FanHouse Cincinnati

CINCINNATI -- Cincinnati senior Tony Pike is rated as the third-best NFL quarterback prospect by NFLDraftScout.com. He likely will make a fine NFL quarterback one day.

Yet, the No. 4-ranked Bearcats are better off without him.

Last season, Pike led the Bearcats to their first Big East title. This year, he led Cincinnati to a 5-0 start before he re-injured his left (non-throwing) arm – the arm he broke last season.

Pike, who had missed the past 2½ games, was cleared to play Saturday against UConn, but he never left the bench. He should stay there the rest of the season.

That's because sophomore Zach Collaros is smokin' hot.

CINCINNATI -- Cincinnati senior quarterback Tony Pike has been cleared to play against UConn Saturday niight, but sophomore quarterback Zach Collaros (right) will make his third consecutive start, Coach Brian Kelly said.

"Tony has been cleared to play, but we don't want to put him in a risky situation," Kelly said. "We'll really have to see how it plays out to decide when to put him in the game."

Collaros replaced Pike in the second half at South Florida on Oct. 15 and led the Bearcats to a 34-17 win against the Bulls.

TAMPA, Fla. -- The demand for a college football playoff could break up the BCS after the 2013 season, but instead of adding a playoff, the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) would likely just revert back to the old bowl system, Big East commissioner John Marinatto told FanHouse.

"It [the BCS] is such an entity where there's so many diverse things that come together that make it work," Marinatto said. "I don't know if all that will continue to go on the way it is. If they're pressured to create a playoff, they would simply go back to what the system used to be like and have it as an at-large, free-for-all where people can go [to whichever bowl] they want.

Halloween in Eugene began with Oregon coach Chip Kelly disguised as the Duck mascot and ended with USC masquerading as Cal. Pete Carroll's Trojans are not exactly immune from defeat in the Beaver State (0-4 since 2006) but they never lose to a fellow highly ranked Pac-10 foe and they most certainly never get waxed.

That's Jeff Tedford's domain.

Hands continue to wring in the Southland -- the Orange County Register declared that "USC's complete dominance of the league, a dominance unmatched in conference history, is over" -- but I believe that Pete Carroll, much like Michael Myers, will haunt the Pac-10 for many Halloweens to come.

Also, I'd like to suggest a more salient reason for Troy's desultory play of late, one that has nothing to do with the freshman QB, the eight defensive starters lost, or the two new coordinators: jet lag (and that's not a Mark Sanchez reference).

And then there were two.

Cincinnati and Pittsburgh are now the lone undefeated teams in Big East play after last weekend's action.

The No. 4 ranked Bearcats and No. 14 Panthers continue on a collision course for the de facto Big East championship game on Dec. 5 in Pittsburgh. By the way, whatever Nick Carparelli, the Big East's senior associate commissioner for football, is making, he deserves a raise.

Carparelli is in charge of the league's schedule and his philosophy is having the league's top games played later in the year. That's easier said than done, but the Big East could have a pair of Top 10 teams playing for the league title if the Bearcats and Panthers don't stumble.

Stumble is exactly what West Virginia did -- again -- at South Florida. Playing in Tampa, Fla., on a Friday night for the second time in three years, the Mountaineers' league title hopes took a big hit with the 30-19 loss to the Bulls, who had lost their previous two games to Cincinnati and Pittsburgh by a combined margin of 75-31.

I'm convinced there's an epidemic currently afoot in America that receives no attention: Cell phones dropped in the toilet.

I have five different friends who have confessed to this via sheepish e-mails (presumably not from the toilet-ed phones). They're trying to reprogram a new phone. This problem is of epic importance, particularly with the importance of smart phones, which can cost upwards of $500. Do you know how much money we've lost by having to replace a BlackBerry or an iPhone because of fumbles during urination? If this happened to Warren Buffet, and he hadn't backed up his information, we'd need a new stimulus package. What if Obama's BlackBerry vanished down the toilet?

I'm convinced that every day in America we throw away the equivalent of the GNP of Moldova in dropped cell phones in toilets. The issue struck me on Saturday as I tailgated and went inside a disgusting port-o-potty. Because a drop here is even worse. How much would it ruin your day if instead of the home bathroom your cell phone went into a port-o-potty? Because, be honest, you might be willing to reclaim a phone dropped at home? But a port-o-potty? It's with the effluvium for all eternity.

Just three weeks ago, we called Pittsburgh the Pitts-ophrenic Panthers after their up-and-down performances earlier this season against Buffalo, N.C. State, Louisville and UConn.

Uh, is it too late to take that all back?

As impressive as Cincinnati has been all season, Pittsburgh might be playing the best overall of any Big East team. The offense is balanced and the defense gets more dominating each week. Saturday, the Panthers (7-1, 4-0 Big East) scorched South Florida 41-14.

Since allowing 505 yards at N.C. State, the Panthers have improved their defensive numbers in each of the past four games. Pitt allowed 305 yards to Louisville on Oct. 2, 303 to UConn on Oct. 10, 286 to Rutgers on Oct. 16 and 212 to USF on Saturday.

CINCINNATI -- A few days ago, a former long-time resident of the Queen City was asked if he ever could have imagined that the University of Cincinnati's football team would overshadow the Bearcats' tradition-rich basketball program.

Without hesitation, Bob Huggins replied: "Not in my lifetime."

These are strange days indeed in Cincinnati, where the football team -- not the basketball program -- is a legitimate national title contender.

On Saturday, coach Brian Kelly's big, bad Bearcats kept steamrolling through the Big East with a 41-10 seal-clubbing of Louisville in the battle for the Keg of Nails.

CINCINNATI -- Cincinnati senior quarterback Tony Pike, who underwent surgery on his left (non-throwing) arm earlier in the week, did not play today against Louisville, but could return next week against Syracuse.

Pike watched from the sideline in sweats as No. 5 Cincinnati routed Louisville 41-10 behind back-up Zach Collaros, who made his first start for the Bearcats.

Kelly said Pike had the plate replaced in his left arm Tuesday and remains day to day.

"It's a matter of getting the swelling out," Cincinnati coach Brian Kelly said. "We want to make sure we don't put him in a position where he can't protect himself.

"He'll start to move himself into a position where a lot of it will depend on his comfort level. Medically, it is what it is."

When the Associated Press preseason poll was released, the Big East was blanked. The Big East had as many teams in the preseason Top 25 poll as the Sun Belt: zero, zip, nada.

Since the league began in 1991, it was only the third weekly poll that the Big East did not have a team in the AP rankings and, on cue, prompted the annual "does the Big East deserve an automatic BCS bowl bid argument?" from out West.

Seven weeks later, however, the Big East is back in the rankings in a big way. The Big East has three teams ranked among the nation's top 22 schools -- no conference has more in the top 22 -- and a legitimate national title contender in Cincinnati.