the administrative tribunal of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has ruled that the local USC has priority of use when it comes to the “SC” logo, including the interlocking version.

The battle between the USCs has been quietly raging since 2002, when USC challenged South Carolina’s application to federally register a version of the “SC” trademark for use on clothing and baseball uniforms. South Carolina fired back with a counterclaim to cancel USC’s federal trademark registration for its interlocking “SC” logo.

We would’ve called South Carolina “the other USC” regardless, but it’s still nice to have some legal backing.

1  USC at Notre Dame            20-Oct       $409          1        $379
2  Ohio State at Michigan       17-Nov       $408          3        $876
3  Oklahoma vs. Texas            6-Oct       $400          2        $419
4  UCLA at USC                   1-Dec       $312          4        $172
5  Tennessee at Alabama         20-Oct       $238          5        $181
6  Georgia at Florida           27-Oct       $274          7        $284
7  Texas at Texas A&M           23-Nov       $268          6        $233
8  Alabama at Auburn            24-Nov       $373          8        $321
9  Tennessee at Florida         15-Sep       $248          9        $180
10 Michigan at Michigan State    3-Nov       $218         11        $193
11 Notre Dame at Purdue         29-Sep       $105         10        $281
12 Arkansas at LSU              23-Nov       $128         12        $226
13 California at Stanford        1-Dec       $118         13        $ 77
14 Miami at Florida State       20-Oct       $113         14        $137
15 Army/Navy Game                1-Dec       $285         16        $150
16 Florida State at Florida     24-Nov       $401         15        $195
17 Georgia at Georgia Tech      24-Nov       $156         17        $161
18 Oklahoma State at Oklahoma   24-Nov       $160         19        $228
19 Pittsburgh at West Virginia   1-Dec       $139         18        $ 87
20 Oregon State at Oregon        1-Dec       $170         20        $173
21 Clemson at South Carolina    24-Nov       $414         21        $282
22 Virginia Tech at Virginia    24-Nov       $191         23        $147
23 Iowa at Iowa State           15-Sep       $122         22        $218
24 Arizona at Arizona State      1-Dec       $ 80         24        $ 69
25 Purdue at Indiana            17-Nov       $ 77         25        $ 59

Granted, this is a fairly useless ranking, as it only uses gross dollar volume of tickets sold through StubHub. But it’s interesting nonetheless. Also, it looks like the Washington schools didn’t make the cut.

Tonight: #2 BC at #8 Virginia Tech, Hokie Hokie Hi.

Tomorrow: Boise St at Fresno St, Can Boise win without the marrying man Ian Johnson?

Saturday:

Gameday: at Penn State as the ESPN/ABC corporate plan comes together with Gameday and the ABC national night game at the same place. Note, you will find no college football on ESPN during the day tomorrow as Breeder’s Cup Horse Racing takes over the Worldwide Leader.

This is my schedule and it should be yours:

• USC at Oregon (3:00pm EDT FSN). Will SC step up and take over the Pac-10 again or will Dennis Dixon (Vince Young StarterKit) lead Oregon to the top of the conference and give them a shot at the title game? CBS will be showing you the “World’s Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party” at 3:30pm and I might flip over for the chance at an outstanding crowd shot.
• Kansas at Texas A&M (7:00pm EDT ESPN2). I like this better than UCLA/WSU (6:30pm FSN) and South Carolina at Tennessee (7:45pm ESPN).
• Ohio State at Penn State (8:00pm ABC). Can Ohio State survive the “White Out” and keep its run atop the BCS standings?
• Cal at ASU (10:15pm FSN). ASU has played no one, so let’s find if they are for real or if Tedford’s boys will continue their losing ways.

