10. Mark Mangino begins a rigorous pre-season fitness regimen.
9. OU cheerleaders scramble to memorize the words to Boomer Sooner.
8. Nerds across the country prepare for twelve weeks out of the shadows as they don Micheal Jackson-esque pseudo-military uniforms to march in the band.
7. A Northwest Florida cryogenics lab begins de-icing Bobby Bowden.
6. Joe Paterno starts sundowning.
5. BYU embraces its African-American population (may also be an indicator of the start of college basketball, or track, or baseball, or hockey).
4. Los Angeles County Superior Court places priority on the probation hearings of the USC backfield.
3. Schools like Boise State escape safety school obscurity and begin to matter.
2. Perennial powerhouse Notre Dame prepares for a daunting schedule against such formidable opponents as San Diego State, Stanford (err, wait a minute), and Navy.
1. Louisiana increases to the 49th most desirable state as LSU makes a run at another championship.

Alabama is in the post-Major Applewhite era, and seems very happy with the new offense.

Oklahoma is trying to forget their last trip to Arizona. I think they might refuse a Fiesta Bowl bid this year.

Still no offense for the Seminoles. Good luck, Jimbo …

Florida’s spring game highlights Chris Rainey in the backfield, not former USC RB Emmanuel Moody. Anybody still (ever) think this transfer was a good call?

UCLA names Patrick Cowan (aka USC killer in ’06) starting QB.

LSU’s Ryan Perrilloux apparently didn’t need spring practice in order to start for LSU this fall.

USC’s first opponent apparently wants the Trojans to worry about their new passing attack.

Finally, from University Park/Howard Jones Field, Joe McKnight can’t handle 3 classes this semester and Mark “Dirty” Sanchez will be SC’s starting QB unless his arm falls off before August 30th.

Apparently, Coach Rod is not making friends with Coach Carr’s players in Ann Arbor. I wonder if Big Blue fans wish that Les Miles wanted to come home?

Ohio State announces a home and home with Tennessee in 2018 and 19. So their schedule is pretty much set: a home and home with SC in ’08 and ’09, then seven years of Youngstown, Akron, and Kent State, then an SEC opponent for a couple years.

Oh, and don’t you think that Mack Brown is sad that he spurned the Longhorns (looking at all of the off the field BS he has dealt with in the last 12 months)?

5. USC

The Trojans played like the best team in the country in their final four games of 2007, but will go into 2008 with plenty of questions. USC will lose quarterback John David Booty and tight end Fred Davis on offense, along with three very good players on the offensive line. The heart of the defense also will be gone, with tackle Sedrick Ellis, end Lawrence Jackson and linebacker Keith Rivers leaving. But coach Pete Carroll still has plenty of talent on hand. Freshman Joe McKnight looked spectacular against Illinois in the Rose Bowl presented by Citi. Mark Sanchez, a redshirt junior next season, is Booty’s heir apparent, but Arkansas transfer Mitch Mustain will battle for the starting job in the spring. Another Arkansas transfer, Damian Williams, should boost the receiving corps. The Trojans’ schedule includes two difficult nonconference games (at Virginia on Aug. 30 and home against Ohio State), but the Pac-10 schedule flips with Oregon, Arizona State and California coming to the Coliseum.

Now, after signing day and the early entry deadline he has revised it.

4. USC Trojans
The Trojans will have to rebuild their offense [blah blah blah]. The defense also takes several hits, [blah blah blah]. But if USC can avoid the injuries that hampered it in 2007 — and if Mark Sanchez or Arkansas transfer Mitch Mustain plays well at quarterback — the Trojans again will be a national championship contender.

Plus, with Ohio State jumping from #6 to #3, that makes the game on September 13th a battle of top-five teams on ABC in primetime.

What’s that you say? A preseason #1 team hasn’t won anything since SC in 2004? True. But starting out with support is a good thing any way you look at it.

What a way to Geaux! Er, ahem.

Like many myths, this one contains a bit of truth. Southern teams play outside their region only during two parts of the year: in September nonconference games, and in the bowls. Since the former take place when it’s warm everywhere, and the latter almost always take place in a warm-weather climate, that means Southern college football teams, unlike their NFL counterparts, never play in cold weather. As a result, many of them play a more wide-open, pass-oriented style than Northern teams, which need players and systems that can succeed in the snow as well as in the sun. So, while the Southern style of football certainly looks faster, that doesn’t mean that the players actually run faster. After all, the few Northern teams that run wide-open spread offenses—such as Purdue and Northwestern—look fast, too.

Southern teams and their fans have perpetuated the myth by making a fetish of their recruits’ dazzling 40-yard dash times—which have become as much a part of the culture of hard-core college football fans as batting averages are to baseball fans. But the 40-yard dash times reported by players and coaches, alas, are notoriously unreliable, since both have an incentive to exaggerate. The only objective measure available for college athletes is the electronic timing performed by pro scouts at the NFL Draft Combine. Casey Calder, an Internet college football analyst, compared the times of skill position players from Northern schools versus those who played in the South. He found that wide receivers from Northern schools actually outran their Southern counterparts: The Northerners, on average, ran the 40 in 4.502 seconds, while the Southerners ran it in 4.548. Southern and Northern cornerbacks finished in a virtual dead heat, 4.535 to 4.555, respectively.

Or consider high-school 100-meter dash times. I looked at the 10 fastest times posted by high-school runners over the last two years in two states, Michigan and Florida. The Florida average was slightly faster, 10.77 seconds versus 10.78. But the two fastest Michigan runners, Kelly Baraka and Charles Rogers, outpaced anybody from Florida. Both, by the way, play Big 10 football.

The No. 7 Trojans are better than both No. 1 Ohio State and No. 2 LSU, which will play for the BCS championship Monday night in the Louisiana Superdome. The Buckeyes couldn’t even beat No. 13 Illinois, which was so clearly overmatched by USC. It’s a shame the Trojans can’t play the winner of the BCS title game in two weeks.

Also, they’ve predicted each of the bowl games. Their prediction of a 3-point win for Utah in the Poinsettia was pretty much right on, so hopefully that bodes well for their Rose Bowl prediction (27-10 SC, with Stafon Johnson as player of the game).