When the ranked go in the tank

Tommy Trojan to Brutus Buckeye:

"Are we back in it?"

Brutus: "I think everyone's back in it."

Gee, what took so long for the season to get so knee-deep in nutty?

Two weeks after Ohio State (allegedly) surrendered its national championship dreams over at USC, and two days after No. 1 USC (supposedly) gave away the Bowl Championship Series store in Corvallis, the top dropped out of college football . . . in a matter of hours.

No. 3 Georgia got weed-whacked Saturday by No. 8 Alabama, 41-30, in Athens, and afterward Bulldogs fans had to be kept away from ledges, not hedges.

No. 4 Florida lost at home to Mississippi, which was 0-8 in the Southeastern Conference last year.

No. 9 Wisconsin had a 19-0 lead at Michigan, but then the Badgers didn't have it. Final score: Michigan 27, Wisconsin 25.

Four top 10 schools lost this week and now you can throw all the contenders' names back into Bear Bryant's houndstooth hat.

Northwestern is 5-0; Duke is 3-1.

What's going on?

What we know now that we didn't know Thursday at 10 p.m. Oregon State standard time:

Top-ranked USC's 27-21 defeat to the Beavers wasn't the beginning of the end -- it was only the end of a beginning.

In order, it was USC losing first and then Florida, which heard Ole Miss scream "Block that kick!" as the Gators set up for the tying extra-point attempt.

You know that cheer never works.

But this time it did, with defensive lineman Kentrell Lockett's deflection preserving a 31-30 Ole Miss upset in the Swamp.

"It's awful, it's bad," Florida Coach Urban Meyer said of the defeat. "It's bad stuff."

Nice weekend for Ole Miss. Friday, the school hosted the presidential nominees and Saturday the football team figured prominently in another national debate.

Wisconsin was the third team to get cow-tipped, blowing a seemingly insurmountable lead in Ann Arbor.

"This one really hurts," Wisconsin defensive back Allen Langford said. "We got up, but we didn't play four quarters. . . . We started fast, we just didn't finish fast."