Los Angeles football will be short two McDonald brothers next season, with T.J. departed for the draft and Tevin for parts unknown. (AP)

The UCLA Bruins have announced the dismissal of starting safety Tevin McDonald for the Ever-Popular-And-Mysterious Violation of Team Rules. McDonald, last seen missing the Holiday Bowl for failing a drug test, is the brother of USC safety and NFL draft hopeful T.J. McDonald, and the son of former Fresno State and current Jets position coach Tim McDonald. Also officially be-goned are lesser-known wide receiver Ricky Marvray and Jerry Rice Jr., whom some of you may have heard of. Those two players intend to transfer.

In the dystopian future of the Big East, BBVA Compass Bowl trophies will be a highly valued currency. (AP)

• “Group of five” still just sounds so ominous. Jeremy Fowler reports on the coalescing system the Big East, Conference USA, MAC, Mountain West and Sun Belt are working on to distribute playoff revenue from the new postseason system:

In this proposed system, more than half the group’s roughly $86-million playoff pot would be distributed among the Big East, Mountain West, Mid-American Conference, Conference USA and Sun Belt as guaranteed base shares, according to a source with direct knowledge of the discussions. The source expects those shares to be evenly split, but added discussions are ongoing. The second tier pays out based on a conference’s body of work — the top conference gets the highest amount, then “X” amount for the next-rated conference, and on down. The third tier pays a kicker to the conference with the highest-ranked team, which is guaranteed an access bowl bid or, if among the top-four teams in the country, a semifinal berth in the playoff.

• Harbros’ early broing days. Check out Dan Wetzel’s tale of relatively wee Harbaughs recruiting youngsters to their dad’s team at Western Kentucky, including an appearance by one Willie Taggart.

• Exactly how you would’ve guessed. Former Miami Hurricanes make up the biggest slice of Super Bowl roster pie charts, but two of the next five teams on that list are … Marshall and Utah? Marshall and Utah! Go ThunderUtes!

• From the no-jokes department. Compelling story via OTL on UCLA researchers and evidence of chronic traumatic encephalopathy in living football players.

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WELL, THAT TOOK A TURN. The story of a bowl, as told through social media:

Easy way to smoke out family members who you shouldn’t be giving gifts to: Ask their opinion of the Hawaii Bowl

— Brian Floyd (@BrianMFloyd) December 25, 2012

“You’re thumbing your nose at the Hawaii Bowl? You hate college football? Well Santa’s skipping your chimney this year”

— Brian Floyd (@BrianMFloyd) December 25, 2012

The Hawaii Bowl is probably going to be pretty thrilling! There’s nothing else going on tonight, is there?

— SB Nation (@sbnation) December 25, 2012

Judging by the lighting, the Hawaii Bowl is coming to us live from the cleaning products aisle in a Walgreens.

— Bill Hanstockings (@sundownmotel) December 25, 2012

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The Hawaii Bowl pineapple football is the most beloved football costume of the college football postseason.

The 2012 Hawaii Bowl is just hours away. We’re sure you have so many questions. We’re here to help. (For an X’s and O’s breakdown, click through to Matt Dollinger’s game preview.)

• What’s all this, then? The Sheraton Hawaii Bowl is known for being a bowl game played in Hawaii around Christmastime, and for being the only bowl game to incorporate a football dressed up as a pineapple into its logo. But it’s not the Pineapple Bowl? The current incarnation of this game isn’t related to ye olde Pineapple Bowl, which itself was a a successor of the fantastically-named Poi Bowl.

• Where will this game be played? Hawaiian Airlines Field at Aloha Stadium.

• When is it on television? Coverage begins at 8 p.m. ET on ESPN, with the vocal stylings of Carter Blackburn, Kelly Stouffer and Kaylee Hartung. The game will also be streamed on WatchESPN. How much better could the ratings be if this game kicked off at 11 p.m. ET, like our beloved late Hawaii contests? Better in our house, to be sure. Nothing quite like falling asleep to the dulcet tones of football being played over the horizon.

• Whom does it feature? Conference USA versus Mountain West.

