I realize CBS doesn’t regularly televise Notre Dame games, but there’s no excuse for these announcers continually expressing surprise at Charlie Weis deciding to go for it on fourth down. Going for it on fourth down is a Charlie Weis trademark. Everyone who watches Notre Dame football knows this. Do your research, guys!

Anyway, it’s 31-14 Notre Dame after a 4th-and-goal attempt by the Irish failed. Navy is deep in their own territory with 12:54 left. Brian Stouffer is still liveblogging.

Does anyone know why Blogger has been having so many problems this week?

Bflo Blog has a preview of the Sabres-Thrashers game tonight at HSBC Arena in Buffalo. After losing to the Hurricanes in the Stanley Cup semifinals last year, the Sabres have come out 10-0, tying the NHL record for the best start ever. See ESPN’s mildly crappy analysis here. If Buffalo wins tonight, they would break the record in dramatic fashion, as the Thrashers are chasing the Sabres for the #1 spot in the Eastern Conference standings. To make the potential win even sweeter, one of Buffalo’s bigger rivals, the Toronto Maple Leafs, holds the old record.

LET’S GO BUFFALO!

At halftime, Illinois leads 24-10 over #17 Wisconsin, and Indiana leads 30-7 over Michigan State! The latter should only be 24-7, but in a classic Michigan State Moment^TM that may have sealed John L. Smith’s fate once and for all, the Spartans ran a bonehead play and managed to fumble the ball deep in their own territory when they were just trying to salt away the clock, giving it back to Illinois, who promptly scored a TD (then missed the extra point).

I wonder when was the last time the Illini and Hoosiers both won a Big Ten game on the same day?

UPDATE: I found the answer! ‘Twas October 12, 2002, when Indiana beat Wisconsin 32-29 and Illinois beat Purdue 38-31. (Hat tip: jhowell.net.)

Coincidentally, Wisconsin in 2002 is also the last team to lose to both Illinois and Indiana in the same season — a feat Michigan State looks poised to match. Hopefully this time they won’t start a brawl at midfield.

I just saw a Joe Donnelly ad in which he accused Chris Chocola of “questioning my patriotism.” Does anyone know what Donnelly is referring to? If he’s talking about a specific TV ad, is there a video link? I’d love to see it.

If Chocola actually questioned Donnelly’s patriotism, that’s despicable. On the other hand, if Donnelly is doing what Democrats have occasionally been known to do — accusing Republicans of “questioning their patriotism” when in reality, the Republicans were simply questioning their policies — that’s also despicable. Accusations that the other side is questioning your patriotism are not something to be thrown around lightly.

Neither side has the right to take legitimate policy debates off the table by asserting that it’s “questioning my patriotism” to, for example, argue that a proposed policy would embolden the terrorists, or hinder our efforts to defeat them. Such arguments cannot be off-limits, any more than it’s off-limits for Democrats to argue that Bush’s policies have made us less safe.

I hope Chocola really did question Donnelly’s patriotism, because if Donnelly is being deceptive about this, it’s going to make me think less of him… and maybe reconsider my vote (or at least the Donnelly ad in my left sidebar).

P.S. Anticipating the obvious counter-argument: yes, there is a substantial portion of the American public that is prejudicially predisposed to believe that any disagreement with the administration’s policies is unpatriotic, and thus to infer “X is unpatriotic” from the statement “X’s policies will make America less safe,” where X is a Democrat. But where the argument itself (”X’s policies will make America less safe”) is legitimate on its face, it is patently unreasonable for the Democrats to demand that the Republicans stop saying it. You need to judge the Republicans on what they actually say (and imply), not what others infer from what they say. That remains true even if the Republicans know people are going to infer it; you can’t expect either party to unilaterally abandon a key portion of its platform just because some people are inevitably going to misinterpret it, to the other party’s detriment.

The solution to the problem of people hearing “X’s policies will make America less safe” and concluding “X is unpatriotic” isn’t for the Democrats to demand that the GOP stop criticizing X’s policies — it’s for the Democrats to take their case to the American people and explain why X’s policies won’t make America less safe, and remind them (in non-defensive terms) that X is very patriotic and wants to win the war; he just thinks the current strategy is failing and wants to change course (it would help here if the Democrats could propose a specific new course that they want to set). That’s how you blunt the GOP’s argument — not by whining about how all the big mean Republicans are implicitly questioning your patriotism by criticizing your proposed policies. The latter course isn’t going to win many votes, nor should it.

P.P.S. All that said… I still don’t know whether any of this applies to the Chocola-Donnelly situation, because I don’t know what Chocola said that Donnelly took such umbrage at. A couple of Google News searches turned up nothing. Any clues?

