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Northwestern 17, Iowa 10. Anytime a nondescript, 16.5-point underdog rebounds from a quick 10-point hole to upend a 9-0 national-title contender on the road, that is a "shocking" result. There was no reason to think Iowa might lose to a team with a gimpy starting quarterback and whose marquee wins to date included unlikely, skin-of-the-teeth comebacks against Purdue and Indiana. The Hawkeyes' miracle season obviously was not supposed to end here -- next week at Ohio State, maybe, but not at home, to Northwestern.

I find it hard to believe, though, that anyone who pays greater heed to probability than to miracles is actually experiencing anything like actual shock, especially after quarterback Ricky Stanzi's ignominious exit with an ankle injury on the end zone fumble turned Northwestern touchdown that turned the game in the second quarter and collapsed the Hawkeyes' Jenga tower of a season in a matter of seconds. At some point, it had to happen: Iowa had already survived the loss of its top three running backs and a starting offensive lineman for the season, as well as its best offensive player for a crucial three-game stretch earlier in the season, and emerged unscathed after fourth-quarter comebacks against Northern Iowa, Penn State, Michigan State and Indiana. When you're saddled with one of the worst offenses in the conference, there are only so many miracles at your disposal.

As much heat as he's taken for his perfectly mediocre performance through the first two months (and his five-interception schizo act against Indiana, in particular), Stanzi's injury was the obvious breaking point. At least the resourceful junior gave the Hawkeyes a chance to move the ball: Their first three drives covered 159 yards and put 10 points on the board off a 74-yard touchdown pass from Stanzi to Marvin McNutt and a 30-yard strike to Trey Stross that set up the field goal. The final eight drives, all led by redshirt freshman James Vandenberg, covered 131 yards, entered Northwestern territory only once and produced zero points. Vandernberg's first pass was a laser directly into the chest of a linebacker that set up the Wildcats' go-ahead touchdown, and his longest completion was just 16 yards. He repeatedly missed open receivers Stanzi may have hit. The high wire snapped when No. 12 went down.

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Today's lineup isn't really as mediocre as all that, despite the frustration of both marquee, national-interest games -- LSU-Alabama and Ohio State-Penn State -- competing with one another in the afternoon slot. Major unbeaten teams are defending their title chances early (Iowa, Texas) and late (Florida, Cincinnati) and old rivals are hooking up in Manhattan, Chapel Hill and Lincoln; the Pac-10 alone offers six of the conference's seven winning teams squaring off in Palo Alto, Berkeley and Tempe. The big games should live up to the hype, but something unexpected and interesting is going to happen outside of Tuscaloosa or Happy Valley.

What: Game day live blog. All games in play, all comments welcome and all alma maters accepted.
When: First kick at noon Eastern; chat kicks roughly simultaneously. The blog will run throughout the day, through the primetime tilts -- although, as intriguing as an evening in the Kibbie Dome may be, don't hold your breath for midnight-oil action in the WAC.
Who: You and all your rowdy friends. Come loud, proud and keeping your head on a swivel. We're not responsible for what may happen if you don't.
How: Hit "Watch Now," enter comments into the available box and do your part to accelerate the slow, agonizing death of conventional journalism.
Why: Because lobbing snarky barbs at earnest adolescents never gets old, especially when there are endless Kafka jokes on tap for the early afternoon. Football!

Ten hyper-specific predictions.

• Despite rumors of his reinstatement this week, suspended Oregon running back LeGarrette Blount doesn't show at all at Stanford -- not that the Ducks need him as they pile up more than 250 yards rushing on more than six yards per carry for the third consecutive week despite also allowing 100 yards to Stanford's Toby Gerhart and finishing in a six-minute hole in overall time of possession. Freshman running back LaMichael James, sitting on 918 rushing yards, goes over 1,000 for the season in the first half.

