College football Saturday, Week 5: Now that was more like it

Kiffin was fired in the parking lot of LAX after his Trojans returned from a 62-41 thrashing at the hands of Arizona State. The loss dropped the Trojans to 0-2 in the Pac-12 for the first time since 2001. The 62 points posted by Arizona State tied the record for most scored on a USC team, and the 612 yards of offense was more than double what the Trojans had been giving up in the team’s first four games.

Great programs -- even those with the history of Southern Cal -- don’t remain great forever. Coaches are the impetus behind the ascention, or return, to the top. Alabama was 67-54 in the 10 seasons between Gene Stallings and Nick Saban. Oklahoma went 61-50-3 and finished in the top 2 of its conference just once in the 10 seasons between Barry Switzer and Bob Stoops. Mighty Texas finished just 72-54-2 in the 11 seasons between Fred Akers and Mack Brown.

It was a week light on truly humiliating losses that were not immediately followed by Most Extreme Coach Termination, so we’ll go with LSU in this space since it’s rough to see your national championship hopes severely damaged right after you thought you’d rescued them. The Tigers were losing, and then were winning, and then were losing again in the span of about a minute and a half, causing the usual implosion on LSU boards. But first:

And now:

Oregon’s De’Anthony Thomas is apparently being ruled out of Oregon’s Week 6 game against Colorado after suffering an ankle injury on Saturday against Cal. The star running back injured his ankle on the opening kickoff in the Ducks’ 55-16 win over Cal Saturday, and did not return to the game.

His official status is questionable, but observation indicates his recovery isn’t being rushed:

Avenged Sevenfold. Lane Kiffin was fired in an airport parking lot, and Paul Pasqualoni was probably just dropped off at a local bus station to fend for himself. It is September, and college football is already firing people. That is not what is important right now. What is important is one man, alone in the rain, keeping the demons at bay in the midst of a 55-17 throttling of his team by Stanford.

“He who makes a beast of himself gets rid of the pain of being a man.” That’s a quote dropped in the lyrics of “Bat Country” by Avenged Sevenfold, referencing Hunter S. Thompson’s reference to a Samuel Johnson’s quote about one solution to life’s agonies. It is also this Washington State fan, stuck in the rain in a hopeless downpour of points and cold water from the heavens, dulling the pain of his existence with popcorn and quite possibly a flask or two of fierce firewater somewhere on his person. He now joins the Pained Red Raider Fan as co-consul ruling all of fandom. He understands what love means: devotion unto unto death or Seattle, whichever comes first.

3.2. Yards per play averaged by UConn in a 41-12 loss to Buffalo. After competitive losses to both Maryland and Michigan, I was willing to entertain the possibility that maybe the Huskies had recovered at least a little bit from their season-opening trouncing at the hands of Towson. Alas, they really, really had not.

--what’s that? The Ducks still led 41-3 at halftime and rolled to a 55-16 win?

Last week’s final Selection Committee matchups: Oregon vs. LSU and Alabama vs. UCLA. Expect that to change this week.

Who are you picking after Week 5?

Recruiting is starting to pick up as conference play starts across the country. More competitive games means more attraction for recruits to visit.

The rest of the Pac-12 has to be pretty disappointed that USC didn’t give Lane Kiffin another chance to turn things around and get a shot at the 2014 season. But the league office has to be very pleased that its most storied and powerful program has elected to make a move to maximize its potential and take the program back to where it was under Pete Carrol.

As is expected in Morgantown, the fans went absolutely nuts after the victory. How nuts? Well, they reportedly started 10 fires and flipped a car.

No injuries have been reported and the AP says only one person has been cited for malicious burning.

ATHENS, Ga. -- No, the SEC isn’t changing forever.

Mark Richt assures you the defense will return, and soon. A few minutes after Les Miles grumbled that he “hoped” the league wasn’t permanently becoming an offense-driven brand of college football in the wake of Georgia’s 44-41 win over LSU Saturday night, Richt shrugged off any kind of intricate analysis and stated the obvious.

It was a big win for the Buckeyes, and an important return to form for Miller from a confidence-building perspective, but the victory was not without its setbacks. As Jeanna Thomas of Ohio State blog Land-Grant Holy Land noted afterward, the team has a big hole to fill with the loss of safety Christian Bryant, who broke an ankle and is out for the season.

On the other side, Jake Kocorowski of Wisconsin blog Bucky’s 5th Quarter was left looking for positives among a tough loss. He found one in the second-half performance of Wisconsin’s defense, which limited Ohio State after a rough start to the night.

The Mountaineers are struggling to find a replacement for Geno Smith, leading Dana Holgorsen to try several different options. In this case, he turned to Florida State transfer Clint Trickett, who made his first start in a WVU uniform. Trickett didn’t wow anybody, but as our West Virginia blog The Smoking Musket explained afterward, his effort was important to the victory:

How well the 3-2 Mountaineers fare the rest of the way remains to be seen, but there’s no doubting this was a huge victory for a team that needed a boost. Still, it wasn’t all fun and games. Dana Holgorsen took out some mid-game rage on his poor malfunctioning headset, which is now permanently malfunctioning.

After a Week 2 loss at Michigan and unconvincing wins over Purdue and Michigan State, Notre Dame desperately needed a statement win at home against No. 14 Oklahoma Saturday. They were unable to do so, however, as the Sooners came in and handled the Irish easily, winning by a final score of 35-21.

