Safety John Timu and Linebacker Thomas Tutogi are now enrolled at UW and officially part of the football team. They will be participating in the winter drills starting this week. Tutogi is expected to win one of the open linebacker slots this spring. Timu, who arrived on campus weighing a solid 225 lbs., may be moving to linebacker.
RB Chris Polk is back at school temporarily quelling any rumors that he is leaving for the NFL after his sophomore year. His mother told the Seattle Times that she would like him to stay in school another year, but no final decision has been made. The deadline for declaring is January 15th.
According to Ted Miller of ESPN the Washington Huskies spend the second largest amount of money on football in the Pac 10. USC is tops spending $21.37 million per year while WSU is on the bottom spending $9.18 million.
Sources out of Detroit are saying that the University of Michigan is willing to make Jim Harbaugh the highest paid college football coach in the country, at a tune of around $6 million per year. He already has an offer from Stanford for $3 million and the 49ers are expected to be offering a $30 million dollar five year package.
Arizona lost five games in a row to finish the season and they are also losing assistant coaches left and right. The latest to depart is Offensive Coordinator Bill Bedenbaugh, who is heading to West Virginia.
Rumors are floating that UCLA OC Norm Chow is going to be fired, but he was on campus going to meetings on Monday.
The Big Ten went 0-5 in bowl games on January 1st. The Pac 10--on the other hand--went 0-0. Stanford plays tonight in the Orange Bowl and Oregon plays next Monday for the National Championship, but wasn't it a shame that we had to go the entire day without a Pac 10 team to watch?
With the conference expanding to 12 teams next season, the Pac 10 needs another guaranteed New Years Bowl game. Larry Scott must figure that one out, and the New Mexico Bowl which is the Pac 12's latest alliance isn't going to fill that need. The Pac 12 needs to make a push for the Insight Bowl bid in Phoenix.
Lots of smoke coming out of Ohio State these days. Just a matter of time till something blows up that puts the program on probation.
Michigan's Rich Rodriguez has probably coached his last game at Michigan. Rumors say he will most likely land at Pittsburgh to take over from Mike Haywood who was able to hold the job for only two weeks.
Randy Edsall, who took over at Maryland after his teams loss to Oklahoma in the Fiesta Bowl, didn't even ride back to Hartford on the team plane. He left immediately to his new post at Maryland, calling it his "dream job". Not exactly a classy exit from a program he ran for the past 12 years.
UCLA linebacker Akeem Ayers is leaving early to head to the NFL. Ayers was a second-team Walter Camp All-American, a Butkus Award finalist and an All Pac-10 selection after finishing with 68 tackles, four sacks, 10 tackles for a loss and two interceptions.
Stanford Mauls Virginia Tech 40-12
No surprise in this one unless you are from the East Coast. Stanford pounded Virginia Tech methodically last night in what may be Jim Harbaugh's last game as head coach of Stanford. Andrew Luck establishes himself as the number one QB in the NFL draft if he decides to come out early. He had four TD passes on the evening. The Pac 10 is now 2-1 in bowl games with Oregon/Auburn left on the docket.
The Cardinal have been to the Rose Bowl before but this season is a pinnacle in their football history. This will be their first top five finish since 1940. Harbaugh took over a 1-11 program in 2007 (that one win coming in the "suddenly senior" game against Washington) and led them to 4-8, 5-7, 8-5, and 12-1 seasons including a win in last night's Orange Bowl.
Harbaugh is the hottest coach in the country this year and can either stay at Stanford, return to his alma mater at Michigan or move on to the NFL. The odds are that he and Luck will decide to move on within the week.