(1) Very good. 49-10 may be a margin that reflects more favorably upon Florida than they deserve, but you don’t beat a top-10 team by 40 points without being national championship material. I agree that the Gators aren’t unbeatable, but for me, they’re as close to it as any team I’ve seen.

(2) I would say yes, but I really have no idea at this point. Too many variables still in play.

(3) 1. Bama, 2. Texas Tech, 3. Penn State, 4. Florida or Texas

Penn State will probably be number two when the new AP and USA Today polls come out, but Tech has a much, much better resume at this point. They demolished Kansas a week ago and beat the number one team in the country tonight. They’re looking very good.

(4) I think Tulsa was just overrated. A close game against a Sun Belt team, even one as good as the Golden Hurricane, is not indicative of a good team. And don’t forget that Tulsa outgained Arkansas in this game by a large margin—Arkansas won the game by capitalizing on a few key turnovers.

I also think that Arkansas was probably never quite as bad as they seemed to be. Their defense is pretty bad, but they’ve put up good offensive numbers throughout the year. Their problem has been that their QB throws lots of interceptions, thus aborting seemingly promising drives.

(5) I think so. He still has more work to do to catch up with McCoy and Harrell, but Tebow now has the one thing he lacked last year: a signature victory over a highly ranked rival. More blow-out victories and a win over Bama in the championship game will impress lots of voters.

(6) Yes and no. Much to my joy, Fulmer thoroughly embarrassed his university tonight. It wasn’t so much that he lost, which was to be expected based on the teams’ resumes coming into the game. It was decisions like the ones you refer to you, which indicated that he didn’t have much faith in his team being able to come back the old-fashioned way, and his decision to take Nick Stephens out of the game after the pick-six. That said, Tennessee will and should let Fulmer coach to the end of the year. Regardless of what it costs them, Fulmer has earned the right to go out his own way after trying to make it to one last bowl game. I like his chances to get to six wins: Kentucky and Wyoming will be wins, and Vandy is a toss-up.

Here’s a question for everyone: if they held the vote today, who wins coach of the year, Mike Leach or Nick Saban?

- UF isn’t 39 points better than UGA, just as it wasn’t 58 better than UK (and it probably isn’t 30 better than LSU, either.) UGA made a lot of mistakes and UF capitalised on them ruthlessly while making few of its own – that’s how to turn a defeat into a whipping. But it seems to me that capitalising on mistakes, and keeping up the kind of pressure that leads to a cascade of errors like UGA suffered in the second, is a mark of a really formidable team.

- UGA’s going to find it tough to find its way back into an at-large bid; ditto for LSU. But I think one-loss Bama gets it, especially if it’s a close loss. And two-loss UF has a pretty good shot (ditto the nature of the SECCG), dependent of course on other results. In a year without ND, and with the Big 10, ACC and Big East all really down, it’s going to be difficult to fill four at-larges if you skip over the SEC.

- UF #4; very hot right now, but I don’t feel comfortable jumping the undefeateds. Penn State #3; aside from the two OSUs, not much there. Bama #2; this isn’t a vintage season for the SEC, but it has more life than the Big 10. TT #1; they beat the consensus leader and buried a decent Kansas squad. TT and Bama have chances to consolidate their position; Penn State has to hope for one of them to lose (and UF has to hope for two of three to go down – Paterno won’t get voted out of a title game with an undefeated team, no matter what the relative schedules look like.)

- “A little of both”, wiseguy. Arky has been improving for several weeks now, rising from awful to mediocre. And Tulsa ran up big numbers against a schedule that would have shamed Bill Snyder.

- Yeah, but Harrell is definitely #1 right now, taking over the rotating ‘best QB in the Big 12’ spot. If UF wins the SEC at 12-1, and no-one escapes the Big 12 undefeated, then Tebow will have a definite shot.

- There can be real advantages to chopping a coach everyone knows is a dead man walking, especially in a year that’s likely to see a lot of high-profile vacancies. But as much as I’ve despised Phat Phil, it seems like an unnecessarily brutal exit for a long-time coach who won a national title.

Oh, and Leach – given equivalent achievement, good-natured pirate beats iron-fisted grinch every time.

How good is Florida, really?
Just ask UGA and LSU. Scary fast. Without the Ole Miss loss, you’re prolly looking at a different #1 team in the polls.

Is it now more or less likely that the SEC gets two teams in the BCS?
UF and Bama both will be there.

Who’s No. 1? Or, for that matter, Nos. 2-4?
Penn State, Alabama, Texas Tech, Florida

Has Arkansas really improved that much? Or was Tulsa horribly overrated?
Both. Petrino’s system is starting to work. Tulsa had played no one.

Is Tim Tebow back in the Heism@n race?
No. Harrell is most likely to win it now. Tebow’s reduced numbers can not get him higher than 4th at this point.

Is Fulmer now a liability for Tennessee?
Yep. The boosters want him gone for the most part, but the AD is going to wait. Hasn’t hurt recruiting yet as they received a commit this past weekend from Tajh Boyd.

1) Relative to the rest of the conference, Florida is as good as it’s ever been. The Gators have won four conference games by 30 or more points. They’ve done that twice before in school history: 1995 and 1996.

2) The SEC is a mortal lock to have two BCS teams at this point.

In order to have two BCS teams, a conference must have two teams in the top 14 at the end of the year. Only the Big 12 (Texas, TT, OU, OSU), SEC (Florida, Bama, Georgia), and Big Ten (Penn State, Ohio State) look like they’ll have multiple teams in the top 14 as the Pac-10, ACC, and Big East ain’t gonna get there.

The four at larges will be from a Big 12 team, SEC team, Big Ten team, and a non-BCS conference team (Boise/Utah/TCU).

3) Bama is #1 by virtue of having the toughest schedule of the 3 unbeatens. Tech has the best win, but a lot of wins of questionable value too. Penn State’s biggest win (Ohio State) is a big downgrade from Tech’s (Texas), but Oregon State is probably a better win than Nebraska or Kansas. Overall, I’d put Tech #2 and PSU #3.

4) Arkansas has had relatively little trouble gaining yards this year, it’s turning them into points that was the problem. They’re finally doing that, so that is a clear sign of improvement.

Tulsa was maybe a little overrated, but they were only in the polls for two weeks. They’re better than they played on Saturday, but they just couldn’t handle prosperity. Last week they were ranked, the coach was on ESPN once or twice, and folks began talking about the OC Malzahn getting a head coaching job. Then, they went on the road and lost. That’s a fairly standard script for any up-and-coming team.

5) The QB of a national title contender is by definition in the Heisman race. I doubt he can pass up the monster numbers of the Big 12 guys, but you never know what the voters are thinking until the bronze still arm is given out.

6) Maybe, but let’s take a long-term view. It would be good to get some firm commitment from the school on whether he’s fine or gone, sure. As bad a stringing him along might look for recruiting though, it would seem bad to me to unceremoniously fire a guy who’s been at the school almost as long as the recruits have been alive.

If they can kick the long-time, full-blooded Tennessee Man to the curb, what’s the promise that the next guy will be there all four years? They have to show they have a reasonable process.