some of the XFL’s spelling rules. We could not agree more.

• When is it on television? Kickoff is scheduled for 3:30 p.m. ET on Saturday, December 31. The game will be televised on ABC.

• Whom does it feature? Typically, the top pick from Conference USA versus a low-ranked SEC team.

• What about this year? A weird to-do with the bowl contracts sent Southern Miss to the Hawaii Bowl instead, which consternated some people, but if this really is about the athletes, put yourselves in the Golden Eagles’ cleats: Christmas in Hawaii versus New Year’s in Tennessee? Thought so. The “winning” Liberty Bowl selectees are 9-3 Cincinnati and 6-6 Vanderbilt.

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Quarterbacks Jordan Jefferson, Kirk Cousins, Logan Thomas, Brandon Weeden. (US PRESSWIRE)

SEC Championship Game

No. 1 LSU vs. No. 12 Georgia: After the grisly spectacle of the Pac-12 title game elicits repeated groans from the masses, will there be any undamaged vocal chords left to complain about the other “one-sided” championship matchup of the weekend? Let’s find out! Georgia hasn’t lost since Week 2, turning an 0-2 start and more tiresome calls for the tanned and fluffy head of Mark Richt into a 10-2 regular season and assurances of a reasonably prestigious bowl bid. The Dawgs did have the advantage of getting their two most fearsome opponents out of the way early, and easily handled remaining ranked foes Auburn and Georgia Tech in November. They also emerged victorious from the World’s Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party. You might have heard. And while South Carolina edged out Georgia in September, the Gamecocks’ two subsequent conference losses boosted UGA back into the Dome.

LSU is … LSU, but without the two regular-season losses that were once the hallmark of even the best Bayou Bengals teams under Les Miles. The Tigers have played seven ranked opponents to Georgia’s four, beginning with that Arlington showdown against Oregon over Labor Day weekend, which they won by two touchdowns. Since then, they’ve dispatched two more top five opponents (Alabama and Arkansas), blown some formerly well-regarded teams out of the water and ground out the requisite low-scoring slugfests.

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Denard Robinson rushed for two touchdowns and passed for three more in a win over Ohio State. (US PRESSWIRE)

Snap Judgments from the Week 13 early shift. For swing shift Snaps, click here. For late Snaps, click here. For Andy Staples’ recap of LSU’s win over Arkansas, click here. For Staples’ take on Alabama’s rout of Auburn, click here. For a recap of all the Top 25 action, click here. For highlights from SI.com, click here. 

• No. 17 Michigan 40, Ohio State 34: I swear, looking at Michigan box scores week after week, you’d think nobody knows that Denard Robinson is a player who ought to be defended on the football field. This week’s reasons to put a body on Denard: 14 pass completions for 167 yards and three touchdowns and 26 rushes for 170 yards and two additional scores. This week’s reason a team might put bodies on Denard and still lose: The Michigan quarterback’s ability to place the football in the hands of running back Fitzgerald Toussaint, who will then do things like run for 120 yards.

Michigan’s defense, the year’s most reluctant talking point, must not be overlooked here. Ohio State’s Boom Herron was contained to 37 yards on 15 carries, his third consecutive sub-century game after running wild against Illinois, Wisconsin and Indiana following his return from suspension. More problematic for the maize and blue was Braxton Miller, who cracked 100 yards rushing for just the third time this season (accomplished previously against Indiana and Penn State) while shattering his former personal best outing as a passer with 235 aerial yards and two touchdown passes. The Buckeyes hung with it early and late, turning a 16-7 first-quarter deficit into a 24-23 halftime lead and adding 10 more points in the fourth to make the margin of loss more than respectable.

Still, the streak ends here. The Wolverines, you’ll recall, hadn’t beaten the Buckeyes since November 2003. They can now start their own cheeky counter: “It has been two hours since Michigan beat Ohio State in football.” We’re also almost surely witnessing the end of the tenure of Luke Fickell, a Buckeyes lifer thrust into a near-impossible situation in the wake of NCAA scandal and Jim Tressel’s resignation.

