Finally, San Diego State lost to a ranked team, which isn't all that bad until you hear it's a I-AA ranking. Cal Poly — 13th in the one-double-A division — battled back from a 14-3 halftime deficit. Primarily a running team (the quarterback and running back both had 20 carries), Matt Brennen and Ramses Barden connected on a 28-yard touchdown. Imagine that. Ramses helped beat the Aztecs. The sun god is pleased.

--Matt Sussman

Pac-10

I figured USC would dominate the Pac-10 portion of this recap once again, but never did I think it would be like this. As you may have heard by now, the mighty Trojans were defeated 33-31 by Oregon State in a game for the ages.

After playing with fire for three consecutive weeks, USC finally got burned. They turned the ball over repeatedly in the first half, gave up several big plays early in the second, and then were turned away on a two-point conversion after a furious comeback in the final quarter. Now the BCS race is wide open, not to mention the battle for a Pac-10 title.

As pre-Aftermath 50 Cent would say, this game had "a lil' bit a everything." Oregon State came out fired up, marching right down the field to take a 7-0 lead. USC quickly responded, but when John David Booty's would-be touchdown pass was underthrown and wrestled away from Dwayne Jarrett by OSU safety Bryan Payton, you could feel that it was going to be a tough afternoon for USC. In fact, the Trojans were lucky to be down just 16-10 at the half, as Oregon State was forced to settle for field goals on several drives despite having a short field.

In the second half, USC looked sluggish coming out of the gates and Oregon State responded, scoring a quick touchdown and then getting a punt return touchdown from do-everything wide out Sammie Stroughter (eight catches for 127 yards in addition to the 61-yard punt return). Suddenly, the score was 30-10. The Beavers nearly scored another touchdown (settling for a 20-yard field goal) before USC started putting up a fight.

The Trojans quickly marched down the field and into the red zone before stalling out. Faced with a 23-point defecit, Pete Carroll was clearly thinking his team would need three touchdowns and a pair of two-point conversions to tie the game, so he went for it on fourth-and-goal from the eight. Huge mistake. Monstrous mistake.

I haven't heard anyone even discuss this, and maybe that is fair, since Carroll has been so terrific at USC. Second guessing him on something like this is akin to "what have you done for me lately?" and might not be appropriate. But the fact of the matter is that USC should have kicked a field goal and taken the points there. Oregon State was missing its star running back Yvenson Bernard and was going to have a tough time chewing up clock. Holding a big lead against a heavy favorite is always a difficult task for an underdog in college football (see: Michigan State hosting Notre Dame earlier this year) and USC should have known that the Beavers would start to freak out as the game continued.