The real story about last night’s Holiday Bowl wasn’t the easy win by Texas (although it sure brought any ASU sackriders down to earth.) It was the strange play that, for a short time, gave Arizona State tons of momentum. A member of Texas’ football operations staff, later identified as Chris Jessie, allegedly touched a ball squirming towards the Longhorns sidelines. The ball was eventually recovered by Texas and taken into Sun Devil territory. Instead, officials called unsportsmanlike conduct on Texas and gave the ball back to ASU inside the Texas 10.

In the end, not much came of it besides some laughs. ASU’s momentum was short-lived. A fake punt by Texas and two ASU personal fouls quickly took all of that momentum away and got Jessie, Mack Brown’s step-son, off the hook. I don’t watch Texas much but it seems like their sideline must constantly get involved in these controversies. After all, on any given play, more than half the coaching staff is a couple steps on the field. Luckily for Jessie and Texas, his brain fart didn’t change the end result of the game: A convincing Texas win.

Just like last season and last week, the Sportable staff will be sitting in the press box at historic Qualcomm Stadium. We’ll be blogging all of the action during tonight’s Holiday Bowl matchup between Texas and Arizona State. We’ll talk about what’s happening on the field and in the press box.

Kickoff is set for 5 p.m on ESPN. The bowl season has already produced some late thrills (even last night’s Motor City Bowl was incredible). The Holiday Bowl is usually one of the better games on the slate. Let’s hope we’re in store for another classic.

It’s been a wild, wild season in college football. And all immature jokes aside (of which there are plenty), Houston Nutt, Casey Dick, and the two running back deities at Arkansas played yet another wild game and beat the LSU Tigers in Death Valley in three overtimes. It was the second time this season that LSU had fallen in triple overtime, the previous one coming against Kentucky. And an even more mind blowing fact? This was the twelfth time this season that an unranked team beat a top five ranked team. Twelve freaking times.

How great is Darren McFadden? Every time there was crucial play in the game, Houston Nutt would pull Casey Dick and just have McFadden line up as the QB. Why not? The idea of football is to get the ball into the hands of your playmakers and Nutt took that to the most literal extent. McFadden’s 200+ yards rushing against arguably the best run defense in college fooball has surely vaulted him back into Heisman contention. And how about Felix Jones? Playing in McFadden’s shadow, Felix Jones has dominated all season and had over 100 yards as well yesterday.

Well, this sure throws a wrench into the proverbial BCS spokes. If you ask me, LSU is still the best team in college football with Florida coming in at second and West Virginia being third. Yet, barring a loss to Missouri today, the Kansas Freaking Jayhawks are the top dog in the land. No, we aren’t talking college football. No, we aren’t talking college co-eds. We’re talking about the Kansas Jayhawks being number one in college football. Hard to grasp, I know. I have two words for that piece of crap computer that prints out the BCS rankings. Playoff system.

Last Week: 4-0
Season: 24-23-1

Connecticut +19.5 over West Virginia. Since losing to South Florida, West Virginia has gone undefeated, scoring over 38 points a game. But they get a pretty stern test in an underrated Huskies defense that has already shut down Big East offenses like Louisville and Rutgers. They’ve allowed just 125 rushing yards a game. They won’t win in Morgantown, but they’ll keep it respectable.

UCLA +1.5 over Oregon. We’ve seen it all year. Whenever an undefeated team loses, they usually lose the next week too (Florida, South Florida, Boston College). I don’t think this game will be an exception. Without Dennis Dixon, this Oregon team is average. I’m not confident in Brady Leaf beating many teams, even if it’s an underachiever like UCLA.

Missouri +2 over Kansas. Every week, I ask the same questions. Is Kansas for real? Can they keep it up? Will they ever play a good team? Can Mark Mangino eat an entire village? We’ll get answers to some of those questions tonight in a surprising matchup of top five teams at Arrowhead Stadium. I haven’t watched much of either team this year but you can’t overlook one simple fact. Kansas hasn’t played a ranked team all season. Missouri is more battle-tested and they have the better quarterback.

Boston College -14 over Miami. Once again, did you see Miami last week?

Last Week: 2-2
Overall: 20-23-1

Georgia -8 over Kentucky: There’s few teams in the country clicking offensively like Georgia. They’ve scored over 40 points in their last three games behind the powerful running of freshman Knowshon Moreno. Revenge is on Georgia’s mind after Kentucky upset them last year.

Wake Forest -6 over North Carolina State: On paper, this looks like a game that NC State would roll in. They’ve won four in a row and face a Wake team that’s lost their last two. However, Wake lost road games in Virginia and Clemson, while NC State beat up teams like Miami and ECU. Wake has covered the spread five of their last six meetings and I think that continues here.

Central Florida -13 over SMU: I’ll admit I know very little about either team but this seems like a good matchup for the Knights. SMU comes into this game averaging over 37 points a game, which happens to be the number of points UCF averages. The Knights have won four in a row and should make it five against a 1-9 SMU squad.

Virginia Tech -16.5 over Miami: Did you see Miami last week?

It’s been a while since we had such a wide-open Heisman Trophy race. Last year, Troy Smith was all but assured the Heisman Trophy even before he faced Michigan. The year before that, it was either Reggie Bush or Vince Young, with few others even considered. But this year, it’s a bit different. There’s only two undefeated teams left in Division-1A and neither Kansas or Hawaii have generated the hype worthy of a Heisman candidate. Because ranking my top five would be next to impossible, I’ll just throw out five names.

Glenn Dorsey, DT LSU. This is where the definition of Heisman Trophy gets a bit skewed. The trophy should be awarded to college football’s best player, which Dorsey (or Michigan tackle Jake Long) is. Instead, it’s often turned into “the guy with the best stats on the best team.” Watch a couple of defensive series and you’ll see how valuable Dorsey is. He’s disruptive, he commands a double team on every play and he’s the cog of a defense that’s surrendering just 236 yards a game, the lowest in the country.

Colt Brennan, QB Hawaii. ESPN finally got around to broadcasting a Hawaii game and Brennan didn’t disappoint, throwing for nearly 400 yards and two touchdown passes before going down to a concussion. But Hawaii doesn’t play anybody, it’s that simple. Brennan can put up these eye-popping numbers and play on Sunday. But until then, he’s going to be seen as a system quarterback the same way Timmy Chang was. Brennan will get a big shot at boosting his resume against Boise State in a couple weeks. Win that one and Hawaii could find themselves in a BCS bowl.

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