Clemson’s Sammy Watkins tallied just 708 receiving yards and three TDs in 2012. (Streeter Lecka/Getty Images)

By Zac Ellis

Throughout the offseason, SI.com will spotlight several teams, players and coaches with something to prove heading into the 2013 season.

Only a year removed from a dazzling freshman campaign in which he made 82 catches for 1,219 yards and 12 touchdowns, Clemson wide receiver Sammy Watkins entered the 2012 season with lofty expectations. Yet the 2011 All-America regressed in his second year, both on and off the field.

Watkins was arrested on drug-related charges in May 2012 and was subsequently suspended for the Tigers’ first two games. He then missed another game at Boston College with a stomach virus, and he played just one series in the Chick-fil-A Bowl against LSU before leaving with an ankle injury. All things considered, it added up to a subpar sophomore effort.

Here’s a comparison of Watkins’ 2011 and 2012 receiving numbers:

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Andrew Manley threw for 242 yards as NMSU fell to UTEP in last year’s Battle of I-10. Will he exact revenge in ’12? (AP)

Kind of like preseason awards for the upcoming weekend of football, and just as binding. For additional preview content heading into Week 3, please see Andy Staples’ Walkthrough.

• Best interstate rivalry game. From Tuesday’s Profiles in Profiteroles, we remind you that the Battle of I-10 passes two trophies back and forth between UTEP and New Mexico State. One is a brass spittoon, the other a shovel found in an abandoned mine. We cannot stress to you enough how thrilled we are that the Battle of I-10 is real. The world is a fine place.

• Best intrastate rivalry game. Central Florida and Florida International have much in common entering this matchup. Both have designs on their respective conference championships, pretty good chances of getting to the top once league play begins and a recent history of disappointments in nonconference play.

• Most promising ranked-teams football game. We suspect No. 2 USC will run (well, fly) away from No. 21 Stanford in kind of a hurry. No. 18 Florida vs. No. 23 Tennessee is a rare night kickoff, which sets off all sorts of bad-luck haunting alarms in our head. That leaves No. 20 Notre Dame at No. 10 Michigan State as the only remaining ranked-on-ranked game of Week 3. It also carries the most promise for a compelling, close-fought football product.

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“Oh, really?” said Jawan Jamison. “No, not really,” said South Florida’s defense, allowing him to pass unimpeded. (AP)

• Rutgers 23, South Florida 13. Ask us again how goofy we feel for having picked the Bulls to win the Big East. We will tell you, free of sidestepping or correct grammar, way more goofier than we did at this time yesterday. The Crystal Ball Curse, which we have made up, lives and breathes of its own accord.

Making Thursday night worthwhile viewing all by himself was Rutgers tailback Jawan Jamison, whose spin move here is fun to watch in .gif form. But it was gasp-worthy in HD. Find video if you can. It was a truly beautiful moment in a game almost entirely devoid of them. Jamison wrapped up his evening in Tampa with 151 yards and a touchdown, his fourth consecutive 100-yard game. Jamison’s 41 carries broke a school record that had stood since 1972. [BOX | RECAP]

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NASA at the moment of “touchdown confirmed.” twitpic.com/ag2g8o

— Andrew Kaczynski (@BuzzFeedAndrew) August 6, 2012

• ROLL DAMN MARS. NASA’s Curiosity rover landed on Mars in the wee hours of Monday morning, and if NASA is calling it a “touchdown,” it means we need to start asking the obvious questions:

@siholly How fast you think Eddie Lacy can run on Mars, Paaawwwwllll? I’ll hang up and listen.

— Cory McCarty (@crmccarty87) August 6, 2012

You can read more about Curiosity (and see a gallery of photos already beamed back from Mars) at NASA.gov.

• Clemson now, if possible, even more infuriating to bet on. Dabo Swinney told assorted media types in Greensboro last month that star receiver Sammy Watkins was working through a laundry list of penances following his May arrest for drug possession, and that he hoped to have a decision on any in-season punishments by the start of fall camp. Friday night, the school announced Watkins will sit the first two games of the 2012 season. This will sideline the Tigers’ star receiver for the trip to the Georgia Dome against Auburn, and a decidedly less daunting contest with Ball State. Watkins will get some warm-up action against Furman in Week 3 before the team travels to Tallahassee on September 22. Read More…

We are not generally overfond of spring football, which clocks in high on pageantry (and higher every year) and low on actual valuable information. But we are highly susceptible to the promise of tailgate meats, and were lured to Death Valley on Saturday to sample a 40-pound brisket* and take in the Orange and White game.

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*May not be actual weight, but it was big. And delectable.

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The Switzies are named for former Oklahoma coach Barry Switzer, the patron saint of college football frolicking. (Rich Clarkson/SI)

Our 10 imaginary trophies celebrating on- and off-field favorites at the season’s midpoint:

• Best new toy: It’s not Clowney, Farmer or Kouandjio. The biggest impact freshman of 2011 is Clemson’s Sammy Watkins, who ranks in the top 20 nationally in receiving yards per game, sixth in kickoff returns and by the numbers is currently the FBS’ No. 10 all-purpose yardage generated. He’s recorded four games with at least 100 receiving yards in less than two months of college ball, and in two of those games has gone over 150. Against Maryland, he hit the century mark in receiving and  racked up 207 yards on kick return duty.

• Best stat: Aren’t early season cherry-picked numbers delicious? Remember those first weeks in September when Robert Griffin’s touchdown passes and incompletions hovered right around the same number? After four weeks of play that ratio was 20:18 and Baylor fan or not, it was hard not to hope it’d stay that way just for the spectacle of it. Subsequent games against Iowa State and Texas A&M knocked his incompletions out of reach. Then again, we’re talking about a guy who has a 78 percent completion rating after six games, so even his off days are nothing to sneeze at.

• Best highlight play: Nothing against the massive runs Trent Richardson’s reeling off, but there’s just something about a good catch that quickens the blood. The year’s best, thus far: Andrew Luck‘s one-handed grab versus UCLA, a move that would’ve been tricky even had the receiver been a receiver, and Mississippi State’s Chris Smith holding onto the ball in an invisible human gyroscope against South Carolina. Honorable mention: LSU punter Brad Wing‘s touchdown-that-wasn’t against Florida.

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