The Crimson & Cream Machine’s M. Hofeld was impressed by the Sooners’ defense in the win.

The Big 12 was our most wide-open conference entering 2013. Five teams out of 10 looked like serious contenders for the league title, a far higher percentage than any other conference. With that number now thinned, the whole national picture becomes more clear.

Oklahoma at Baylor on Nov. 7 now projects to be the conference’s closest thing to a championship game, assuming no major upsets along the way. (There will be major upsets along the way. All is meaningless.) The winner of that game should have an excellent shot at securing the conference’s Fiesta Bowl tie, while the loser could still be in the running for a BCS at-large spot. I think that’ll happen.

Georgia climbs to No. 6 while LSU falls to No. 11 after the Bulldogs’ home win over the Tigers, but the big story is the state of Oklahoma. The Cowboys dropped quite a ways after their loss to unranked West Virginia, allowing in-state rivals Oklahoma (who beat Notre Dame) to pass them in the poll.

Ole Miss, Notre Dame and Wisconsin all dropped as well after losses to higher-ranked opponents. Joining are NIU, Arizona State, and Nebraska.

The top of the Associated Press Top 25 poll remains mostly the same, with LSU falling to No. 10 and Georgia climbing to No. 6 after the Bulldogs beat the Tigers in Athens. Oklahoma State also takes a big drop, from No. 11 to No. 21, after losing to a West Virginia team that had been blown out of the water by Maryland the week before.

Alabama holds on to the top spot after a convincing win over Ole Miss, with Oregon and Clemson right behind after similarly dominating wins in conference play.

After erratic, uncharacteristically eventful wins over Virginia Tech and Texas A&M, Alabama finally returned to form this weekend by doing what they love most: slowly suffocating someone with their very strong hands in front of a horrified audience in a 25-0 win over Ole Miss. Nick Saban got to freak out over nothing, too! They’re rounding into classic Saban form, are going to win everything for the third year in a row, and nothing interesting will ever happen in college football ever again that doesn’t involve Lane Kiffin being fired on a Sunday morning.

Beat Cal 55-16 in a blinding rainstorm in Eugene. Converting for the weather, that’s about 77 points in fair weather, and a good 42 in blinding hail. We’re saying Oregon’s so far ahead of the game that they’ve adapted their football style to cope with global warming and unpredictable weather patterns, and that we should just give up and let Oregon and Alabama fight for the future of humanity right now and get it over with before October even starts.

USC fires Kiffin. After losses in seven of their last 11 games, USC has fired head coach Lane Kiffin after a 62-41 defeat at the hands of Arizona State. The Trojans desperately needed a win to stay in the Pac-12 South race, and now find themselves in last place in the conference standings as the only Pac-12 team 0-2 in conference play.

Trojans’ lee hurts knee in road loss. To make matters somehow worse for the Trojans, wide receiver Marqise Lee may be out for the season after an injury suffered in the loss. Lee came down awkwardly after being brought down on a kickoff return late in the third quarter. Gamemplay was suspended for several minutes as Lee was carted off the field and his Trojan teammates looked on in anguish.

The end of the Lane Kiffin era has come. USC’s long-embattled head coach suffered another big defeat on Saturday, this time at the hands of the Arizona State Sun Devils. Kiffin was fired after the loss, which dropped USC to 3-2 on the season, but perhaps more importantly, is the latest evidence of a team gone haywire.

After leading 21-20 right after halftime, USC’s defense allowed 28 straight Sun Devil points, giving Arizona State a 48-21 advantage. The Sun Devils would set a new record for points scored against USC in the win and total over 600 yards of offense while doing so.

Helped by a bevy of first quarter turnovers, Oregon sprinted out 27-0 lead in the first quarter and never looked back. The Ducks buried Cal underneath a series of touchdowns, as they have done against every opponent so far this season.

Rankings Ramifications: Oregon is not likely to move up as a result of this win, as No. 1 Alabama won this week.

Washington State had some opportunities to give Stanford a scare early on, but the Cougars’ mistakes continued to mount until a pair of pick-sixes in the third quarter eliminated any chance of a comeback with Stanford cruising to a 55-17 win.

Hogan and Cajuste nearly connected for a third touchdown, but Deone Bucannan picked Hogan off in the end zone as Stanford was threatening to expand its lead to 24-3 just before halftime.

USC receiver Marqise Lee appeared to be injured in the fourth quarter of the ASU-USC game, twisting his left knee after a punt return.

He was visibly in pain before the play had even finished and surrounded by his teammates on the field while he was down. The junior then left the game and was helped onto a training table, where he held a towel over his face. After an examination, he was carted off the field. According to ESPN, he smiled on his way off the field.

Washington State is getting run off the field by Stanford, but at least one fan is enjoying himself and his popcorn.

H/T Jeff Collier

Let’s not get carried away here. The Barry Sanders that played at Oklahoma State and for the Detroit Lions might be the greatest college and pro football player ever. Or the most amazing. Or most memorable.

His son, a former four-star recruit at Stanford, has yet to start a college football game, much less win a Heisman or break NFL records. All we’re saying is that you should take a look at something:

Ohio State was able to get on the board first in the second half, as well, as Miller found Corey Brown for a one-yard touchdown, making it 31-14.

Box Score Hero: Braxton Miller. He only threw for 198 yards, but had four touchdowns and ran for 84.

No official word has been given as to his status or when he might return.

Marshall came into the game with 196 rushing yards and two touchdowns.