NCAA Football ucla Bruins

Blanket Coverage is a weekly rewind of all the action of Week 6, from the big opinions, to the small news, and, of course, coverage of all players named Ju-Ju.

In the second half of Florida's 13-3 win at LSU Saturday night, CBS color analyst Gary Danielson opined that a one-loss SEC team would play in the BCS Championship Game. Danielson's forecast seems fair enough, particularly considering the teams playing in front of him in Death Valley.

The Gators lost one game in both 2006 and 2008 and won the national championship. The Tigers lost two games in 2007 and beat Ohio State in the BCS title game. What Danielson failed to consider, though, was whether a one-loss SEC team with the second-best record in the conference might advance to Pasadena come January.

LOS ANGELES -- Based on the inconsistent history of UCLA's football program, smart money would go against the undefeated Bruins overcoming the loss of starting quarterback Kevin Prince and winning the Rose Bowl this season.

Why? Well, let's start with the fact that UCLA has only represented the Pac-10 in the Rose Bowl twice since Jan. 1, 1986 and the last time the Bruins played a bowl game in their own home stadium was Jan. 1, 1999, when they lost to Wisconsin, 38-31.

Then there's UCLA's poor track record in bowl games. In 29 postseason appearances, the Bruins are 13-15-1, including defeats in four of their last bowl games.

Want more? Just go back to last season when rookie coach Rick Neuheisel led UCLA to a 4-8 record, the program's worst in 20 years.

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As night fell in Knoxville, a father dropped back to pass to his son.

"Go out five yards," he said.

The son, a portly 9 or 10 years old in an orange Eric Berry No. 14 jersey, ran a wobbly five yards and turned to receive his daddy's pass. The football whizzed in his direction, slammed into the pavement three yards short of its target and bounced high into the night air.

"I'm Jonathan Crompton," the dad said. Fellow tailgaters erupted in guffaws as the son tracked down the ball in the fading light.

The UCLA Bruins are not supposed to win football games like this.

No way. Not on the road in front of a hostile Tennessee crowd of 102,239 in a game that featured a fourth-quarter goal-line stand by the Bruins and a couple of key late officiating calls that did not go in their favor.

This just does not happen for a Pac-10 football program in SEC land. But it did.

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Another week of college football, another mid-day chat, we're here to serve. Like last week we'll commence at 3 PM Eastern as the early games wrap up and take you through the middle of the day featuring teams like Notre Dame, Michigan, Oklahoma State, UCLA, Tennessee, TCU, Texas and BYU. That's some good football, no?

Oh and we can certainly discuss USC and Ohio State or whatever else strikes your fancy while Tweets from some of our writers provide updates from elsewhere. Chat application after the jump.

Pac-10 teams begin their second week of play on Saturday, highlighted by No. 3 USC's trip to Columbus to play Ohio State. It means nothing but consensus leans heavily towards the Trojans despite it being a cover of darkness road game before what Eleven Warriors calls 105,000 of college football's best hooligans, despite starting a true freshman quarterback in Matt Barkley and despite Ohio State having the tiebreaker of all tiebreakers in Terrelle Pryor.

Yeah, USC's loaded. The rest of the conference lineup Saturday is a mixed bag filled with one big road trip to SEC country, a couple middling names and a handful of regional cupcakes. Mmm, cupcakes. Wait, no, bad Pac-10. Time to bag some fresh game out of say, Knoxville? Hmmm, maybe not.

LOS ANGELES -- It's put up or shut up time for the Pac-10 Conference.

With three of the conference's top teams facing difficult games on the road -- highlighted by USC's national showdown at Ohio State - the strength of the Pac-10 will be under the spotlight this weekend.

And arguably, the most important matchup will take place in SEC territory when UCLA second-year coach Rick Neuheisel leads the Bruins into Knoxville to battle Tennessee first-year coach Lane Kiffin and the Volunteers.

Even first-year Pac-10 commissioner Larry Scott, who's new to the game when it comes to improving the perception of West Coast football, said,: "Strong out-of-conference matchups capture the public's imagination."

Every week during college football's endless offseason, The FanHouse Walk will put last week's stories to bed and deliver the essentials to bridge that agonizing space between now and September.

Remember Cal 2004 -- Texas coach Mack Brown, who, aside from last year's Big 12 tiebreaker dustup, has benefited greatly from the BCS, has apparently decided to get off his high horse when it comes to matters of BCS. Brown hilariously brought in experts during the offseason to explain the BCS to him and his coaches, ignoring that he fully understood matters enough in 2004 to politic for Texas' inclusion over a Cal team that had a better season and overall performance to that point than his Longhorns.

So is this the year someone besides USC wins the Pac-10 title and gains the automatic BCS bowl berth?

If there is ever a year for USC to get chased from behind and caught, this is this year. The Trojans are breaking in a new quarterback in Aaron Corp and replacing several departed starters to the NFL draft.

So who's it going to be? Cal? Can the Golden Bears overcome early-season trap games and win the games they are supposed to and make it interesting? Can Oregon beat USC at home and win difficult road games and take the title? And how about Oregon State? Do Mike Riley teams always have to start 1-3 before getting into high gear?

And what about the rest of the field? Is this Stanford's breakout year? Is UCLA ready to become a Pac-10 factor again? And is Arizona really the third worst team in the conference as it was picked by the media? These are all intriguing questions that will be worked out in the coming weeks.

Our standings preview and records predictions are after the jump.

LOS ANGELES -- USC was picked to win the Pac-10 football title for the seventh consecutive year by the media, and yet the coaches from all nine competitors -- including Arizona's Mike Stoops (right) and even USC coach Pete Carroll -- touched on the uncertainty of the Trojans this season.

USC received 28 of the 32 votes with California receiving three while third-place Oregon collected one vote. The Trojans will be breaking in a new quarterback and several new defenders since 11 players were taken in the NFL Draft. Perhaps this is the year another school emerges and takes the crown out of Los Angeles, but they approached Thursday precariously and with respect. There were no declarations that USC is going down or the reign is over -- not even from UCLA coach Rick Neuheisel.