Florida versus Texas or USC for this season's national title is no longer the cinch it seemed Saturday when your paper hit pavement.
Tim Tebow and/or Colt McCoy for this year's Heisman Trophy also allowed for some rethinking, while opening a lane for speedy California tailback Jahvid Best.
He scored one-two-three-four-FIVE touchdowns against Minnesota.
And scratch, with the biggest No. 2 pencil you can find, Brigham Young from this year's storybook: No team from a league outside the "power six" has seriously contended for the Bowl Championship Series title and no team is going to do it this season after the Cougars were wiped out at home, 54-28, by Florida State.
Nostradamus once predicted Washington and Washington State would undergo years of simultaneous toil and upheaval only to one day rise to win games on the same day -- but this soon?
As usual, this is what always happens when you play the games.
It was Payback Saturday, not so much for Florida and Texas, but for Washington -- a 56-0 loser to USC last year in the Coliseum.
And now Washington State comes to Los Angeles next week on a one-game winning streak to play the team on the one-game losing streak?
Impossible, except it's true.
Florida was so internally combustive in trying to exact revenge for an opposing coach's comments, the trainer could have swapped out the Gatorade for bicarbonate of soda.
Tebow, the quarterback who does little wrong, had a key late fumble that helped narrow the final score into something Volunteers fans could almost brag about:
The headline in Knoxville could have been: "Tennessee Prevails: 13-23!"
At least Tebow didn't have to deliver a postgame speech that would be called "The Promise 2."
Texas' rip-snorting revenge for last year's loss to Texas Tech ended up a 10-point ho-hummer. McCoy, one of the most accurate passers in NCAA history, couldn't keep his fastball down most of the night.
The Longhorns' only touchdown in the first half came on a punt return in which Jordan Shipley almost ran into Bevo beyond the back of the end zone.
USC's 16-13 loss at Washington would be shocking if stuff like this didn't happen so often after big wins over Ohio State.
Side note: As USC was returning home after "the Mistake by the Lake," the last school to defeat USC in a regular-season nonconference game, Kansas State, was playing UCLA at the Rose Bowl.
