The bouncers working the velvet ropes of the national championship party let Washington State inside last August, but not without a sneer. The Cougars earned their designation as preseason favorite in the Pac-10, but picking them to win violated the unwritten laws of college football. Washington State? You may as well take that bus driver who hit the $1 million halfcourt shot at Madison Square Garden last Saturday and put him in the Knicks' starting lineup.

By going 10-2 last season, Washington State set a school record for victories in consecutive seasons with. . .14 (insert ooohs and aaaahs here). When the Cougars win games, as when they went to the Rose Bowl five years ago for the first time since 1930, they get patted on the head and told what a great poster child they are for parity. Hey, anybody really can win!

	Jason Gesser leads the Pac-10 in passing efficiency and has WSU on the verge of a BCS bowl bid.

"We were picked before the season," coach Mike Price said after the Cougars' Saturday morning practice, "but it was mentioned like, 'They deserve it but we really don't think it's going to happen.'"

With two games remaining on the schedule, Washington State is 9-1 and third in the BCS formula. "We weren't overrated," Price said. "We always were underrated. We don't get anything easy. That's why we're good. I told my players, "If I give you $20 or if you made $20 because you mow my lawn or clean out my garage, what is worth more?" This being college football, the real answer, of course, is C) If I give you $20, it will be an NCAA violation. But we digress.

The hardest task in college football is not to win every Saturday. It's not even to win when winning is expected. The hardest task in college football is for a team that has never before been expected to win to find its inner swagger and embrace the expectations without falling in love with itself.

Washington State has done that. The Cougars have won by sticking to the task at hand. Senior quarterback Jason Gesser has played most of the season with cracked ribs and played well enough to rank sixth in the nation and lead the Pac-10 in passing efficiency (24 touchdowns, eight interceptions, 2,696 yards, 59.4 completion percentage).

The Cougars have won by sticking together even as they threatened to tear apart. After linebacker Ira Davis attacked cornerback Jason David and broke his cheekbone in a locker-room fight, the team stayed together. The day that David returns to action, which looks as if it will be Dec. 7 against UCLA, is the day that Davis will be allowed to return.

"It just didn't feel like it was good to have him (Davis) out on the field," Price said. "It wouldn't be right."

Now comes the Apple Cup, with all the ill will that's annually engendered between Washington and Washington State. Balanced atop that are the Cougars' hopes of winning the Pac-10 and maybe, just maybe, playing for the national championship. Washington State is third in the Fiesta Bowl sweepstakes.

"Is there any way," Price asked with mock seriousness, "we can get both teams to lose?" The Cougars need only one of them to lose, and Ohio State almost cooperated Saturday before winning at Illinois in overtime, 23-16.

The Buckeyes disappointed the Cougars as much on Saturday as they did on Sept. 14, when Ohio State beat Washington State, 25-7. "We feel like we have lost one half of one game," Price said, referring to the second half in the Horseshoe. The Cougars led at halftime, 7-6, but the early-game loss of two offensive linemen to injury exposed Gesser to too much pressure.

The only position worse than third in the BCS rankings is fourth in the Olympics. You're one of the best in the world, but no one gives you a medal. Blame it on east coast bias. Blame it on one half of bad football. But say this about the Cougars -- they belong inside the velvet ropes.

K-State Giving Them Ell
Kansas State's 49-13 rout of Nebraska served as the closing crash of cymbals to the Huskers' long reign atop college football. Already this season Nebraska had seen its streak of 348 consecutive appearances in the top 25 come to a close. Then came the end of the 26-game winning streak in Lincoln. The loss to the Wildcats means that the Huskers will have to beat Colorado and win their bowl game (Pardon me boy, is this the Shreveport Choo-Choo?) to extend their streak of nine-win seasons to 34.

	K-State's Ell Roberson stole the show with 228 yards against Nebraska.

Enough of Nebraska's misery. The lasting impression of Kansas State's victory should be the maturity of Wildcats quarterback Ell Roberson. The junior has struggled to harness his physical skills and play football within the confines set by coach Bill Snyder. For all of his discipline, Snyder knows how to showcase a quarterback who has the ability to improvise. Remember, Michael Bishop took the Wildcats to the brink of playing for the national championship in 1998.

For much of the last two seasons, Roberson has looked like a student in an OSL (Offense as a Second Language) class. Against the Huskers, he looked fluent, rushing 29 times for 228 yards, the second-best day in Kansas State history, and three touchdowns. He even completed four passes in eight attempts. That may sound average to you, but to the Kansas State fans who recall the Roberson who completed 1-of-11 passes last year against Nebraska, average is a revelation.

With Kliff Kingsbury of Texas Tech and Chris Simms of Texas headed for the NFL, the best quarterbacks in the Big 12 next season will be in the North. Catch a preview this Saturday when Roberson and Kansas State head to Columbia to play Brad Smith and Missouri.

