• Sailors would guide entire journeys by it, but the joke was on them. Are we ever so happy as when another school comes out with a football-themed rap video? We really think not:

The best part of this particular contribution to the field of college football-themed music videos is that it’s school-sanctioned, and cannot therefore be written off as the actions of a mere fringe group. We like to think the bewildered-looking girl functions as a kind of silent Greek chorus here. We’re right with you, honey.

• Western Kentucky 31, Troy 26. The Hilltoppers remain undefeated in conference play in a deep Sun Belt, along with the Warhawks and Ragin’ Cajuns. [BOX | RECAP]

• Tulsa 33, UTEP 11. Filed under “Thing UTEP Did This Week:” Achieved the elusive scoreboard elevener! [BOX | RECAP]

• Arizona State 51, Colorado 17. A 17-point second quarter for the Buffs had us feeling pretty bad about our predicted Sun Devils blowout win. That feeling did not last too long. [BOX | RECAP]

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The Hilltoppers rightfully expect big plays from Jonathan Dowling, who has pulled in four interceptions in 2012. (AP)

Finally, that blessed time of year where Thursdays fill up with college football. We’re sure you have so many questions. And we’re here to help, sort of. Kickoff times and TV listings for tonight’s action are as follows:

Western Kentucky @ Troy

• What information do I, the discerning consumer, require in order to consume this game? The Hilltoppers and Trojans kick off at 7:30 p.m. ET. The game will be televised on ESPNU and streamed on WatchESPN.

• What am I watching for here? WKU should be able to run the ball with some ease, but we’re really looking forward to seeing the Hilltoppers’ defense, particularly Jonathan Dowling, who has hauled in four interceptions in four games played. He’ll go up against Corey Robinson and Troy’s prolific passing attack.

• What’s at stake? With a win, the Hilltoppers remain undefeated in conference play and at the top of the Sun Belt standings with the Warhawks and Ragin’ Cajuns.

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Colby Cameron and Johnny Manziel lead two of the nation’s top offenses. Who wins? Or will they decide to film a buddy cop comedy instead? JOHNNY FOOTBALL AND THE COLB-CAM: LOOSE CANNONS. (AP-Stacy Revere/Getty Images)

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

It is time. The Ohio Bobcats are 6-0, bowl eligible and unranked and likely to stay that way for a little bit while AQ teams above them take losses and are dropped in the polls accordingly. They’re also not making a great case for Big Important Bowl Inclusion, having allowed three non-AQ teams (Marshall, UMass and Buffalo) to play them closer than their Week 1 opponents at Penn State. Six MAC teams remain on the schedule, not one of which finished 2011 with a winning record and only one of which (Kent State) is currently above .500 in 2012. If the Bobcats plan on ascending into the national Top 25 before the year is out, they’ll have to stage some blowouts.

This week, national spotlights will be trained on Louisiana Tech, a team less likely to go undefeated but more likely to impress the BCS if it does. A matchup viewed as a high-stakes Week 1 upset possibility has only seen its stakes increase since Hurricane Isaac forced a six-week delay, as both LaTech and Texas A&M went and got themselves ranked. Tech’s No. 23 AP ranking is just the second AP nod in program history and its first since 1999. A&M has rattled off four straight wins since dropping its first SEC game to Florida in Week 2, with the final scores ranging from the predictable (70-14 versus South Carolina State) to the uncomfortable (30-27 at Ole Miss).

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Central Michigan scored a win for the MAC by knocking off Iowa in the final seconds. (Matthew Holst/Getty Images)

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

This will mark our fifth season tracking the record of non-AQ programs against teams from power conferences, for no other reason than liking to watch where the numbers go. We’re not sure we’ve ever seen a weekend produce a winning record for a mid-major league that involved more than one or two games. But glory be to the MAC, which played seven games against BCS-favored opponents, and won four. (Yes, we’re even including Northern Illinois’ win over Kansas, even though Kansas is Kansas. COUNT IT.)