It’s 3-0 Irish early, but Navy is threatening. The Midshipmen are inside the red zone.

I’ve been saying for weeks that any of the service academies could potentially beat Notre Dame, if the Irish don’t come to play. Navy (5-2) has looked good this year, and always plays hard against Notre Dame; Air Force (3-3) almost won at Tennessee, and we’re playing them at their stadium (and their elevation); and Army (3-5) almost won at Texas A&M, and could take advantage of ND’s players looking past them to the next week’s game against USC. I’m not predicting a loss, I’m just saying these are not guaranteed victories; the Irish need to show up and play a decent game. (Now, North Carolina, that’s pretty close to a guaranteed victory… he says, knocking on wood furiously.)

So, could this be the opening salvo of an upset? Well… no. While I was typing the above, the Notre Dame defense stuffed the Midshipmen, and then Navy’s kicker missed the field goal. So it’s still 3-0 Irish, and Quinn & co. have the ball back.

GOOOOO IRISH, BEEEEEAT NAVY!

…and later…

FIGHT ON TROJANS, BEAT THE BEAVERS!

UPDATE: Irish score on a great TD catch by David Grimes… and it’s 10-0! Woohoo!

UPDATE 2: Now it’s 10-7 Irish.

I’m going to stop liveblogging, for the moment at least. But Brian Stouffer is liveblogging.

Considering that today’s college football action is already underway, I figure I’d better post my weekly update on the remaining unbeaten and winless teams in Division I-A, and who they play this weekend.

With West Virginia and Louisville both idle in preparation for Thursday’s huge head-to-head showdown, Boise State also idle, and Rutgers playing tomorrow night (go UConn!), it’s a relatively quiet day among the unbeatens. Only the top three — Ohio State, Michigan and USC — are in action. Among the winless teams, Stanford is idle, but the other three have games today.

THE SPECTACULAR SEVEN
(Undefeated teams ranked according to AP poll; opponents ranked according to the CBS Sportsline 119. Betting odds from Vegas.com.)

1. Ohio State (8-0) — vs. #66 Minnesota (3-5), 3:30 PM — Buckeyes favored by 28
2. Michigan (8-0) — vs. #90 Northwestern (2-6), noon — Michigan by 30
3. USC (6-0) — at #47 Oregon State (4-3), 3:30 PM — USC by 11 1/2
4. West Virginia (7-0) — Idle
6. Louisville (7-0) — Idle
15. Boise State (8-0) — Idle
16. Rutgers (7-0) — vs. #84 UConn (3-4), 8:00 PM Sunday — Rutgers by 19

THE FEEBLE FOUR
(Ranked according to the CBS Sportsline 119. Betting odds from Vegas.com.)

114. Stanford (0-8) — Idle
117. Florida International (0-7) — at #39 Alabama (5-3), 3:07 PM — no point spread issued
118. Duke (0-7) — vs. #69 Vanderbilt (3-5), 1:00 PM — Vanderbilt by 9
119. Temple (0-8) — vs. #86 Bowling Green (4-4), 1:00 PM — Bowling Green by 15 1/2

As for the worst one-win team in Division I-A? #116 Buffalo is at #18 Boston College. BC is favored by 33, the second largest point-spread of the weekend. (#13 Arkansas is favored over #115 Louisiana-Monroe by 35.)

The Cardinals just won the World Series in five games on a swinging strikeout by the Tigers. Final score: 4-2.

The St. Louis Cardinals beat the Detroit Tigers by a score of 4-2 tonight to take the World Series, 4-1, their first win since 1982 and their 10th of all time (2nd most overall).

Can I just say that the kerfuffle over dirty passages from Jim Webb’s novels — the top “story” on Drudge all day — is seriously the Stupidest. Scandal. Ever.

Ann Althouse writes: “Politicians who dabble in fiction writing usually throw in sex scenes, and these things nearly always look ridiculous out of context. But do the desire to write a sex scene and the failure to do a very good job of it say anything about a person’s competence as a legislator?”

Ooh, ooh, pick me, teacher, pick me! I know the answer to that one!

Daylight Saving Time ends at 2am Sunday, meaning residents in most of Indiana will be “falling back” for the first time in 30 years. Some residents are happy about the return to “normal time,” while the Indianapolis Star says Hoosiers need to quit whining about DST.