Fit To Be Tied
A legacy of the dominance of Miami and Florida State in the Big East and ACC, respectively, is the strange tiebreaking system that the leagues employ. In most conferences, the winner of the head-to-head game is designated the champion. But when your conference looks like a Motown group, you want to make sure that Smokey Robinson gets the headline, not one of the Miracles. So each league added a qualification to its tiebreaker. If the loser of the game finishes more than five slots higher in the final BCS ranking, than it will be designated champion.

What the rule says to Pittsburgh is, hey, knock yourself out. Beat Miami Thursday night. But you better not lose to West Virginia, or else Miami will get the BCS bid. In the ACC, if Florida State loses to North Carolina State, the Seminoles will have to beat Florida and hope that they remain close enough to Maryland in the rankings to take advantage of their 34-10 defeat of the Terrapins on Sept. 14.

On The Clock
Did anyone else notice how coolly Georgia performed when it gained possession of the ball at its own 41 with just over two minutes left to play, trailing Auburn 21-17 in front of 85,000 mostly hostile fans?

This is the same Georgia team that a year ago lost close games to Auburn and Boston College because its rookie head coach, Mark Richt, mismanaged the clock. During the offseason, Richt brought Homer Smith, the former offensive coordinator at Alabama and Arizona, among many other places, out of retirement and into Athens to teach him the principles of clock management.

"Mark coached at Florida State, where they didn't have many clock decisions because they were always so far ahead," Smith said.

Smith said the key is to hoard timeouts ("A timeout is worth three or four plays."), to make sure the next-to-last play called leaves time for the game-winner, and to be decisive.

"Those situations have paralyzed a lot of guys. You're talking to one of them," Smith said. "When Mark gets to a decision, he makes a decision."

Richt learned well from Smith, and proved it in his two visits to the state of Alabama. The Bulldogs bled the clock down to 38 seconds before Billy Bennett kicked the field goal that beat Alabama, 27-25, on Oct. 5. Last Saturday, at Jordan-Hare Stadium, Greene may have been too efficient, throwing his dramatic 4th-and-15 pass to Michael Johnson for the game-winning touchdown with 1:25 to play.

Georgia won its first SEC East title and first title of any kind in 20 years, and the hiring of Richt is looking smarter every day. However, Smith is withholding a final grade.

"I couldn't say A-plus," Smith said, "because the next situation can bring you to your knees."

The Perfect Ten
One more Top 10 List. . .

1. Miami -- O.K., you tell me. Who beats the 'Canes?
2. Ohio State -- Mark of a winner: when Illinois scored, Buckeyes answered.
3. Washington State -- Cougars took three days off during idle week.
4. Iowa -- With 46 days until Jan. 1, how can Hawks be sharp in bowl game?
5. Oklahoma -- Sooners are 6-0 at home. Red Raiders are only 3-3 on the road.
6. Georgia -- Greene's TD pass to Johnson may rival Belue-to-Scott in Dawg lore.
7. Alabama -- Two losses to teams ranked directly ahead of them.
8. Kansas State -- Nine points from a perfect season.
9. USC -- New life in running game can only help Carson Palmer.
10. Notre Dame -- Rutgers won't help strength of schedule, but Trojans follow.

Quick Hits
Judging by the response to my Heisman column pleading for someone to win the trophy, there are a lot of fans who believe that Kliff Kingsbury of Texas Tech already has. Kingsbury, who threw for 475 yards and six touchdowns in the Red Raiders' 42-38 upset of Texas, has just been named Big 12 Offensive Player of the Week for the fourth time this season. To win the Heisman, however, Kingsbury will have to buck history. No one who has played on a team that lost as many as four regular-season games has won the award since Paul Hornung of Notre Dame in 1956. ... Baylor's search to replace fired coach Kevin Steele has begun. The school has contacted or plans to contact four current I-A coaches -- Jim Grobe of Wake Forest, Urban Meyer of Bowling Green, Guy Morriss of Kentucky, Tony Samuel of New Mexico State -- as well as Joe Glenn of Montana, the defending I-AA national champions who won a I-AA record-tying 24 straught games before losing last weekend, and former Oregon State and San Diego Chargers coach Mike Riley, now an assistant coach with the New Orleans Saints. ... Though freshman can step onto the field more quickly at tailback than at nearly any position on the field, they also take more punishment at that position than their bodies may be able to handle. The two best freshmen tailbacks in the nation, Maurice Clarett of Ohio State and T.A. McLendon of North Carolina State, have struggled, and failed, to remain healthy. Clarett has missed nearly four games with a shoulder injury. McLendon is playing with a broken wrist as well as shoulder and knee injuries. ... Army's 14-10 upset of Tulane means there will be no winless teams this season. That may be an accident of scheduling. Of the four one-win teams, Rutgers (1-9) beat Army (1-9) and Buffalo (1-10) beat Rutgers. Tulsa (1-10) defeated UTEP (2-9). ... Remember when running the ball well meant that a team won games? Of the ten best rushing teams in the nation, more have losing records (three: Navy, Rice and Ohio) than are in the top 10 (Kansas State).

Ivan Maisel is a senior writer for ESPN.com. E-mail him at ivan.maisel@espn3.com.