• Iowa never trails against Northwestern, yet manages to fully examine the apparent hopelessness and absurdity that seem to permeate the works of Northwestern quarterback Mike Kafka by turning the Wildcats away at least three times inside the Hawkeye 30-yard line, including a pair of turnovers by Kafka that lead him to demand the game film be burned before viewing by the rest of the team on Sunday. After throwing five interceptions in last week's wild comeback over Indiana, Iowa quarterback Ricky Stanzi doesn't throw an interception but still frustrates the home crowd during a stretch of at least three straight possessions without taking the offense into Wildcat territory.

• In Berkeley, Oregon State running back Jacquizz Rodgers piles up more yards than California's top backs, Jahvid Best and Shane Vereen, combined, and picks off Bear quarterback Kevin Riley multiple times in a close but convincing road upset.

• Oklahoma trails early at Nebraska but piles up more than 200 yards rushing between backs DeMarco Murray and Chris Brown and holds the Cornhuskers out of the end zone in the second half, during which Nebraska coach Bo Pelini draws a 15-yard penalty for exploding against officials following a critical call. The 'Husker offense finished below 300 total yards for the fourth time in five games.

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Nothing in LSU's first six games suggests the Tigers have any hope of upsetting a top-three rival on the road. This was a team that struggled mightily against Washington in the opener and required a dramatic goal line stand to win at Mississippi State -- without defensive and special teams touchdowns that overcame the Tigers' offensive malaise in those games, there wasn't much to suggest they could win anywhere of any consequence. After coming back to beat Georgia in a game that featured zero touchdowns in the first three quarters, LSU returned home to narrowly avoid being shut out by Florida, 13-3, without coming close to the end zone. The offense still ranks dead last in the SEC in total yards per game.

For the optimists, though, there are the last two weeks, in which the LSU offense has found a little life off a post-Florida bye: The Tigers racked up 31 points against Auburn, their best output against the division's other Tigers since 2002, and hung 42 points on overmatched Tulane, their first game this year with 40 points or (not and) 400 total yards. Jordan Jefferson is emerging as one of the most efficient passers in the SEC, and his backup, true freshman Russell Sheppard, is coming on as a dangerous big-play threat as a runner, with long touchdowns runs in each of the last two games to complement the between-the-tackles thumping of regular tailback Charles Scott.

And by all appearances, this is the right time to catch Alabama. The Tide's surprisingly balanced offense through their 4-0 start in September has disappeared into a cloud of dust as they get deeper into the SEC slate, carried to a great extent by the Heisman-worthy legs of Mark Ingram but still held out of the end zone entirely by Tennessee and in three of four quarters by both Ole Miss and South Carolina. Quarterback Greg McElroy has looked increasingly like the "game manager" holding down 'Bama's rankings in the preseason, and the perfect season has looked increasingly vulnerable as the weeks go by.

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That's right, it's another Friday night WAC tilt we're foisting on you, because you know you should care. We care about Boise State at Louisiana Tech, anyway, and here's why (besides the fact that we're addicts):

Admit it: Ruston is growing on you. Both teams have already made a pair of Mid-week Madness appearances on national television this season -- the Broncos laid waste to Fresno State and survived a scare at Tulsa; the Bulldogs beat Hawaii and lost to Nevada, both in fairly convincing fashion. Tonight they meet in lovely Ruston, La., home of Louisiana Tech, Elephant 6 and very little else. Don't underestimate the somnambulant effects of the 1,948-mile trip from Boise, either.

Who will protect our precious BCS landscape? Their trajectories may be entirely divergent, but don't be fooled by Boise State's undefeated record and Louisiana Tech's three wins. A lot could change tonight. The Broncos have been difficult to peg despite their early season heroic versus Oregon -- there are a lot of convincing wins on their '09 record, but they do stumble every once in a while, as evidenced by that close call against the Golden Hurricane. You're not likely to catch them sleepwalking, however -- with that schedule, one slip is all it will take to cost them a BCS bid, and they have to know it. Their No. 7 spot in the BCS standings isn't going anywhere good without some showy victories (and some luck wouldn't hurt, either, but the victories come first).