• What about this year? The 9-3 Fresno State Bulldogs versus the 6-6 SMU Mustangs! … welcome back, June Jones? Jones may find this an unpleasant return, yes. Remember that time we thought last year’s game might not be competitive either and then Southern Miss only won by a touchdown and also there was a fight? No, but for real, Fresno State is quite good and has players to watch on both sides of the ball (see: Rouse, Robbie; Thomas, Phillip; Carr, Derek) and SMU lost to Tulane. TULANE? Tulane.

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• Come back soon, RonP. College football’s buyout hero is with the Jacksonville Jaguars now, but does that make a minute and a half loop of him singing on the Jags’ video holiday card any less compelling? We say nay:

May your days be merry and bright, and may all your buyout clauses be airtight.

• Can’t spell COIN COIN without COI? Oregon will have its Committee on Infractions hearing. Bylaw Blog does a bit of explaining.

• Coach-hirin’ follies. Boston College hires its coordinators … Gary Andersen pulls what we’re going to call a Reverse Tommy Tuberville … we actually met some Oregon fans last year who professed to be “tired of the Rose Bowl,” so this is a real phenomenon, however dumb.

• Realignment tidbits, grudgingly dispensed. Big East commish Mike Aresco says “We feel we have a very good league.” This is secret code: you cannot spell “FEEL” without “Fresno State and UNLV.”

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De’Anthony Thomas torched Oregon State for 122 rushing yards and three scores. (Jonathan Ferrey/Getty Images)

Snap Judgments from the Week 13 midday flight. For more, check out Friday’s Snaps, Saturday’s early Snaps, Saturday’s late Snaps, our recaps of Michigan-Ohio State, Florida-Florida State and Notre Dame-USC and our complete Top 25 review.

• No. 5 Oregon 48, No. 16 Oregon State 24. Despite the typically gaudy final score for the Ducks, this game was close well into the third quarter. Two De’Anthony Thomas touchdowns in just more than two minutes, separated by a Beavers fumble on a kickoff return, put the game out of reach. And Oregon being Oregon, the Ducks piled on just a bit, with Kenjon Barner and Marcus Mariota adding another pair of touchdowns around a second-down Sean Mannion interception. Turnovers completely hamstrung Oregon State this afternoon; the Beavers committed six in all, including three interceptions that killed off three of their four final drives.

While the Ducks’ most memorable defensive plays occurred in the air, their offensive attack was confined largely to the ground. Mariota completed 17-of-24 attempts for 139 yards and a touchdown and rushed for an additional 85 yards and a score. The best of these: a 42-yard touchdown run just more than two minutes into the first quarter. Ahead of him in rushing: Barner, with 221 yards and two scores on 29 carries, and Thomas, with 122 yards and three scores on 17 attempts.

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What glories yet await Cory Dorris and the Golden Hurricane as Conference USA play continues? (AP)

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

Tis the season for car commercials with big-ass bows and conference math. We attempted to explain, in bewildering detail, how the MAC races could shake out from here in our Wednesday night MACtion preview. We are here to inform you (with some glee, as we adore late-season chaos) that the MAC has far from the most convoluted conference race situation at the moment. Very quickly, the current states of the remaining non-AQ conference races, as teams not named Navy or BYU begin to prettify themselves for postseason suitors:

• Conference USA: Two teams with perfect 6-0 league play records top the two divisions: Central Florida in the East and Tulsa in the West. After Saturday, one squad’s record will bear some blemish when the two clash in Tulsa, but don’t expect that to affect the race. The Knights have only UAB to clear after that in the regular season, and hold a head-to-head advantage over East Carolina, the only other team in the division with fewer than three conference losses. Tulsa’s championship game aspirations could still be spoiled with a loss tonight and another at SMU November 24, assuming the Mustangs (4-2 in league play) beat Rice in the meantime.

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Everybody who wants to see the national championship trophy filled with marzipan, thumbs up! (AP)

Saturday games of varying degrees of interest, grouped in highly subjective categories. For more in-depth preview content, visit Andy Staples’ Walkthrough.

