College Football

By HERMAN MATTHEWS
Sunday, November 12, 2006
While Ohio State remains the top team in this week's Matthews/Scripps Howard Computer Power Ratings, Louisville has surged to second just over a point behind the Buckeyes.

Ohio State (10-0) did little to build on its lead Saturday _ struggling for much of the game in a lackluster 17-10 win over Illinois.

By SCOTT CACCIOLA
Sunday, November 12, 2006
When Chris Vernon brought his guitar to work one afternoon in September, he hardly planned on becoming part of an Internet phenomenon. But the buzz surrounding his song, "Colonel Reb Is Crying," has grown with each forwarded e-mail and every Ole Miss football highlight broadcast on ESPN.

By JIM BENTON
Friday, November 10, 2006
Air Force's football chronicles are filled with upset victories, and that's why Falcons coach Fisher DeBerry is looking forward to the challenge this week.

By JAKE CURTIS
Friday, November 10, 2006
Our three R's this week stand for the Reality Check facing Rutgers, San Jose State and Wake Forest, three surprising teams that will discover this week whether they are as good as they seem:

REALITY CHECK I

Monday is the 137th anniversary of the first college football game ever played: a 6-4 victory by Rutgers over Princeton before a few hundred spectators at Rutgers.

By RAY McNULTY
Friday, November 10, 2006
The buzz from Gatorland has started already.

(Ital)If we get past Steve Spurrier's South Carolina team, beat Florida State, then win the Southeastern Conference title game, we should play for the national championship.(End ital)

Which is exactly what you'd expect from University of Florida football fans.

Because, well, they're football fans.

Florida is their team.

The Gators are 7-1.

And, of course, their 7-1 is better than everyone else's 7-1, or 8-1, or, in the case of the Big East, 8-0.

Why? Because the Southeastern Conference plays the best college football in America.

And because winning the SEC title is actually tougher than winning the national championship.

And because Florida has played a stronger schedule than all those other one-loss teams also hoping to get a shot at the trophy.

That's what they believe, anyway _ and nothing or no one is going to change their minds.

You can try.

You can argue that the SEC really isn't as tough as they think it is, that the league has no great team that it's just a pack of pretty good teams that beat up on each other on a weekly basis.

You can point out that Texas' lone loss was to top-ranked Ohio State, that Wisconsin's only defeat came at No.

By GREG WALLACE
Friday, November 10, 2006
With just under a month left in the 2006 regular season, one Atlantic Coast Conference coach _ North Carolina's John Bunting _ has already found his way to the unemployment line.

By BOB SMIZIK
Friday, November 10, 2006
A six-minute exhibition of simply awful and totally-out-of-character football, most of it astonishingly coming from the best player on the team, ended the sweet national championship dreams of the West Virginia Mountaineers and the state that so loyally follows its beloved team.

The third-ranked and unbeaten Mountaineers were outplayed by fifth-ranked and unbeaten Louisville here in a matchup of the two top teams in the Big East Conference.

By RON HIGGINS
Thursday, November 09, 2006
Tennessee's Jonathan Wade knows that as a cornerback, the very nature of the position is to be fearless.

It's just you and the wide receiver, way out on the flanks.

By MICHELLE SMITH
Thursday, November 09, 2006
John David Booty waited his turn on the Southern California sidelines for three years, mustering as much patience as could be expected when you're backing up one of the marquee players in college football.

By JAKE CURTIS
Thursday, November 09, 2006
With the college football world focusing on the contenders for the national championship game, some significant accomplishments are being overlooked in Athens, Ohio, and Moscow, Idaho.