MAC teams beat one Big Ten team, two Big East teams and one Big 12 team. Directional Michigan schools had a particularly grand weekend, with Central Michigan knocking off Iowa and Western Michigan laying out UConn. Eastern Michigan also acquitted itself admirably, putting up a dogged fight against Michigan State.

The fifth big winner of Week 4 was the gaudiest: Louisiana Tech, a team with qualities we have been relentlessly touting since last December or so, mowed down Illinois on the road, 52-24. The Bulldogs currently field the nation’s third-ranked scoring offense and have two more high-profile nonconference matchups in the next three weeks: at Virginia and home against Texas A&M. Stay tuned; they’re our favorites behind Ohio to finish the 2012 regular season undefeated.

Speaking of the Bobcats: They’re through their nonconference gauntlet after a Week 4 win over Norfolk State and received 40 votes in this week’s AP Poll. The only other non-AQ teams on that list are Boise State at No. 24 and Louisiana Tech, which received seven votes.

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Rashad Greene and other FSU return men, beware! Clemson’s long snappers will haunt you once every two years! (AP)

• A very specific part of the Clemson-Florida State series is haunted. We must share this email we received from Clemson sports information, because it’s too wacky not to pass along: “Clemson long snapper Phillip Fajgenbaum recovered a Florida State punt fumble in the first half. It set up a Clemson touchdown, helping the Tigers to a 21-14 lead at intermission. It was the first fumble recovery of Fajgenbaum’s career. What made it odd was that it marked the third straight trip to Tallahassee that a Clemson long snapper had recovered a Florida State fumble.  And those are the only recovered fumbles by  Clemson long snappers in the 21st Century. In 2010, Matt Skinner recovered a Florida State fumble on a punt return and in 2008 Charles Roediger accomplished the same feat.” Florida State special teams players of 2014: HEADS ON A SWIVEL.

• Other news of the weird in our inbox. Here’s a press release excerpt we bet the Big Ten didn’t count on writing this year: “Minnesota, Northwestern and Ohio State carry unblemished records into the beginning of conference play following wins last weekend…”

• Hey, Harvey Updyke’s back! “Updyke ran into trouble again last week when attempting to return a lawnmower to a national home improvement store in Hammond.” Harvey Updyke’s post-treeslaying life is going about how you’d expect.

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Tracking the zeitgeist of college football’s fourth weekend through social media:

How about ULM’s two biggest fans tonight – Willie (Duck Dynasty) and SBC commish – go Warhawks twitter.com/kbcommish/stat…

— karl benson (@kbcommish) September 22, 2012

House of Pain, color-out attendance, weeknight kick, no running backs… OMG Monroe deep fried the MAC.

— Steven Godfrey (@38Godfrey) September 22, 2012

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Jason Wilson and Central Michigan flattened Keenan Davis and Iowa with a last-minute upset win. (Getty Images)

Snap Judgments from the Week 4 early slate. For more coverage, check out our midday Snaps, late Snaps and complete Top 25 review. Also check out our coverage of Florida State-Clemson, Kansas State-Oklahoma and Notre Dame-Michigan.

• Central Michigan 32, Iowa 31: College football’s governing trickster gods are cruel and capricious, and let us never, ever forget it. The same afternoon that saw an Iowa running back deliver a standout performance without suffering the latest in a staggering series of tailback injuries also saw the Hawkeyes defeated by a directional Michigan team –and not a particularly well-regarded directional Michigan team.

Running back Mark Weisman’s 27-carry, 217-yard, three-touchdown outing was overshadowed by the triumph of a Chippewas squad that’s seen little in the way of glory since the departure of quarterback Dan LeFevour. Weisman nearly doubled up Central Michigan’s entire team rushing-wise, but Chippewas quarterback Ryan Radcliff made up for it with an aerial attack that covered 283 yards and two touchdowns.

