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Profiles in Profiteroles: Sun Belt comes through in a big way in Week 2

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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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  • Published On Sep 11, 2012
  • Arkansas remains ‘ranked;’ more Designated Reads

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    How many voters in the Coaches’ (LOLZ) Poll can name a single ULM player? We’ll get you started: This is quarterback Kolton Browning. (AP)

    • It is entirely possible that Arkansas will still be ranked in the “Coaches’” “Poll” when John-El is fired. Your post-Week 2 polls are out and are being met with the usual mix of exasperation and outright contempt. Alabama, USC, LSU and Oregon top the AP Poll, with Florida State and Oklahoma tied for fifth; the Coaches’ Poll favors the same six teams in a slightly rearranged order and some complete and total tomfoolery down in the double digits. When the steam currently emanating from your ears dies down (No love for Kansas State? Any sort of love for UNC?), please enjoy one of our favorite seasonal features, Bryan Fischer’s Poll Attacks.

    • We were also really looking forward to constructing a reader poll that “ROLL TIDE” would surely win. Via the AP: “Big East commissioner Mike Aresco says there are no plans for the conference to change its name,” which is all kinds of too bad, because with the conference’s coast-to-coast reach, but dubious likability we were sort of hoping they would name it after Lee Greenwood.

    • And that, as they say, is that. Mike Markuson, Wisconsin’s O-line coach, is Wisconsin’s O-line coach no more.

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  • Published On Sep 10, 2012
  • Auburn’s woes continue at Mississippi State; more early Snap Judgments

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    Auburn’s Kiehl Frazier struggled mightily at Mississippi State, throwing three interceptions and no touchdowns. (AP)

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

    Mississippi State 28, Auburn 10. We question the Bulldogs’ commitment to tradition and history, friends and neighbors. We really, really do. It’s almost like Dan Mullen doesn’t read our blog, and went through Week 2 entirely unaware of our heart’s dearest desire to see a repeat of the 2008 3-2 Tigers-Bulldogs tilt. What gives, Coach Mullen? We thought we were buds.

    That first half was a thing of terrible beauty on both sides, to be passed down through the generations and cherished as one might preserve a lock of a baby’s hair — and then both teams just threw all our feelings away. Or ran away with them. Literally. Probably.

    This Auburn team certainly did its part to honor that day, as quarterback Kiehl Frazier managed negative two passing yards and two interceptions in the first half. He finished with three picks and 125 yards on 13-of-22 passing as the Tigers fell to 0-2 on the season. Auburn did, however, display a complete disregard for this blog’s express wishes with a 100-yard Onterio McCalebb kickoff return at the start of the second half.

    Bright spots, if you are for some reason “into” good football and actual scoring: Mississippi State quarterback Tyler Russell’s 20-for-29, 224-yard, three-touchdown performance for the Bulldogs offense, and defensive back Johnthan Banks’ two interceptions for State’s defense. The most valuable player, clearly, was Bully on a water treadmill.

    Auburn gets a tune-up game next week against Louisiana-Monroe before facing division hopefuls LSU and Arkansas. Mississippi State, meanwhile, could pad its record in its next three games against Troy, South Alabama and Kentucky. [BOX | RECAP]

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  • Published On Sep 08, 2012
  • Designated Read: AA so passé? We say nay!

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    Umm, it’s called the Football CHAMPIONSHIP series for a reason. HelLO. (AP)

    • Think we’ve solved this thing. The entity we are apparently still insisting on calling the FCS wants to rebrand itself, and is endeavoring to do so with the NCAA’s help:

    CAA officials are not revealing the cost of the plan, nor do they want to end the suspense by releasing a recently completed consultant’s report.

    But it’s about more than just a name, NCAA spokesman Damani Leech said. ”There’s other things related to branding. There’s the strategy behind it. There’s the actual messages,” Leech said. “It’s more than just what you call yourselves, but it’s what you say about yourself and how you talk about yourself.”

    For free, we will now fix this problem: Return to I-A and I-AA. AA is, like, a whole ‘nother A, you guys. Americans are not super great at applying basic math to real-world problems. Ride that. In many high school football systems, a greater number of A’s affixed to one’s team signifies a larger program.

    Act larger. Swagger taller. Send your best teams to the Sugar Bowl and demand they take the field. Based on our previous experiences in the Superdome, it is entirely possible this might be allowed to happen. Your destiny is exactly that: yours.

    • And now, the weather. From the “Tropical Storm Isaac, College Football And You” Department: Tulane moves the Green Wave to Birmingham to ride it out; LSU has closed school today and tomorrow with Saturday’s opener with North Texas still planning to go ahead, and last we heard from Louisiana Tech, the Bulldogs and Texas A&M were still scheduled to convene in Shreveport Thursday night.

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  • Published On Aug 28, 2012
  • Designated Read: The poll dance is a sad samba

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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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  • Published On Aug 20, 2012
  • Frequently Asked Questions: The BCS presidential oversight committee

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    Notre Dame’s Rev. John Jenkins is one of 12 university presidents on the current oversight committee. (ZUMAPRESS.com)

    What’s all this, then? The BCS presidential oversight committee convenes in Washington today to deliberate college football playoff plans proposed by the conference commissioners last week.

    The what, now? There are a lot of moving decision-making parts controlling the college football postseason; the BCS doesn’t actually begin and end with Bill Hancock (even though he gets to say all the fun stuff). From the organization’s mission statement: “The conference commissioners and the Notre Dame athletics director make decisions regarding all BCS issues, in consultation with an athletics directors advisory group and subject to the approval of a presidential oversight committee whose members represent all 120 Football Bowl Subdivision programs.”

    So who’s in charge here? Virginia Tech President Charles W. Steger is the ACC’s rep and chairman of the committee.

    Anything special we need to know about him? According to Virginia Tech, Steger “has been asked by the Swiss Ambassador to the United States and The World Bank to serve on a committee to establish a foundation in the United States to conduct research on mitigating global natural disasters.”

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  • Published On Jun 26, 2012


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