Honoring the week's best (and worst) in college sports

Brian Roberts' 31 points helped serve one team a slice of humble pie. AP

By Jacob E. Osterhout

Welcome to the year's last Dean's List, where we're going to quickly recap a few of the lessons we learned in 2007. Quarterbacks who date pop singers never should invite their girlfriends to their games. Underclassman can, in fact, win Heisman Trophies. And college basketball coaches should never, under any circumstances, take off their shirts in public.

The Dean's List Team of the Week goes to the Dayton basketball team, which served up a nice dish of humble pie to Pittsburgh, beating the Panthers 80-55 on Saturday. Normally, a mid-season victory wouldn't garner such a prestigious honor, but Dayton's impressive win came one week after Pitt stunned Duke in the final seconds of an overtime thriller. The Panthers walked away from the Duke game with an undefeated record, but when they arrived at UD Arena they promptly took a swift kick in the mouth. Okay, so Pitt is still learning to play without small forward Mike Cook, who was injured in the Duke game and lost clutch guard Levance Fields during the game, but that's no excuse. The Flyers out-rebounded, out-shot, out-assisted and just generally dominated the Panthers. Brian Roberts scored 31 points for Dayton, which extended its winning streak to 10 games.

This holiday season, our hearts and thoughts go out to Michigan football recruit Elliot Mealer, who lost his girlfriend and his father in a car crash on Christmas Eve. The Mealers were heading to church, as was their family tradition on the night before Christmas, when their sport utility vehicle collided with a car that had run a stop sign. The impact caused their sport utility vehicle to flip and land on its roof. Mealer's father and girlfriend, who were not wearing seatbelts, were thrown from the vehicle and pronounced dead at the scene. His older brother is in critical condition with a crushed vertebra. Michigan coach Lloyd Carr learned of the crash on Christmas. "It's difficult for all of us," said Carr. "It's a horrible thing." That it is. Life is unpredictable so let's be sure to appreciate the time spent with our families this holiday season.

Joe Paterno might be 81, but he hasn't lost his marbles, at least not yet. JoPa casually brushed off the now infamous incident at a Texas A&M pep rally, during which an Aggie yell leader screamed, "Joe Paterno's on his death bed! And someone needs to find him a casket!" The Penn State coach put the disparaging comments in perspective. "I think everybody's got to take everything with a grain of salt," he said. "Some young guy got up there and he's trying to be funny. Maybe he's accurate, I don't know." Way to take the high road, coach.

What is Eddie Sutton thinking? When the former Oklahoma State basketball coach announced the he was taking over for Jessie Evans at San Francisco on an interim basis the Dean's List couldn't figure out what was going on with the 71-year-old. Sutton retired from Oklahoma State after the 2005-2006 season with 798 career wins, but he left under less than ideal circumstances. He was forced to miss the final 10 games of that season while dealing with a drunk driving accident. Now that he's been out of basketball for more than a year is he looking for a chance at redemption? Or is he looking for those two illusive wins that'll get him to 800? We're not alone in our confusion.

We're getting biblical on you at the Dean's List. What if, instead of winning 52-34, Texas had lost to Arizona State in the Holiday Bowl? What if Chris Jessie's absent-minded gaffe --the stepson of Texas coach Mack Brown inadvertently stepped onto the field and illegally touched a fumble -- changed the course of the game and ASU came back from 21 points and won the game? Would Brown have to go all Abraham on his stepson? Would the football coach have to sacrifice Jessie at the alter of Vince Young to appease the vengeful Texas football gods? Would an angel appear at the last minute and offer an aggie in Jessie's place? Thankfully for Texas football fans and Chris Jessie, we'll never know. It's like the bible says in Genesis 22 - "On the mountain (or in this case, the gridiron) the Lord provides."

It's safe to say that the Temple Baptist women's team had a bad Saturday. The Runnin' Rams only dressed five players for their game against Wayne State and they could've used the subs. Wayne State won 132-13. That's a 119-point margin of victory, three points shy of the NCAA Division II record. Temple Baptist went the first 9:30 without scoring and trailed 76-8 at the half. And the second half wasn't a whole lot better. The Runnin' Rams committed 54 turnovers, which turned into 92 points for Wayne State. That's got to be one of those days you just wish you'd stayed in bed.