What did we learn from Saturday?

(AP Photo/Dean Hare)

Absolutely nothing if you've been paying attention to college football since forever! One would think that after last season - one that featured a weekly dose of top-5 teams losing - people would lose the attitude that one in-conference loss means you're out of the national title picture. Pac-10 teams lost some out of conference games and USC lost to OSU. So what?! Florida just lost to a TERRIBLE Ol' Miss team at home. Wisconsin just lost to an even worse Michigan team. Georgia just got blown out by Alabama. So what?! Teams get upset in this day-and-age of college football, it's just the way that the landscape is. Legit athletes who want a chance to start for four seasons are going to the Mountain West, WAC and Big Ten (just kidding) to get that opportunity and it's starting to show on the field. It says a lot to the point some people are making on the legitimacy of preseason polls.

I was probably one of the only people I talked to after the OSU win over USC who wasn't shocked at the outcome. Why? Mark Sanchez is still Mark Sanchez, isn't he? The same guy who threw 2 INTs against Oregon last season, right? The defense that people were so high on is filled with the same guys from last season, minus Sedrick Ellis, right?. All that game showed me was how terrible Ohio State is without Beanie Wells. The Beavs ran the ball at will against the Trojans - something Oregon should pay attention to - with the same exact offense they've been running since Mike Reilly came back, and with the exact same type of running back. The Quizz show looked an awful lot like the Yv show - and the Ken Simonton show, for that matter - when you think about it, didn't it?

A lot has been made nationally this season about the "fall of the Pac-10." While I acknowledge that the Washington schools are as bad as they've ever been, hopefully this weekend will calm everybody down, so they can start using the other half of their brains - you know, the half that has logic - and realize that the reality of college football nowadays is that the difference between #5 and #35 isn't a lot, and the only thing that really matters is who steps up and plays on any given day. I know that's expecting a lot from the likes of Lou Holtz, Mark Mays and Jesse Palmer, but I can hope. Hopefully Herbie can speak some sense to them because it's really hard to believe that these supposed college football experts are THAT out-of-touch.

Wish list aside, it was a pretty good couple of days. The Ducks stayed atop the Pac-10 standings and didn't injure a QB, USC was exposed, UCLA lost, The Huskies lost, and the SEC beat itself up. That, my friends, is a good college football weekend.
-Alex