Highlights:

• College football on ESPN or ESPN2 every night this week as they try and counter-program the MLB playoffs that they no longer carry. The best game of the weeknight slate is Thursday’s #8 Kentucky at #11 South Carolina. While Rich Brooks is convinced that his team is Top 5 material, I would like to see them beat someone away from home. (I will be flipping between this and my beloved Indians)
• Saturday early: I can’t recommend anything other than Erin Andrews in HD as she reports on Wisconsin at Illinois; my plan is to get the wife chores out of the way before 2:30 Central.
• Saturday midday: Oklahoma and Texas at the State Fair of Texas (ABC, Nessler/Griese/Maguire) or UGA at Tennessee (Bolerjack/Beurelein on CBS).
• SC on Versus. I know that DirecTV just got VersusHD but I am not sure what to expect with this.
• Saturday night: Start with Florida at LSU (CBS primetime with Lundquist/Danielson) then check out some of Ohio State at Purdue (Musburger/Herbstreit) and finish up with Nebraska at Missouri (The Greatness of Ron Franklin and the ass-whip of Ed Cunningham. They should really let Franklin role solo.)

As SI considers the ‘Pac-10 vs. SEC’ question, Bill Trocchi seeks some outside help in constructing his latest conference power rankings:

For this particular exercise, I forwarded Ken White, the senior oddsmaker for Las Vegas Sports Consultants, 10 hypothetical matchups. Keep in mind that White’s company sets the odds for 90 percent of the casinos in Nevada. These matchups were created by the following: The teams in the SEC and Pac-10 were ranked 1-12 and 1-10 based on SI.com’s current 119. In an effort to be as balanced as possible, the SEC’s sixth and seventh teams (Arkansas, Kentucky) were thrown out. So the top five teams in the SEC were matched up against the top five teams in the Pac-10, and the bottom five teams in the SEC were matched up against the bottom five teams in the Pac-10. Seems fair, right?

The results

• USC over LSU by 3.
• Florida over Cal by 3½.
• Oregon over Alabama by 3.
• South Carolina over Washington by 8½.
• Arizona State over Georgia by 1.
• Tennessee over Washington State by 7.
• UCLA over Vanderbilt by 7.
• Oregon State over Mississippi State by 7.
• Auburn over Arizona by 4.
• Ole Miss, Stanford is a pick-’em.

show a slight edge for the Pac-10.

So there you have it. The Pac-10 squeaks out a 5-4-1 record in these 10 matchups. Armed with this new information, and given the Pac-10′s record vs. BCS foes this year is 6-2 while the SEC’s is 4-3, and considering the Pac-10 won the only real matchup between the two conferences, the Pac-10 grabs the top slot this week.

It’s a little bit early to get too excited about these results, but we’ll take ‘em all the same.

• First, Parrish Alford, of the NE Mississippi Daily Journal, still thinks Louisville is #13 while Kentucky is #24. (And here I could’ve sworn that I saw Kentucky score at will against the Cards D on Saturday night and beat them 40-34.)
• Second, there is Aditi Kinkhabwala, of the Bergen (NJ) Record, who has 5 Big East teams in the Top 25—including Rutgers, who hasn’t played anyone, at #9.
• Third, Wayne Phillips, of The Greeneville (TN) Sun, has Louisville #16 and Kentucky unranked; he also has UCLA and Georgia Tech still ranked after their craptacular performances on Saturday.
• Fourth and finally we give you Jon Wilner, of the San Jose (Calif.) Mercury News, who ranks South Carolina #4 (WTF), Alabama at #6 (again, WTF), and has Georgia Tech at #25 and Kentucky unranked.

In other news, apparently the Associated Press doesn’t really care that USC SID Tim Tessalone has asked that we not be referred to as “Southern Cal.” [page 2, bottom right]

• The weekend opens with Texas A&M at Miami and Erin Andrews probably in a tank top—YEAH! (Erin will also be in Tampa for South Florida, so it might be a tank top twofer.)
• We’ll see if Coach Fran really has a team that can compete with Texas and Oklahoma.
• The GE/NBC train wreck returns with “Sparty” coming to South Bend. Right now, I think ND needs to worry about positive rushing yards before it worries about points.
• Ron Franklin and Ed Cunningham are following Ohio State around: they get the Buckeyes Big 11 opener at N’western after seeing them throttle the Huskies in Seattle. Michigan gets 4 home games in a row; nice job, Mr. Big 11 Schedule Maker. And we’ll see if Penn State is as good as Herbie says they are.
• CBS brings you to Baton Rouge for the Head Ball Coach and the Gamecocks’ visit. Gameday and the ESPN Primetime game (Mike Patrick shut up) are in Tuscaloosa as Georgia looks to get to 1-1 in conference.
• ABC will show part of the country Wazzu at USC while Brent and Kirk head to Madison for Iowa at Wisconsin.
• Finally, the night ends in Pasadena as UCLA tries to bounce back against Jake Locker and the Huskies.