• Biggest game we feel like we couldn’t predict if our lives depended on it: No. 3 Kansas State at TCU, 7:00 p.m. ET. We’re still harboring a dream that seemed far-fetched just a few short weeks ago, a dream inspired by Tom Fornelli suggesting that if Bill Snyder takes home the crystal football this year, he’ll break it in half and make two hard candy dishes. The ‘Cats, at 9-0, are one of six undefeated teams remaining in FBS play. No gimme games remain, but then again, they haven’t played a gimme game since Oct. 6 against Kansas. In their past three outings, they’ve beaten three ranked opponents by a combined score of 154-68.

The Horned Frogs, no slouches on defense, will pose a greater threat to K-State’s undefeated season if the Wildcats take the field without starting quarterback Collin Klein. The Heisman frontrunner’s status for Saturday has been carefully guarded almost since the moment of his injury during last week’s game against Oklahoma State. It’s entirely possible we could see this contest played out without either team fielding the quarterbacks that topped the depth charts at the year’s outset. Only one thing is for certain: This will be the purplest football contest of the regular season.

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Fresno State’s offense gets plenty of attention, but Phillip Thomas would have you know the Bulldogs are also ranked seventh nationally in pass efficiency defense. (Courtesy of Fresno State Athletics/Cary Edmondson)

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

Profile in Ownage: Phillip Thomas, SS, Fresno State

It’s nine weeks into the first season of the Tim DeRuyter era at Fresno State, and if your thoughts turn to the Bulldogs, they probably turn to quarterback Derek Carr, the younger brother of David currently putting up more than 300 yards of offense a game, or Robbie “Mighty Mouse” Rouse, the diminutive back who scored four touchdowns in a quarter against Colorado. But as the season winds down, we’d suggest familiarizing yourselves with the body of work being assembled by senior strong safety Phillip Thomas. The Bakersfield, Calif., native has recorded an FBS-leading seven interceptions through two months of play, three of which he returned for touchdowns, and one fumble recovery. He’s also forced three fumbles, made seven tackles for loss and collected three sacks.

“This 3-4 defense that we run, we learned it from Dick LeBeau and the Steelers, and Phillip’s our Troy Polamalu,” DeRuyter told SI.com. “Where you’ve gotta have a guy who’s gonna be a difference-maker, you can blitz him, you can have him in pass coverage, you can have him as a run-force player, he can play man coverage and he can disguise everything? That guy, for us, is Phillip.”

Thomas is keying a major defensive turnaround. A team that ranked 116th nationally in turnover margin last season is up to 11th in 2012, thanks in large part to a player who spent most of his junior year watching from the sidelines on one good leg.

“I know we’ve had a reputation here offensively,” said DeRuyter. “When you’ve got players like Derek and Robbie, it’s deservedly so.

“What I think people don’t know is Phillip didn’t play a year ago.”

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CAUTION: DO NOT KICK TO THIS PLAYER. HE WILL RUIN YOU. (Scott W. Grau/Icon SMI)

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

We lamented, last week, the loss of the best hope for a BCS-busting scenario in 2012, but please don’t think we’re writing off five conferences and the independents. This entire series is a labor of love, constructed to avoid precisely that notion. Louisiana Tech probably won’t make an appearance in the Orange Bowl, but the Bulldogs will be bowling somewhere. And after a week out of the national rankings, they’re right back in following their 70-28 obliteration of Idaho. All any team can ever do is beat every opponent placed in front of it, and should it stumble along the path to postseason glory, the absolute best thing a team can do is what LaTech is doing right now.

Tech clocks back in at No. 24 in the AP Poll, trailing Boise State at No. 21 and Ohio at No. 23 and ahead of Toledo, Tulsa and NIU stuck under the “also receiving votes” category. Ranked this week in the actual BCS standings: the Broncos at No. 21 and Bobcats at No. 24. This week marks the Bobcats’ first-ever appearance in the BCS standings.

First in votes also received, the Rockets really should’ve cracked the Top 25 this week, in our humble, unimportant opinion, after knocking off No. 21 Cincinnati. (If you missed it, this was one of the weirder games of the season, with Toledo recording a 29-23 victory without an offensive touchdown. Its scoring: A 75-yard interception return, a 91-yard kickoff return and five field goals.) Look for Toledo to make a for-real appearance in the polls next week if the Rockets can really pile it on at Buffalo this Saturday.

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