College football coverage, Week 13: Baylor, Oregon downed; Florida hits bottom

KNOXVILLE, TN - The caller’s accent is thick and lilting, the kind of Southern drawl you hear on a bad television show set in Savannah.

“The shape that our program has disintegrated to ...”

Yards allowed by California in 2013, at a disturbing rate of 7.1 yards per play. The Bears rank 100th in Def. F/+ just two years after ranking 31st and allowing 5.2 yards per play.

The last time Boise State lost to a conference foe two years in a row. Back then, Big West foe North Texas took out the Broncos, 17-10, after winning 21-13 the year before. It took 14 years for it to happen again, but Saturday’s 34-31 overtime defeat by San Diego State, a year after a stunning upset in Boise, did the deed.

The Cowboys in white hats defended their merciless turf against the men from Waco, just as they’ve done since 1939, and the Big 12’s food chain remains intact.

1. On the way into Stillwater, Oklahoma along I-35 North, I saw four accidents in an hour, cars discarded by indifferent roads into guardrails and each other. Oklahoma State Troopers attended services for the cars, gingerly motioning for flatbed tow trucks and shaking their heads at the wreckage, the panhandle-shaped state outlined in white on the black doors of their Magnums.

• No, every team that loses one game isn’t a total fraud

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In a conference known as much in recent years for in-fighting and turnover as on-field product, it would make sense that the Big 12 conference continues to solidify its reputation as the conference that eats its own. In 2011, an improbable Iowa State overtime win over Oklahoma State kept the Cowboys out of the national title game by a couple of decimal points. In 2012, a Baylor romp of Kansas State did the same. And on Saturday, OSU exorcised some demons, administering a 49-17 destruction of a Baylor team that hadn’t lost since destroying KSU a year ago.

This isn’t new, of course. No conference title game was as damaging to national title hopes as the Big 12’s now-defunct finale, from Texas beating Nebraska in 1996 to Texas A&M beating Kansas State in 1998 to Colorado beating Texas in 2001 to Oklahoma beating Missouri in 2007. (Two other title games also almost knocked out title contenders: KSU’s whipping of an Oklahoma team that still made it in 2003, and Texas’ near-miss against Nebraska in 2009.)

Last week: Lost 26-20 to Georgia Southern

Record: 4-7 (3-5 SEC)

Years: 3

Overall record: 22-15

School record: 22-15

Three-year record: 22-15

Salary: $2,928,000

Buyout: $8 million

Football ratio (percentage of the athletic department’s overall revenue derived from football): 58.9%

Subsidy (percentage of the athletic department’s budget that comes from John Q. Taxpayer): 3.5%

Dreaded vote of confidence? Yes.

Florida lost to Georgia Southern at home Saturday, an upset that would’ve entered the pantheon of Appalachian State-Michigan if it had occurred earlier in the season. With it, Muschamp assured the first under-.500 season in Gainesville since 1979. The season ends next week with a visit from No. 2 Florida State, and no team has ever beaten No. 2 the week after losing to a school whose name sounds like a railroad from a Drive-By Truckers song.

After two top-five teams went down in Week 13 -- thanks for keeping us entertained, Baylor and Oregon -- at least one more top-five will fall in Week 14.

Next weekend, Alabama and Auburn will meet for the annual Iron Bowl. If the stakes in that one weren’t high enough already, the winner will also be named SEC West champion. If that team is able to then beat Missouri or South Carolina in the SEC Championship Game, it will almost assuredly be headed to the national championship.

Georgia Southern’s win against Florida isn’t just mystifying because, um, it’s Georgia Southern beating Florida. It’s mystifing because of the complete domination: The Eagles outgained Florida by 150 and the game was only a six-point game because they fumbled the ball twice. Sure, Florida has some injured players, but they’re Florida, and Georgia Southern is an FCS team that was 4-4 in the Southern Conference. How does a team get beat so thoroughly by an opponent that should be so inferior?

But one screenshot can explain a lot of what happened to the Gators:

And the Valley Shook said the game was a return to old form for LSU, and something the fans had been waiting for a while.

Manziel’s struggles against LSU are not new, and Good Bull Hunting saw some of his more consistent problems flair up in the game.

Oregon entered Saturday’s game against Arizona as the fifth-ranked team in the country, with an outside shot at the national title thanks to the chaos falling around them. Either way, the Ducks controlled their own destiny in the Pac-12 race, against an Arizona team that was 6-4 and had lost two consecutive games, including one to Washington State. Sounds simple, right?

Kevin Zimmerman of Arizona Desert Swarm said the Wildcats’ quick second half score made the difference in the game.

The Baylor Bears came into their nationally televised matchup against the Oklahoma State Cowboys ready to take on their toughest matchup of the season, but still hopeful for their outside shot at the National Championship. After a poor performance in Stillwater, however, the Bears will instead be hoping just to get a shot at a BCS bowl in general.