Radcliff wasn’t the highest-scoring Chippewa, though. That would be kicker David Harman, who made up for weeks of special-teams shame directed at kickers nationwide by hitting a career-long 47-yard field goal with three seconds remaining to clinch the win. And how did Harman find himself in position to hit the game-winner? The final 45 seconds of the game saw the Chippewas fail on a two-point conversion; fail to recover an on-side kick, then recover the on-side after a delay-of-game penalty gave them a second shot; continue to advance on a 15-yard Iowa personal foul penalty; and score nine total points to pull the upset. [RECAP | BOX]

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Denard Robinson will look to play hero against Notre Dame for the third straight season. (Lon Horwedel/Icon SMI)

Kind of like preseason awards for the upcoming weekend of football, and just as binding. For additional preview content heading into Week 4, including actual discussion of actual upcoming football games, actually, please see Andy Staples’ Walkthrough.

• Best opportunity for a drink refill and perhaps a nice nap inside a stadium. We have heard tell of this campaign to make Notre Dame fans watch football games more like living people and less like tastefully attired statues, but the combination of legions of Fighting Irish Down-In-Fronters and this banner does not inspire confidence in the possibility of a rollicking Saturday night in South Bend. More’s the pity, with both teams ranked and the possibility of an Actual Football Game looming large in prime time. Denard Robinson! Manti Te’o! Notre Dame’s defensive front! Denard Robinson again! Rejoice.

We have but one request, attendees of tonight’s festivities: Prove us wrong. Let your joy and anguish ring from sea to shining sea. We want it to be possible to relate to you, to like you, just in case your football team actually is planning on going the distance this year. Bridge the gap. Stand up and holler. Do the right thing.

*This makes Alabama very, very tall, yes. The football team, we mean. Not … well, you know.

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Robbie ‘Mighty Mouse’ Rouse, out for a leisurely stroll against one of the worst football teams in human memory. (AP)

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

Soooo remember last week, when we were all “Robbie Rouse is 79 yards away from becoming Fresno State’s all-time leading rusher, isn’t that swell?” We all know by now what happened next. So while we’ve got Mighty Mouse up on a pedestal, let’s put some of his teammates up there with him.

Video game football doesn’t begin to cover what Fresno State did to Colorado in Week 3; this was more akin to watching a cartoon. Were you aware … 

•  Rouse’s 94-yard touchdown run, the one that made him Fresno State’s all-time leading rusher, wasn’t even the Bulldogs’ longest scoring play of the game? On Fresno State’s prior possession, Derek Carr and Isaiah Burse combined for a 97-yard pitch-and-catch touchdown run.

•  Carr recorded his 300 passing yards and five touchdowns all in the first half?

•  Fresno State’s defense recorded four interceptions and four sacks?

•  Safety Phillip Thomas was responsible for three of those interceptions, two of which he returned for touchdowns?

•  Even the Bulldogs’ punter, Andrew Shapiro, got in on the rout with a career-long 69-yard punt? 

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Loud, long and sincere applause for Manti Te’o, y’all. (AP)

Snap Judgments from the evening Week 3 slate. For more coverage, check out our early Snaps, midday Snaps, Alabama-Arkansas recap, Cal-Ohio State recap, Stanford-USC recap and complete Top 25 review.

• No. 20 Notre Dame 20, No. 10 Michigan State 3. That Michigan State scored at all in tonight’s contest is something of a minor miracle, particularly taking into account certain other fateful kicks we’ve seen go awry today. Dan Conroy made a successful 50-yard field goal with four minutes remaining in the first half, the Spartans’ lone scoreboard contribution of the evening. Michigan State’s Andrew Maxwell was sacked four times (giving him the unenviable rushing stat of -28 yards), barely completed half his passes, and accounted for 187 of his team’s 237 yards of offense. Le’Veon Bell, he of the 44-carry, 210-yard outing against Boise State, contributed 19 rushes for 77 yards.

Everett Golson’s completion percentage was even poorer, but he made one crucial pass count early, hitting John Goodman in the end zone for a backwards leaping touchdown catch you’ll be seeing frequently on highlight reels this weekend. Cierre Wood, George Atkinson and Thewo Riddick contributed 56-, 43- and 30-yard rushing performances for the Irish.

Points aside, all Irish eyes were focused on star linebacker Manti Te’o, performing admirably just days after the deaths of his girlfriend and grandmother. Te’o recorded 12 tackles (seven solo) and two pass breakups. [BOX | RECAP] Read More…