Thoughts on the late games ...

Typical, cliche comment, but was it not a GREAT day of college football? All that can be asked for the second week of the season.

South Florida 26, Auburn 23
(somewhere MarktheShark is 26 sheets to the wind) Great win for the South Florida program, for Matt Grothe, and for one of the most underrated coaches in the college football. Most teams would crumble after turning 4 turnovers into 0 points and missing 4 field goals. Somehow Jim Leavitt kept his Bulls attacking on the road in SEC country. Very, very impressive. But I think most of us who follow college football knew SF was a sleeping giant. The teams who lost most today were Miami, Florida State and Florida. The Bulls in 5 years might just be the best of the Sunshine state.

I always know a guy is having a rough night when my girlfriend who isn't paying attention starts feeling bad for a football player, and then all of a sudden cares about the sport enough to root emphatically for that team. Tonight, she was a Bulls fan for the 4th quarter. Delbert Alvarado fortunately has a plane ticket home instead of a bus fare. That was awful. Not as awful as Llyod Carr, but Matt Grothe deserves a better kicker. Exalt Big East, you have a couple teams with defense and they aren't West Virginia or Louisville.

South Carolina 16, Georgia 12
You know what I like about this version of the OBC. He's winning his big games with defense, and I know it's irritating the *&% out of him. The Gamecocks had 174 yards passing and really didn't move the ball that effectively, but held the Bulldogs to only field goals. If you didn't know before today, and shame on you, Jasper Brinkley is a stud.

Penn State 31, Notre Dame 10
0-2 Notre Dame vs 0-2 Michigan next week. That's beautiful. While I love to bash the Irish when I can, let me say that Jimmy Clausen will inevitably be a very good QB in South Bend. He doesn't need pathetic comparisons to Lebron James and Wayne Gretzky as they did today, but he'll be good. Better than Brady Quinn. Right now, the Irish ran into another good football team that isn't going to lose at home. What should really concern Irish fans more than their special teams, running game and defense should be penalties. 14 flags for 97 yards? Come on Charlie. You're on notice, genius.

LSU 48, Virginia Tech 7
#1 in my rankings last week, #1 this week with everyone else at #5. Seriously, how ferocious are the Tigers? They'd scare the piss out of me if my team had to lineup across the line of scrimmage. 598 total yards to 149. This is a good, if not very good, Hokie team. Their defense is scary, but even more amazing is the balance on offense. 301 yards through the air, 297 on the ground. I'm feeling very good about my national title pick.

On a related note, welcome to college football Tyrod Taylor. You're going to be the man the rest of the season, and Virginia Tech will still be in the ACC title hunt.

Hawaii 45, Louisiana Tech 44
Please tell me why I'm supposed to vote for the Warriors? I don't get it. They're not good, they merely have an offense that puts up flashy numbers in the passing game. Watched a good portion of this, and yet again not impressed. Hawaii was bailed out on a couple pass interference calls en route to tying the game against a team that's not very good itself.

Texas 34, TCU 13
Longhorns handle adversity well. To the tune of 20-straight points on a very good defense. Hopefully Oklahoma and Texas can keep their focus until they line up.

Plenty more exciting games happened, feel free to share your reactions on all of them right here.