West Virginia athletic director Oliver Luck isn't exactly taking the high road as his Mountaineers hightail it out of the Big East and to the greener pastures of the Big 12. Instead, he's burning the bridge.

Luck told the Charleston Gazette last weekend that West Virginia was lucky to get out of the Big East, which is now struggling to fill out its football membership after the Mountaineers, TCU, Pitt and Syracuse all have left for other leagues.

"We were fortunate to get out," Luck told the paper. "We got out [of the Big East] when the ship was seriously going down. I mean, only the tip of the sail was showing."

It probably doesn't help that West Virginia and the Big East are in a heated legal battle over when the Mountaineers can start their new Big 12 venture. West Virginia sued to play in the Big 12 by 2012. The Big East countersued for the Mountaineers to abide by the 27-month waiting period that is outlined in the conference bylaws.

One of the reasons Luck cited for his

TCU kicker Ross Evans was arrested earlier this month for doing what he does best: Kicking.

On Nov. 8, Evans attempted to retrieve a friend's cell phone from an apartment by kicking the door in. Only problem was that the apartment didn't belong to either person and the owner didn't exactly like coming home to a busted door.

A police report was filed and Evans, who was this week's Mountain West special teams player of the week, turned himself in Monday morning after a warrant was issued for his arrest. He was released on a $2,500 bond. Evans faces a misdemeanor charge of criminal trespassing, which carries a maximum sentence of a year in jail and/or a $4,000 fine.

The Fort Worth Star-telegram said TCU athletic director Chris Del Conte is aware of the incident, but that the university is still gathering information. As of this post, no punishment had been levied.

It's a good thing Evans doesn't play for Boise State, or he would have missed the door wide right and kicked the wall. Too

Weekly notes from the undercard.

Western Kentucky is in uncharted waters. After defeating North Texas on Saturday to become bowl eligible, the Hilltoppers are now in a position to make their best pitch for an at-large bowl berth.

"You've got a football team that's hot right now," said coach Willie Taggart. "You've got a football team that's been on a roll. Out of our last seven games, we've won six of them. We only lost to the No. 1 team in the country [at LSU]. We've got a red-hot football team that deserves it."

The Sun Belt's automatic ties with the GoDaddy.com Bowl and the R+L Carriers New Orleans Bowl were filled by Arkansas State and Louisiana-Lafayette respectively. Leaving Western Kentucky and Florida International, which has seven wins compared to the Hilltoppers' six, looking for postseason homes. While Western Kentucky has been the hottest team in the conference next to Arkansas State, it doesn't have the same quality of wins as FIU. The Golden Panthers boast wins over

Give props to USC for striking while the iron was hot: Less than 24 hours after quarterback Matt Barkley connected for four touchdown passes in the Trojans' 38-35, championship-spoiling upset at Oregon, the university released a YouTube video championing Barkley for the Heisman Trophy.

And almost all of the highlights in the video are from last week's game against the Ducks. USC even cribbed a quote from Oregon coach Chip Kelly, who said Barkley was the best quarterback the Ducks had faced this year — a list that includes Stanford golden boy Andrew Luck, who had one of the worst games of his career in a 43-20 loss to Oregon two weeks ago. Barkley, on the other hand, bombed the No. 1 pass defense in the Pac-12 for 323 yards, six completions covering at least 20 yards and four scores, good for the highest pass efficiency rating against a Duck defense in two years.

There's no doubt Barkley deserves to be in the conversation: For the year, he's one of only six quarterbacks nationally with

Vanderbilt is already working on bulletin board material for next year's game against Tennessee. After a controversial 27-21 overtime win by Tennessee, the Volunteers had an epic celebration in their locker room that someone filmed and later posted on YouTube for all to see — including Vandy coach James Franklin and his Commodores, who were still stewing over some botched calls by officials.

The postgame celebration included Tennessee players jumping up and down, coach Derek Dooley being hoisted into the air and punching the Tennessee "T" on the ceiling, a thank you to the seniors, and a now infamous quote by Dooley:

"The last thing that I'm going to remind you before we sing, is that the one thing Tennessee always does is kick the (expletive) out of Vandy."

The team goes on to sing, "Don't give a damn for the whole school of Vanderbilt, the whole school of Vanderbilt, the whole school of Vanderbilt. Don't give a damn about the whole school of Vanderbilt, we're from Tennessee."

Patrick_Witt2

Patrick Witt's decision to forgo his Rhodes Scholarship interview to play his final game against Harvard didn't have a poetic ending. In fact, it was quite the opposite: Harvard trounced Yale, 45-7, and Witt was picked off three times.

Witt had been in the headlines the past couple weeks due to a unique conundrum: choosing between playing in his final collegiate game against rival Harvard or interviewing for a possible Rhodes Scholarship. The interviews were held in Atlanta at 8 a.m. Saturday morning, just four hours before kickoff, so there was no way he could do both.

Witt decided earlier in the week that keeping his commitment to his teammates was the right move and never looked back despite some critics questioning his decision.

While it's hard to question the emotional value of finishing the season with his fellow seniors, the outcome of the loss to Harvard was actually the worst loss the Bulldogs have suffered at the hands of their rival since 1982.

Initially, it looked like

Houston 37, SMU 7.
Iowa State's upset of Oklahoma State did more than help Houston and its ascension up the BCS standings. It put the Cougars on notice.

Oklahoma State was proof that no matter how well things are going, an undefeated season can be undone if you don't come to play. So, with ESPN's College Gameday in town, senior day and a whole host of other diversions on the Houston campus this week, the Cougars went to work for their first win this season over a winning team. The win moved the Cougars to 11-0, only the third time in school history Houston has won 11 games.

And it wasn't pretty. The vaunted offense that has become synonymous with Houston and should get quarterback Case Keenum to New York as a Heisman Trophy finalist, was pretty average. Yes, Keenum broke a couple more records — he set the all-time completions mark, became only the second player to throw for 4,000 yards in three seasons and tied the career mark for most 300-yard games — but his 318 yards and two scores