The Gameday crew’s host Chris Fowler has commented but Lee is trying to avoid the controversy his mouth caused.

“I’m a little puzzled (about) the approach (of) marketing the team by attacking Lee,” Fowler said. “I don’t speak for him at all. But I think (Corso’s) reaction to the campaign was pretty evident if you saw the show.”

“I don’t speak for what that would mean for the likelihood of ‘GameDay’ coming there. But I can tell you it doesn’t increase the chances,” Fowler said. “If South Carolina continues to win games, it will always be on the radar for game shows. But it would be a consideration, to go somewhere the show has been targeted.”

Hey Lee, if you are going to make comments that you afraid to stand up for then don’t make them—no matter how right you are. (South Carolina will not win the SEC while Spurrier is the coach; he will make them competitive, but Florida will always have the horses.)

Virginia Tech looked to be the 2nd most overrated team in the country; however, Pat Forde feels that LSU is #1.

The Ole Ball Coach pulled his magic against Georgia (this time in Athens) to upset the #11 Bulldogs.

Penn State made Casey Clausen wish for the Oaks Christian OL. Ohio State tried to lose its first game to another Ohio college since 1921 (looking ahead to the game in Seattle perhaps) and Wisconsin (25 pt favs) almost lost at UNLV.

The Student Body Right Top 5:

1. SC (homerism rocks)
2. LSU (VT is overrated)
3. Oklahoma (Miami ‘s offense is awful)
4. Florida (heads-up, Tennessee: Tebow looks scary)
5. Wisconsin

What to watch for in Week 3: Tennessee at Florida, Arkansas at Alabama, Ohio State at Washington, and USC at Nebraska.

1a. Under extenuating circumstances, however, you may have up to three Division I-A rooting allegiances, so long as the schools meet the following criteria:
[...]
(e) You’re a bandwagon-jumping, low-self-esteem weenie and scurry from Notre Dame to Miami to Ohio State to USC to Boise State depending on the year, the polls and the amount of water flooding into the ship. [I don't understand how this counts as one of the criteria for schools, but anyway.]

9. You are allowed to root freely against the following schools for no specific reasons: Notre Dame; Notre Dame in their puke-green jerseys; Notre Dame when playing on “Triumph of the Will”-shaming propaganda house organ NBC; USC; any school that plays its fight song approximately 4,387 times per game like USC; Michigan; Miami; Ohio State; any school like Ohio State with a pretentious “the” in front of its name, because otherwise how would we know which Ohio State university they were talking about?; any school coached by Steve Spurrier; any school coached by Nick Saban. [I began to understand this rule when we watched last year's Oregon State game in a sports bar in Columbia, Missouri. Although I would add this addendum: you can't root against USC (for example) unless you can name the college town its opponent comes from ...]

25. It is never OK to deny the hotness of the USC song girls.

25a. Not even if you attend UCLA.

26. Please observe the following age guidelines on appropriate thoughts to have while ogling the USC song girls:

• 11-15: What is this strange tingling feeling?
• 16-18: College is going to be awesome.
• 18-24: Damn, I wish she’d wear that skirt to sociology class.
• 25-35: College was awesome.
• 36-50: Damn, I wish she’d wear a burka or something. That could be my baby daughter!
• 51-75: Gee, what a lovely young lady. I hope she meets a nice boy.
• 75-over: What is this strange tingling feeling? Do I have to go to the bathroom again?

41. Observe the following statutes of limitations:

(a) Bragging about national title: 25 years
(b) Bragging about a top-five finish: 15 years
(c) Bragging about a top-five finish if you are Ohio State, USC, Florida , Miami, Tennessee, Michigan, Florida State, Texas, Oklahoma: 0 years
(d) Bragging about a BCS bowl win: 10 years
(e) Bragging about a blowout BCS bowl win over Notre Dame: one year, or until someone else joins the club
(f) Bragging about Heisman winner: 10 years
(g) Bragging about Heisman winners whose last names rhyme with “Baretta”: six months
(h) Bragging about Heisman winners named “O.J.”: null