by Adam Jones

Rain came to Austin on Tuesday and I had the day off. No better place to be in such a circumstance than at the Frisco Shop on Burnet. The Frisco is a real coffee shop, a relic from the fifties and the last restaurant standing in the once famous Night Hawk steakhouse chain. You can get strong coffee at the Frisco, but if you order a 2%-decaf latte the waitress will look at you the same way a goat looks at a new gate. It's that kind of place.

I was hungry and looked to stake my claim to one of the five parking spaces fronting Burnet. A blue Ford F-150 swooped in front of me and took it, which wasn't cool because, well, I was hungry and now would be forced to sit through another red light at the corner of Burnet and Koening while I made the block and parked around back. The Frisco is a seat yourself joint and I found a booth by the window, which allowed me to take great solace in being dry and well-fed while the rest of the world drove around in the rain striving to accomplish their daily tasks. Did I mention I was hungry?

I could pause here for a lengthy description of the Frisco Shop and perhaps bore those of you waiting to get to the write-up of the Auburn/Florida game by over-romanticizing a simpler time and doing my best to leave you with the impression of Frisco Shop as cultural icon that will have you both weeping and making plane reservations to come to Austin and make your own bacon and egg pilgrimage back to 1953. I won't do that, but I will note the establishment's most distinguishing feature. When you order soft-scrambled eggs here, you are actually served soft-scrambled eggs. This, my friends, is worth the price of admission, especially when you are hungry and some jackass in a blue Ford F-150 takes the last parking space out front. I noted to the waitress how much I appreciated the kitchen staff's spectacular spatular artistry. She put her right hand on her hip and tilted her head.

"Honey, those boys back there do a pretty good job when we're not backed up. Come on in during the Saturday rush, though, and depending on whose shift it is, I don't have any idea what kind of eggs you're gonna get."

Sound advice. Once the pressure starts, you really don't know what kind of eggs you are going to get.

Vanderbilt 24, Georgia 22

Indiana 31, Iowa 28

The trivia question of the day: "When was the last time Vanderbilt and Indiana defeated ranked opponents on the same day?" With these two teams, you could make the research somewhat easier by simply asking when both teams simply won on the same day and, in some seasons, the question might be, when did Vandy or Indiana simply win? Considering that, as recently as 2003, these two combined to go 4-20. But let's put all that aside.

Vandy and Indiana aren't bad-no sir. One could assert that Georgia is finished after the disaster at Tennessee, but the Bulldogs still have a passel of top-flight athletes on both sides of the ball and were playing in front of 92,000 of their dearest friends. Vanderbilt made a number of key plays against the Dawg defense and came back to win on a clutch field goal in the closing moments.

Indiana, while playing at home, outplayed Iowa in rebounding from a 21-7 deficit. Iowa's only other loss was to the best team in the nation and, just last week, the Hawkeyes had completely embarrassed Purdue.

Now if there was just a bowl we could match these two up in...

In the latest episode of "How the SEC Ruins Their Own BCS Chances," the football gods punished Florida. After last week's Cavalcade of the Spectacularly Stupid Festival put on by LSU, Florida proved their own ineptness with a series of blunders that would make John L. Smith blush. Auburn took full advantage, reasserting themselves in the SEC race. 27-17, War Eagle and all of that business.

Speaking of John L. Smith, Michigan State has officially thrown in the towel with a 38-7 lay down versus Ohio State, piling up 198 total yards and avoiding the shut out with a garbage time TD. On the plus side, Ted Ginn brought back a punt 60 yards, which at least made anyone who shelled out full price for a ticket a bit more satisfied with the day's entertainment.

Michigan held serve in a 17-10 slugfest win at Penn State and Wisconsin crushed Minnesota 48-12. Interesting.

LSU mauled Kentucky 49 to zero. There must be a misprint in my newspaper, which indicates zero turnovers and only 41 penalty yards for the Bayou Bengals.

Cal was very impressive, beating the bejabbers (yes, the bejabbers) out of Wazzu on the road. The Golden Bears hadn't done that in 27 years.