Bulldogs make the best underdogs. The upset path will not be easy. Louisiana Tech's 16th-ranked turnover margin has been a program touchstone this year, but taking the ball away from the Broncos is even more difficult; they're fifth in turnover margin themselves. But there's a grand Bulldog tradition of giving better-equipped visitors headaches for four straight quarters: They beat Mississippi State in Ruston last year, and crushed Hawaii back in September, when the Warriors still had a quarterback for their prolific passing attack.

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At the beginning of November, three-quarters of the way into the season, our hard knowledge of Penn State as it heads into its season-making date with Ohio State Saturday amounts to the following set of observations against a very un-illuminating schedule:

• They can still play defense. The Lions lead the nation in scoring defense and rank in the top six in rushing, pass efficiency and total D, as well as sacks; they've given up a total of 26 points in the last four games, including a shutout against Minnesota. In PSU's only loss, the defense picked off Iowa's Ricky Stanzi twice and held the Hawkeye offense to 13 points, 10 of them coming on drives that began inside the Penn State 25 following turnovers in the fourth quarter.

• They prefer to spread the ball around. This is a pretty balanced offense -- 36 runs per game to 31 passes, and that includes plenty of garbage-time clock-killing -- and though tailback Evan Royster is carrying the bulk of the running game, four different receivers have hauled in at least 25 passes for 340-plus yards on the season. Derek Moye is the deep threat, but Chaz Powell, Graham Zug and Andrew Quarless (as well as Royster and Joe Suhey, who have 25 catches between them out of the backfield) have all been reliable targets.

• They're healthy. The defense has endured various injuries over the course of the season, notably to star linebackers Navorro Bowman and Sean Lee, but shouldn't be missing a single starter on either side of the ball Saturday.

For a top-15 team with serious BCS hopes and lingering (though very distant, thanks to unfriendly tiebreaker scenarios) designs on another Big Ten title, that's not very much, especially where the offense is concerned. That's what you get when your schedule to date includes one team that received votes in the latest polls, and you were held to 10 points by that team. As solid as the Lions have been offensively in every other game -- including their subsequent four Big Ten games, in which they're averaging 31 points on 453 yards -- their inability to score over the last three quarters against Iowa follows overhead like one of those tiny, personal storm clouds in the old Looney Tunes shorts as they come up against the only other defense on the schedule that measures up to the Hawkeyes'.

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I recounted Thursday the long chain of calls, apologies, complaints and threats that put the SEC in the position of potentially fining or suspending Florida coach Urban Meyer for criticizing conference officials, with one looming question: Did the conference really have the guts to drop the hammer on its most visible, most successful and highest-paid coach for a mild line in a press conference? Today, the SEC office answered authoritatively: Yes, yes it does.

Florida coach Urban Meyer was fined $30,000 by the Southeastern Conference for his public comments concerning officiating, Commissioner Mike Slive announced Friday.
[...]
"Coach Meyer has violated the Southeastern Conference Code of Ethics," Slive said. "SEC Bylaw 10.5.4 clearly states that the coaches, players and support personnel shall refrain from public criticism of officials. The league’s Athletics Directors and Presidents and Chancellors have made it clear that negative public comments on officiating are not acceptable."

Give the league this: It stepped up to enforce its stated policy, and brought enough heat to finally bring the escalating series of mini-scandals over the last month to an end. Meyer apologized for publicly suggesting officials failed to flag Georgia for an illegal hit on Tim Tebow last Saturday in the Gators' 41-17 win, and the SEC's other 11 coaches will think five or six times before calling out the refs with a microphone in their face again.

It's the "again" part, of course, that made the fine necessary, and the SEC's decision to repeatedly, publicly undermine its own officials opened the door to those circumstances.

