Some contenders rise to the occasion if not hype

Bud Selig really needs to stick to whatever it is he does.

After Wednesday’s fantastic wild-card finishes, Major League Baseball’s commissioner proclaimed “only baseball could have produced a night like that.”

Actually, only in Selig’s baseball could an All-Star game end in a tie.

It took baseball 162 games and a billion sunflower seed shells to reach the kind of hair-raising drama you get on several Saturdays during football season.

Was Wednesday in baseball better than Saturday in football?

You bet, Pete Rose, but check back next week.

Saturday was ho-hum by collegiate standards because Auburn didn’t come back from 24-0 down to beat Alabama on the same day the Boise State kicker’s missed chip-shot cost his school a Rose Bowl trip.

Stanford, as a 40-something point underdog, did not slobber-knock shock USC (that was 2007). Les “The Hat” Miles didn’t stumble into some miracle win to keep Louisiana State in the national title race (2007, ‘08, ‘09, ’10 … 2011?).

Texas didn’t need one second put back on the clock to beat Nebraska (2009). Flutie didn’t flip a pass in Miami (1984), UCLA didn’t tackle Edgerrin James in Miami (1998), and Navy didn’t snap a 43-game losing streak to Notre Dame.

Saturday could only do the best it could:

--Clemson, college football’s out-of-nowhere version of the Arizona Diamondbacks, improved to 5-0 with a 23-3 win at Virginia Tech.

Clemson finished 6-7 last year and entered 2011 with this assessment from the Sporting News: “Few teams in college football underachieved more dramatically in 2010 than did the Tigers in Dabo Swinney’s second full season as head coach.”

Ouch … but true.

No one saw this coming. Clemson hasn’t won the Atlantic Coast Conference since 1991. The Tigers did not receive one point in the preseason Associated Press poll — but Nevada, Washington and Northwestern all did.

Clemson, in three weeks, has now defeated Auburn, Florida State and Virginia Tech.

--Wisconsin and Alabama are for real. Each passed huge tests in this year’s race to the national title. Wisconsin ruined Nebraska’s Big Ten debut with an introductory Camp Randall rout, 48-17, in Madison.

If this is what Big Ten football is all about, Nebraska needs to get back on its Corn-mobile and head back to the Big 12 North.

Florida threw a brief scare into Alabama in Gainesville when Gators quarterback John Brantley hit Andre Debose on a 65-yard scoring pass just a few ticks into the first quarter.

Alabama’s alarm clock, though, soon sounded and Crimson Tide rallied to win easily, 38-10.

Florida, looking to make a big national statement, now limps to LSU next week without Brantley (probably), who left Saturday’s game with what appeared to be a serious leg injury.

--Stanford quarterback Andrew Luck made what may turn out to be the catch of the year in the first quarter against UCLA..

The question now: Can he win the Heisman and the Biletnikoff awards?

--USC quarterback Matt Barkley passed for a school-record 468 yards in USC’s 48-41 win over Arizona.

What is it about the Coliseum and quarterbacks?

The Rams’ Norm Van Brocklin, in 1951, set the still-standing NFL record of 554 passing yards in a win over the New York Yanks.

Years later, in 1985, in February of all months, in something called the USFL, Jim Kelly of the Houston Gamblers established the professional record with 574 yards against Steve Young’s Los Angeles Express.

--Texas A&M Aggies. Oops, they did it again. The Southeastern Conference is now considering accepting only the first-half Texas A&M Aggies for membership.

--Washington State went to Colorado and … won! The seemingly sad-sack Cougars (3-1) trailed the Buffaloes in Boulder, 27-17, with 5:11 left before rallying. Victory wrecked Colorado’s Pac-12 debut and could be a pivot point in saving Paul Wulff’s job. “Our fans were so loud it felt like a home game,” Wulff joyfully tweeted afterward.

--Illinois improved to 5-0 with a late victory over Northwestern. Try to mouth these words: “Ron Zook, Big Ten coach of the year.”

--Ohio State needed a late touchdown at home against Michigan State to avoid being shut out for the first time since 1993. The Buckeyes are 3-2 in the post Jim Tressel, Tattoo-Gate era with a chance to get tattooed a few more times.

--Working extra. Southern Methodist stunned Texas Christian, 40-33, in overtime, on J.J. McDermott’s 19-yard scoring pass to Jeremy Johnson.

--At Syracuse, the overtime gods got even. Last week, a blown officials’ call handed Syracuse an overtime win over Toledo. This week, Rutgers took Syracuse to double overtime and won. It dropped Syracuse’s record to 3-2 overall — 2-1 in overtime.

It might not have been as exciting as baseball was one day this century.

But maybe this, Bud, was not for you.

chris.dufresne@latimes.com