More importantly, this means The Backer will be open for an hour longer than usual. It still closes at 3:00 AM, but because we “fall back” at 2:00 and thus basically repeat the 1:00-1:59 hour, 3:00 AM is four hours after midnight. :)

It will also be the last time Daylight Saving Time ends in October, in the vicinity of my birthday (which is Monday [thanks for the subtle reminder -ed.]). Starting next year, DST will go from the second Sunday in March until the first Sunday in November, instead of from the first Sunday in April to the last Sunday in October.

Anyway, The Onion explains the significance of the end of DST. Heh.

With the usual apologies for the delay in this update, here’s the latest on the BrendanLoy.com Notre Dame and USC college-football prediction contests.

ND contest: Everyone’s picks | Standings after 6 games | Current standings (after 7 games)

USC contest: Everyone’s picks | Standings after 5 games | Current standings (after 6 games)

South Park, doing something in bad taste? I’m shocked, I tell you, SHOCKED!

Dave Revsine, writing at ESPN.com, sums up the BCS situation nicely: “it still looks like we have two options for the BCS title game: the Michigan-Ohio State winner vs. USC, or the Michigan-Ohio State winner vs. a team to be determined by mass chaos.”

Heh. Well, really, that’s a win-win situation for me. I love USC … and I also love mass BCS chaos!

Trying to make order out of (potential) chaos, Every Day Should Be Saturday looks at the nonconference record of each major conference — a measurement which makes the Big East look pretty darn good — and wonders, “why is there some sort of question regarding whether an undefeated Big East Champion should go the title game? … I’m not arguing the Big East is the best conference, just that running through the conference slate undefeated in the Big East is worthy of a Championship game bid.”

Don’t tell that to the GameDay crew, though. According to Heisman Pundit, “Talk continues on ESPN Game Day about how a one-loss SEC team should ‘definitely’ be taken over a no-loss Big East team. What’s more, only a one-loss team from the SEC should be considered to jump over an undefeated team.” The Pundit rather reasonably asks:

I have an idea. How about these talking heads look at the schedules of the teams on a case-by-case basis at the end of the season and then determine who is worthy? Would that be too hard? Is that too much to ask?

If it turns out that Auburn or Florida had a tougher schedule overall, then fine. But it is certainly not a fait accompli.

Why, of course it’s a fait accompli! Georgia (preseason #14, now #25 — and shouldn’t be ranked at all) and Alabama (preseason #24, now unranked and unvoted-for) are just as good as we originally thought they’d be! As is Florida opponent Florida State (preseason #10, now unranked and unvoted-for). And the fact that Arkansas, whom Florida does not play, has turned out to be one of the SEC’s best teams, doesn’t need to be taken into account at all, in assessing the Gators’ schedule. Nor is it necessary to consider that the Big East is much stronger than we expected back in August. Nope. Things are exactly as we thought they were… the SEC rules, everyone else drools… I know this is true because ESPN told me so…

P.S. It’s required by the BrendanLoy.com Bylaws that, whenever we discuss Auburn’s schedule, I mention that Auburn’s non-conference schedule included — all at home, of course — Arkansas State, Tulane and Buffalo.

Buffalo.

Thank you, that is all.

USA Today’s preseason basketball poll is out. Unsurprisingly, defending national champion Florida, which returns all five of its starters, is #1. North Carolina is #2, Kansas is #3, Ohio State is #4 and Pittsburgh and UCLA are tied for #5. Gonzaga finished just outside the Top 25, coming in at #26 (or #1 in the “others receiving votes” category).

Notre Dame received no votes. Ranked (or almost-ranked) teams on ND’s home schedule are: #12 Alabama (Dec. 7), #28 Louisville (Jan. 3), #32 Villanova (Jan. 27), #40 DePaul (Feb. 20) and #17 Marquette (Feb. 24). Aside from Marquette, the Big East’s other Top 25 teams either don’t play the Irish this year (#5 Pitt, #18 UConn) or else they host us (#8 Georgetown, #20 Syracuse). Not the most exciting home schedule ever, but also perhaps a bit of an easier conference road than last year’s. We’ll see. Non-conference road games of note include #39 Maryland (Dec. 3) and possible NIT showdowns with #43 Indiana in Indy and, if the Irish win that one, probably some combination of #2 North Carolina, #24 Tennessee and #26 Gonzaga at Madison Square Garden.

As for USC… they also received no votes. Their first game against a ranked team is a doozie: Dec. 4 at #3 Kansas. After that, they travel to #45 George Washington on Dec. 9. They may play #27 Wichita State on Dec. 23, depending on how the first-round games in the Las Vegas Classic go. Ranked conference foes are #5 UCLA, #10 Arizona and #16 Washington. The pollsters apparently expect a “down” year in the Pac-10, as those three are the only conference teams that received any votes at all.