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With upset bids from Oklahoma, Missouri and Oklahoma State emphatically quashed over the last three weeks and championship runs by fellow powerhouses like USC and Ohio State out of the question, all that's standing between Texas and the BCS title game in the Rose Bowl is holding court over its last five games. For the record, those games are against Central Florida, Baylor, Kansas, Texas A&M (combined record against teams from "Big Six" conferences: 5-12) and the annual patsy from the North Division in the Big 12 Championship, which hasn't come within two touchdowns of the South champ since 2003 and looks weaker than ever this year. The path to Pasadena is so clear, the hometown Austin American-Statesman is already offering advice for Longhorn fans more concerned with securing a seat than cursing their team with premature hubris:

"We've seen a jump in bookings to Los Angeles and Burbank after every Texas win," Southwest spokeswoman Ashley Rogers said. "The biggest was after the Oklahoma win."
[...]
Jon Berry, who works at Square 1 Bank downtown, already has his plane tickets to California and a welcome to stay with friends in Los Angeles.

Berry also has reserved the right to buy a game ticket at the $275 face value using the official Pasadena Tournament of Roses Web site. He paid $90 for that right, before the season began. As of Thursday, reservations to buy end zone seats were going for $520 and up.

The last sentence of the article -- "The Longhorns take on the University of Central Florida at 11 a.m. Saturday at Royal-Memorial Stadium" -- plays almost like a punch line in its irrelevance. Who are we kidding with this Central Florida/Baylor/Kansas charade? By any realistic standard, Texas is playing against itself from here on.

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Our weekly tailgating guide stays West this week, meandering down the coast to Berkeley for Cal's date with Oregon State.

The Lowdown.
Cal is a bit of a unique critter when it comes to tailgating, in that there's not a lot of traditional tailgating happening at all. The stadium is situated right in Berkeley; there are no massive parking lots and no fleets of RVs with grills on their trailer hitches streaming in on Thursday afternoons. If you're looking to make new friends, you'll find tailgaters in bars around town (none of which are remotely close to the stadium), frat houses and wherever someone can scare up a patch of green space. For a school whose geography makes standard mob revelry kind of impossible, though, they do know how to throw a party. I've been three times in the last three years and can remember very little from any of those trips, so they're doing something right.

If you're smart, you won't even get near campus with your car. We promise you don't have the booster cred to drive anywhere near the stadium, so be smart and take the BART train in or get your student buddies to pick you up and ferry you in to the action. Don't bother trying to find a street space in the residential areas, either; fines often double on football Saturdays. And please note: Wherever you land, you're going to be walking, a lot, and there are seemingly nothing but hills on this campus. Leave the stilettos in the closet. There are gameday trolleys around, but they're slow and crowded. Hoofing it is your best bet, and a fine way to work off the many delicious microbrews you'll be plied with.

Music follows you in some form everywhere you go in Berkeley. The Cal Band sings, plays, and dances its way across campus (stopping at one point to scream at a library for reasons that are unfathomable to visitors, but it's highly entertaining nonetheless). You'll also meet wandering bands of a capella singers serenading picnickers wherever the mood strikes them:

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• Black on the helmets, green on the minds. Joining Ohio State's throwback motif and possibly countless other Nike clients, Florida State will be unveiling a new uniform product for its Nov. 21 game against Maryland. The "Pro Combat" look -- designed neither for professionals nor combat -- will feature black helmets, intricately logo'd gloves, a four-way stretch twill that provides superior moisture wicking, strategically placed padding zones (i.e. thigh and hip pads), dual-density foam cells, high-tenacity yarn and, of course, that enduring symbol of the spirit of unconquered marketing, the Swoosh. Quarterback Christian Ponder seems to think they're schweet.

The Noles' makeover will come just one week after the Terps trot out their own special unis, a camouflage get-up by Under Armour to promote the Wounded Warrior Project for their game against Virginia Tech on Nov. 14. So much for the Great Recession, I guess.

• Cav crowds, it's time to Grow for Groh. It seems like Al Groh has been pulling himself out of the fire for years now at Virginia, and might have been on his way again after rebounding from another awful start with three straight wins over the first three weeks of October. Off two straight losses, though -- including the Cavs' second straight stumble against Duke -- athletic director Craig Littlepage was "cast[ing] an ominous cloud" Thursday in a conversation with the Associated Press, less about the Cavs' losing record than the fact so many fewer people have been on hand to see it:

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