Time now to look to the future: Miller appears to be a young quarterback with many fine double-threat attributes. Wonder where the Buckeyes will find a head man with experience coaching up such athletes? Anybody hear anything? [RECAP | BOX]

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After starting the season 0-2, Mark Richt's Georgia Bulldogs won nine in a row to claim the SEC East. (AP)

Snap Judgments from the Week 12 early shift. For late shift Snaps, click here. For swing shift Snaps, click here. For Stewart Mandel’s take on the BCS chaos, click here. For Andy Staples’ Nebraska-Michigan wrap, click here. To see how Top 25 teams fared, click here. For highlights from SI.com, click here.

• No. 13 Georgia 19, Kentucky 10: An uneasy afternoon for several SEC teams playing presumed gimme games began with one division very nearly folding in on itself.  But now the race is over, and the Georgia Bulldogs are the sacrificial critters who will be handed over in an early December ceremony to an SEC West team that will almost surely make mincemeat of them. My Athens-educated beau has been referring to today as “2 for $20 Saturday,” with slapdash games barely qualifying as football littering the schedule.

Georgia prevailed despite problems cropping up early and often in an area that has been fraught with drama this season: the tailback position. With Richard Samuel not slated to return from injury for several weeks and Carlton Thomas missing a game for unspecified personal reasons, the first drive of the game was about the worst possible time for freshly hatched star Isaiah Crowell to leave the game. He sprained an ankle during a collision with a teammate, and did not return. For what should be obvious reasons, the ground attack didn’t really gain any traction until the second half.

Aaron Murray appeared out of sync with his receivers, and promising drives were cut short by turnovers. We can let the defense escape largely without criticism; despite allowing one monster pass from Maxwell Smith to Matt Roark and committing a couple boneheaded penalties, Todd Grantham’s boys played lights-out ball. From here, of course, it only gets harder. [RECAP | BOX]

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Freshman star Sammy Watkins amassed 95 all-purpose yards before leaving with an upper-body injury. (AP)

Snap Judgments from the Week 11 early shift. For swing Snaps, click here. For late Snaps, click here. For Andy Staples’ account from Penn State, click here. For a recap of all the Top 25 action click here, and for highlights from SI.comclick here. 

• No. 9 Clemson 31, Wake Forest 28: Kicker Chandler Catanzaro was the savior of the game and the clincher of the ACC Atlantic Division title for the Tigers, but he came perilously close to being the goat. Tied at 28-all with less than two minutes remaining in the game, the well-regarded Catanzaro missed a 30-yard field goal attempt. Quarterback Tanner Price got Wake out of its own red zone with an 18-yard pass to Cameron Ford, but his next two attempts fell incomplete, and after taking a sack on third down the Deacs relinquished control. Clemson’s Tajh Boyd was more precise in his targeting, and with seven seconds remaining, the Tigers were back in kicking range, if only just. Back came Catanzaro, with a 43-yarder that sailed true.

It’s just one of those years, isn’t it? One of those years where Jim Grobe puts together a Demon Deacons team good for a few scares and almost nobody realizes it until it’s nearly too late. Wake beat Florida State, played Notre Dame too close for comfort, and very nearly cost Clemson its Top 10 ranking today.

The Tigers were mauled by the rushing efforts of Brandon Pendergrass, who finished with 134 yards on 20 carries and two touchdowns. Considering the next-closest runner was Price himself with nine yards on nine carries, you can’t argue the the Tigers didn’t know where the ball was going. Boyd hauled them out of trouble but was vulnerable in the air, throwing two interceptions in a high-yardage outing. Of more immediate concern: The status of freshman phenom Sammy Watkins, who left the game after recording just 95 all-purpose yards with an undisclosed upper-body injury. [RECAP | BOX]

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LaMichael James and Oregon mounted a second-half comeback to beat Stanford 52-31 last season. (SI)

Plot threads to track in Week 11:

• No. 6 Oregon @ No. 3 Stanford: Night games in the Pac-12 are a fine affair, particularly in such a lovely setting as Stanford. Ducks versus Cardinal is the unassailable contest of the week, and the tropes are hanging low and ripe. Andrew Luck throws a lot! LaMichael James can run real fast! Red versus green! Big versus fast! Nike versus … some more Nike! You’ll be sick to death of hearing all the reasons why by this time tomorrow night, but there’s just so much to love about this matchup.

