Week 9 winners and losers

Winners:

Notre Dame.  Won a 30-17 decision at Oklahoma and remain undefeated.  They will almost certaintly jump into the top 4 of the BCS, and only have 1 challenging game remaing: @ USC on November 24.  Win that and they could very well play for the championship, but the win @ Oklahoma almost certainly locked up a BCS birth for the Irish.
Collin Klein (Kansas state QB).  After recording 7 total TDs last week against West Virginia he recorded 4 yesterday against Texas tech, all 4 in the second half in leading K-state outscoring Tech 42-14 in the second half and a 55-21 rout of the Raiders and continue to be the front runner in the Heisman race.
Georgia.  Saved their season with a 17-9 victory in Jacksonville over Florida in which they kept Florida out of the end zone.  With the win they not only knocked their rivals from the unbeatens and possibly out of the national championship game, the Bulldogs now control their own destiny in the SEC race.  A Florida win would have ended the race.
Washington.  Another team that possibly could have saved their season, and knocked off an unbeaten team.  They looked lifeless in a 52-17 loss in Arizona last week, but hit a field goal with 1:20 left yesterday to get a 20-17 win after blowing a 10-0 lead.
Western Connecticut.  Have to give a shout out to my school who won their first football game since November 2009 yesterday in overtime against Montclair state after the Montclair kicker missed what would have been a game-winning 26 yard field goal at the end of regulation.

Losers:

Tennessee.  Dropped to 0-5 in the SEC for a 3rd straight season after a late fumble resulted in a 38-35 loss.  The days for Tennessee coach Derek Dooly could be numbered.
Gene Chizik (Auburn coach).  Things don't get better for Chizik and the hot seat gets warmer after his Auburn Tigers were smoked at home by Texas A&M 63-21.  Auburn now falls to 1-7 and 0-6 in the SEC this year and who officially is eliminated from participating in a bowl game this year 2 years after winning the 2010 championship.
Oregon.  Its hard to be a loser when you score 70 points and win 70-14, but that's exactly what happened to Oregon this week.  Oregon desperately needed USC & Oregon state to win out up to when Oregon played both of these teams to boost their strength of schedule, but both teams lost.  Even if Oregon is able to beat both Oregon state and USC twice (since Oregon likely would play USC again in the Pac 12 title game) USC would have at least 4 losses at seasons end and possibly 5 if they lose to Notre Dame as well.
Defense in Arizona.  Arizona state and UCLA combined for 1021 yards and 88 points in Tempe while about 110 miles down I-10 in Tucson, USC and Arizona combined for 1206 yards and 75 points including USC's WR Marqise Hill Pac-12 record 345 receving yards and finished with 469 all purpose yards after 2 big kick returns in the game.  Even though USC finished with 618 total yards, 5 turnovers really hurt them in the 3 point loss.
Cincinnati & USC's time management.  On Friday night with about 45 seconds left in the 4th quarter and the game tied, Cincinnati came up with a sack of Louisville QB Teddy Bridgewater to bring up a 3rd down.  With 2 timeouts left deep in Cincinnati territory, Cinci could have used the timeouts to get the ball back or make Louisville make a play.  They got bailed out by Louisville calling the timeout after the sack, but the quarter ran out after a holding penalty and a pass competion were the last 2 plays of the game.  The timeouts don't carry over into the next game or into overtime, so if you have them, use them!  You never know if they will have a bad snap, a blocked kick, a good return, etc.  Cinci got the ball first in overtime, turned it over and Louisville won on a field goal on their possession.  The first attempt was a bad snap but was negated by Butch Jones (Cincinnati coach) calling timeout, and the second attempt went right down the the middle.
Bring up USC on Saturday now.  They got the ball back with 55 seconds to play at their own 13 yard line needing to go about 65 yards to get a good attempt at a game tying field goal with 0 timeouts.  The Atlanta Falcons were in the same posistion a couple weeks ago against the Oakland Raiders except they only had 22 seconds and 1 timeout in a tie game.  Atlanta was able to get off 3 plays by using the sidelines and using their timeout and won the game as time expired on a game winning field goal.  In college football it is much easier to run the 1 minute drill because the clock stops on 1st down to move the chains, so even with 0 timeouts you can still use the middle of the field assuming you get the first down.  However, Matt Barkley the QB had no sense of urgency.  They were able to get 3 first downs and move into Arizona territory but they could get no futher and a hail mary at the end bounced off Lee's finger.  More sense of urgency from Barkley and the USC coaching staff, they would have gotten closer then the Arizona 48 yard line and instead of a 48 yard Hail Mary maybe it;s only a 25 yard Hail Mary which is easier to convert.  Coaches have to always know and practice time and situation, and both Cincinnati & USC possibly could have walked away with wins instead of 3 point losses if they knew the time and situation.