Mark Seymour of Our Daily Bears says that while the loss is heart-wrenching, it doesn’t take away from the massive success for Baylor’s program under Art Briles.

Well, hello again, Employee of the Month.

We don’t gauge the health of Alabama by “points” or “touchdowns” or “attempting to do anything whatsoever on offense.” As stated in Genesis 12:82:092, subsection gamma, “The earth hath given us abundance enough, and we shall live in defense of it, and probably treat offense as this ugly, if sometimes handy necessity. This verse is totally in the Bible so don’t even bother looking it up.”

In the final year of the BCS as the determining factor of the national-title combatants, it seems appropriate that top-five upsets are becoming a common occurrence late in the season. The shakeup continued Saturday, when No. 4 Baylor and No. 5 Oregon went down to No. 10 Oklahoma State and unranked Arizona, respectively.

Of the two big losers, Baylor is probably the less-affected by Saturday. The Bears were in line to take the Big 12’s automatic BCS spot, and while that appears to be up in smoke, they still have an excellent chance to receive an at-large berth. If they pick up wins in their final two games against TCU and Texas, they’ll finish the year 11-1 with an incredibly dynamic offense. That could be enough to get Baylor into a big-time bowl.

Oklahoma State dominated in practically every aspect of the game. They outgained Baylor 598 to 453, and forced three turnovers, two deep in their own territory. Baylor was without some key contributors, but the difference between the two teams was wider than just a few players.

Box Score Hero: Clint Chelf was masterful for the Cowboys, going 19-25 for 370 yards and three touchdowns and also rushing for another score.

Missouri running back Henry Josey staked the Tigers to an early lead by running in a four-yard touchdown on the game’s first drive. After an exchange of field goals, Marcus Murphy ran in Mizzou’s second touchdown of the night, and the Tigers held a 17-3 lead at the half.

Rankings Ramifications: Missouri could see a move in the polls, especially given the losses by Oregon and perhaps Baylor ahead of them. Ole Miss, which reentered the polls only recently, will likely fall back out of the Top 25.

East Carolina beat North Carolina State today. Like, literally, today. And they’ve already got a billboard up zinging the Wolfpack:

My favorite part of this is that East Carolina so thoroughly OWNS being Pirates. We picture East Carolina staff members starting conversations like “so, where you wanna go to lunch” just so when you start to answer they can interrupt you and be like “I was thinking ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRBY’S” or similar things.

GIF credit: ESPN

The play was somehow upheld after review, and now Harris will miss the first half of the Cavaliers’ in-state showdown against Virginia Tech. Good gracious, what a disaster of a call. It’s possible that the official upheld the call after review because Harris did leave his feet to hit a sliding quarterback, but he clearly didn’t make contact with the crown of his helmet.

Next Saturday, No. 1 Alabama heads to one-loss archrival Auburn, which could rank in the BCS top five. The game will decide the SEC West and, in the long run, quite possibly decide which of the two teams heads to the BCS National Championship.

As if America’s most 365-days-a-year rivalry needed higher stakes.

Texas A&M is busting out new uniforms for their big matchup with LSU tonight, and, look! They have lines!

Rick Carlisle admitted he was imitating Popovich while talking the other night, answering yes-no questions with “yes” and “no.” But this strategy was meant for Mark Dantonio, a man who has never, ever, ever displayed happiness at any point in his life. (Sure, there was that one time he danced to Rich Homie Quan, but then he said he’d never do that again.)

Of course, Dantonio had done this in the past:

GIF credit: Fox Sports

Lockett’s receiving yardage accounts for 76 percent of Kansas State’s total yardage. Granted, he’s taking advantage of some truly awful coverage on the part of the Oklahoma secondary, but those numbers are absolute madness for only one half of football.

Wilson was covering the deep middle of the field when Yale senior QB Henry Furman lofted a pass to sophomore WR Mathew Rubino. Wilson came from his deep safety position to knock the ball loose from Rubino, but was flagged in the process.

• Full Week 13 TV schedule, including five ranked games

Northwestern has been by far the unluckiest team in the Big Ten this year. That streak of awful luck is showing no signs of abating as Michigan State just took a 14-3 lead on this play:

That’s a wounded duck of a throw into double coverage that turns into an 87-yard touchdown for MSU’s Bennie Fowler, and one you’ll be seeing on the Plays of the Day highlight reels all night. And for Northwestern, well, uh... 2014 season starts in just 10 months, guys!

The Michigan State-Northwestern game may be early, but its dynamic has already shifted substantially for the rest of the game after this fateful hit:

(via ESPN)

This can’t possibly end well, right? Not Lee Corso with guns, those are just props. We mean picking against Baylor.

Maybe it’s because it’s Week 13. Maybe the momentum just peters out after 3 months. Maybe our momentum can’t sustain over the course of a full season. Whatever. The point is we’re... not thrilled with this week’s signs. We’re not upset, it’s just that this is the first week where we’re wondering why we got up early for this. So it goes. Anyway, onto the signs.