The joy of Stanford and Oregon lies in watching two systems loaded with the proper personnel operating week after week like they’re supposed to. (If this seems overly simplistic, ask Norm Chow what he’d do for a Time-Turner in Salt Lake City right about now.) Statistically, these squads are so evenly matched that we have to turn aside to find potential game-breaking factors. Two of natural note: injuries and defense.

Chief concerns for Stanford are the absence of star receiver Chris Owusu, who’s out for concussion-related precautions, and the well-being of those big blocky tight ends the Cardinal are so fond of. Levine Toilolo should be back in the lineup after being knocked out against Oregon State, but Zach Ertz is a likely scratch thanks to a knee injury sustained against USC. Safety Delano Howell, who’s been sidelined with a hand injury, may return.

For the Ducks, Darron Thomas and James are back at full strength from injured knees and a dislocated elbow, respectively, but Thomas didn’t put on his best performances against either of the Washingtons last week and the week before. And as evenly gifted offensively as these teams are on paper, Stanford holds the edge on defense, allowing an average of 17 points to Oregon’s 21. “Not the best” might be all the room the Cardinal need.

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Justin Blackmon and Oklahoma State will likely move to No. 2 in the BCS standings after improving to 9-0. (AP)

Snap judgments from the Week 10 late shift. For swing shift Snaps, click here. For early shift Snaps, click here. For a review of the Top 25 action, click here. For game highlights from SI.com, click here.

• No. 3 Oklahoma State 52, No. 17 Kansas State 45: It’s a low-hanging fruit of a plotline to grab at, but it’s too perfect to ignore in good conscience: In Week 10, for those who stayed up late enough, college football peddled wares for every taste. While the top two teams in the country traded body blows in four quarters and an extra frame of siege warfare, the No. 3 squad weathered a shootout to remain undefeated and in the thick of the national title hunt. Even the gods of sport got in on this one, causing what might have been the biggest earthquake recorded in state history just after the game wrapped. (Kirk Herbstreit, by the way? Not amused. They’re calling this a 5.6, and I’ve only ever been in a 5.5, and let me tell you, I can’t blame him for going Madame Alexander for a minute there.)

Brandon Weeden having a personal-best day is a real treat, if you’re into scads of points, and a sparklier sight than most other quarterbacks’ successful outings; his 502 yards were not only a career high, but set a Cowboys program record. His biggest beneficiary was, of course, Justin Blackmon, who caught 205 yards’ worth of advancement and two of Weeden’s four scoring passes. The other two landed in the arms of Tracy Moore and Joseph Randle, who tacked on two rushing touchdowns at crucial moments, including the game-winner.

We can’t let the night pass without a nod to Collin Klein, who bested his personal passing and rushing highs for the season with 377 all-purpose yards and four touchdowns. K-State’s passing game broke down completely in the game’s final minute, however, just past midfield. A 22-yard connection put the Cats at OSU’s five-yard line with 25 seconds remaining, but Klein’s last three heaves of the game were for naught. Kansas State might fall out of the Top 25 for this one, and right now, that feels monstrously unfair. [RECAP | BOX]

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Cincinnati's Isaiah Pead has amassed 257 rushing yards in three games and is dangerously close to averaging 10 yards per carry. (US PRESSWIRE)

Your weeknight amuse-bouches, with a capital “AMUSE,” amirite, TOB?

• Hampton @ Bethune-Cookman, 7:30 p.m. ET (ESPNU): The Thursday-night HBCU series continues with a MEAC date in Daytona Beach. Hampton currently holds claim to a share of the top slot in the conference standings, sharing a 1-0 in-league and 2-1 overall record with Norfolk State. Bethune-Cookman has already lost one conference game, and maintains a 1-1 overall record. The Pirates are coming off a close loss to Old Dominion last Saturday, 45-42, and though they look like the stronger team on paper, they’ll be operating on a short week against a Wildcats squad that’s had a bye week to prepare for their arrival.

• North Carolina State @ Cincinnati, 8:00 p.m. ET (ESPN): Thursday night marks the return game of a home-and-home series that last year saw the Wolfpack top the Bearcats, 30-19. State and Cincy have shared similar trajectories thus far in 2011: The ‘Pack trounced Liberty and South Alabama, but lost to Wake Forest by a touchdown, while the Bearcats blew by two wildly overmatched opponents in Austin Peay and Akron but got torched at Tennessee.

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