Saturday Rewind: What We Learned

Five lessons from a Saturday where San Diego State and Washington State set football back 50 years, Penn State gave gamblers nationwide ulcers and Lou Holtz uttered something about Mike Leach and Benito Mussolini. 1. There's no question who's the nation's best team. Texas only has one hole in its game (the secondary), but everything else is so good, you can argue its the most complete team in the game. Right now there's no other quarterback I'd rather put a must-win game on than Colt McCoy, he has two big-game receivers in Quan Cosby and Jordan Shipley, the running game is better than many believed and those lines are dominating. The Longhorns also showed a killer instinct, and an ability to play with a bull's eye on their collective backs as they defended the No. 1 ranking with a 56-31 rout of the supposed 11th-best teams in the country in Missouri. Tests still remain, but you have to feel pretty good about the 'Horns chances of landing in Miami on Jan. 8. 2. Ohio State showed its back in the hunt. Sorry everyone who had enough of the Buckeyes after the last two BCS title game losses, but this team is once again playing its way back int the national championship picture. We've been waiting for the Chris "Beanie" Wells-Terrelle Pryor partnership to finally deliver on its potential and it finally did against Michigan State. The duo combined for 338 total yards and four touchdowns as the Buckeyes ripped the Spartans 45-7. Really, it couldn't have come at a better time for OSU, which has a showdown with Penn State next weekend in Columbus that will go a long way to deciding the Big Ten title. 3. The Big 12 North has fallen back into line. Last season, the division was a media darling with Kansas and Missouri stealing headlines and Sports Illustrated covers (exhibits A and B) and entered the season with a supposed legit national title contender in the Tigers. After Saturday, the two best records in the division belong to Kansas and Missouri (no surprise) but both teams are 5-2, while Colorado, Kansas State and Nebraska are all 4-3 and Iowa State is 2-5. The North has been dominated by the South in head-to-head matchups so far 1-7, with the North's only win coming from Kansas State beating Texas A&M. There's little debate that the Big 12 is again a one-division race. 4. Mike Stoops continues to do enough to save his job. Bob's bro is 22-31 in five seasons at Arizona and his highest Pac-10 finish is a tie for fifth in 2006, yet he continues to stay employed and seeing him in Tucson next season is all but a lock at this point. Why? Dude continues to knock off ranked teams. Saturday, his Wildcats topped No. 25 Cal 42-27, marking the sixth win over a Top 25 team in his tenure. Last year it was No. 2 Oregon, in '06 it was No. 8 Cal and No. 25 Washington State, in '05 it was No. 7 UCLA and in '04 No. 24 Arizona State. It's hard to fire a coach who continues to lift his team to victories in big games but you have to wonder: how much longer can he continue to stave off termination like this? 5. The best mid-major team is ... definitely not BYU. The Cougars looked to be the cream of the mid-major crop heading into the season but TCU exposed Max Hall as a QB who can't avoid a pass rush and put a kink into BYU's plans. After the weekend, Ball State, Boise State, Tulsa and Utah stand as the only remaining unbeatens from outside the BCS conferences, while the Horned Frogs have just once loss at the hands of Oklahoma. So if I'm bound, gagged and expected to hitch my wagon to one mid-major program for the rest of the season and have the lives of myself, The Se?iorita and The Hijo, I'm picking TCU. Yes, its the chic pick after Thursday's dismantling of the Cougars, but this team now has an impressive win over a Top 10 team and it didn't embarrass itself in a loss to another (Oklahoma). What other mid-major in recent memory can even say that? The Horned Frogs have a dominant defensive front led by end Jerry Hughes and lead the nation in sacks, the ground game is 11th in the country and they lead all Division I-A in time of possession. That's a good formula for a BCS run, even if they do trail Utah in the Mountain West standings.