Oregon travels to Pullman next week after surviving UCLA 30-20 behind Jonathon Stewart's 121 yards.

Some teams in the high rent district looked lousy and still won. USC, for one, was taken the wire-again-by an Arizona State team that actually quit playing a month ago. The Trojans could have put them away early, but didn't and John David Booty threw about the ugliest pick six in the faceguard era. The kid is not Matt Leinart. USC survives 28-21.

Louisville welcomed Brian Brohm's return and celebrated by playing uninterested football against a mediocre Cincinnati squad before prevailing 23-17.

Meanwhile Texas, down two starters in the secondary, watched the backside of lots and lots of Baylor receivers, whose precision attack (did I just write that about Baylor?) posted 31 points when a flag football game broke out against the Longhorn defense. Oh, Texas did score 63, but this was not one of their proudest moments.

Missouri fell from the unbeatens, getting thwacked by Texas A&M in Aggieland, 25-19. The Aggies played well and for once did not devise a torturous method of self-inflicted defeat down the stretch.

Rutgers did remain unbeaten in impressive fashion by routing a very solid Navy club 34-0. I keep telling anyone who bothers to listen that the Louisville/West Virginia winner is not guaranteed the Big East Championship. Of course as soon as I write that, I need to note that WVU clobbered Syracuse 41-17 in a game that saw Pat White run for 247 yards in his best Tommy Frazier impression.

Hey, didn't you used to be Texas Tech? Colorado 30, The Mike Leach Experiment 6. Huh?

Nebraska beat Kansas State 21-3, which used to mean something. In other games that didn't mean anything, Clemson bored the daylights out of the Thursday television audience by desecrating Temple, 63-9. Arkansas drilled Southeast Missouri Secretarial and Janitorial, 63-7 and half the top 25 did not play.

Boston College crushed Virginia Tech on Thursday night and, not to take anything away from the Golden Jesuits, Virginia Tech looked just awful.

In the worst ending of the day, Oklahoma came out focused and aggressive in a 34-9 wipeout of Iowa State. Adrian Peterson capped a 183-yard day with a long touchdown that ended with an awkward end zone landing and a broken collarbone. AD is done for the season and that, my fellow football fans, is a damn shame. We will see you on Sundays, Mr. Peterson.

Impressive Showing of the Week: Vanderbilt and Indiana and Rutgers and Colorado and every other doormat who gets tired of the world's crap and goes out and does something about it

1. Ohio State: I guess the Indiana game looks a little trickier. Who are we kidding, bring on the Wolverines.

2. Michigan: Don't underestimate the degree of difficulty in winning at Penn State. The Wolverines get Iowa at home next week and we will see if the Hawkeyes are spent, or if Kirk Ferentz can right the ship. Remember, Michigan has already beaten Wisconsin.

3. The SEC Champ: What are you supposed to do if you are an honest AP voter and you must compare conferences with two great teams (or one, in some cases) against conferences with four? Just put Auburn, Florida, Arkansas and Tennessee here and pull them out of a hat. My hunch is that Florida will emerge, but who knows? For that matter, I am not sure LSU isn't one of the best ten teams in the nation.

4. Texas: USC and Louisville played poorly and won by single digits. Texas played poorly against a team worse than USC's opponent but at least equal to Louisville's and won by 32.

5. California: Because the Bears will blister 'SC on November 18^th and the talking heads will hyperventilate telling us all what an upset it is.

6. West Virginia: Because I finally watched them play for an extended period and was very impressed. Could they run on Texas or Michigan? I don't know. The New Year's bowl season might let us answer that question.

7. USC: Yes, the past USC juggernaut squads got out of some tight spots. But those teams usually got untracked and won going away and they weren't extended every single week - not by the MIDDLE of the Pac Ten, which is where Wazzu, UW and ASU reside.

8. Louisville: But could I see a show of hands of those who would bet their hard-earned money straight up on the Cardinals against either Clemson or Georgia Tech?

9. The SEC Runner-up: Now I am really out of ideas, but any of these teams could beat Notre Dame. That includes LSU.

10. Notre Dame

Now how do you want those eggs?

Copyright 2006

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