Interesting piece from ESPN's "Outside the Lines" series profiling the unusual hiring of Oregon Athletic Director Pat Kilkenny. Kilkenny was a well-heeled Oregon booster with ties to former Nike founder Phil Knight.

OTL: "The next time you consider hiring or firing a coach will you call Phil Knight first? To see what he thinks?

PK: Yeah, I'd probably would talk to him about it, I would talk to some other donors too.

This kind of stuff makes the NCAA incredibly squeamish, but Kilkenny comes across as honest about the murkier aspects of his ascent and relationship with Knight.

Previously at FanHouse
Oregon's Filthy Rich AD Draws Preschool Teacher's Salary

Puuuuuuuuuuuuure fiction.

Refresher: a high school football recruit out of Nevada named Kevin Hart made a commitment to California several days ago. Problem was, Cal hadn't recruited him. Neither had any other schools. That prompted an investigation and the involvement of law enforcement.

The story soon centered around a mysterious recruiter who allegedly duped the poor high school senior.

Turns out we were all duped. SportsByBrooks is reporting (via the Reno Gazette-Journal) that Kevin Hart has admitted making it all up.

"I wanted to play D-I ball more than anything. When I realized that wasn't going to happen, I made up what I wanted to be reality. I am sorry for disappointing and embarrassing my family, coaches, Fernley High School, the involved universities and reporters covering the story."

Now the school district "continues to conduct its internal investigation into how so many people were duped by the high school senior."

I betcha that'll look good on his transcripts.

Previously at FanHouse
Football Recruit Commits to Cal, Law Enforcement Gets Involved

Good debate here between ESPN's Robert Smith and Jesse Palmer.

Palmer says Terrelle Pryor is raw as a passer, and would be better suited with his skills at spread schools Oregon and Michigan (welcome to the modern age, fellas). Ohio State's pro-style offense involves a fullback and tight ends and might be overwhelming for a guy that raw.

Smith makes it known Pryor simply won't redshirt and if he went to Ohio State, its offense would most certainly change. Lost in all that discussion: Penn State, the presumed favorite of Pryor's father. Good stuff.

I direct your attention to this story from Oregon:

Jeff Gaulton, the nightclub's co-owner, says he routinely comps Ducks [athletes playing for the University of Oregon].

For Oregon, this could be trouble. Because to the NCAA, this is taboo.

"I had no idea," Gaulton says.

Letting athletes in free while making others pay constitutes what the NCAA calls an "extra benefit."

Gaulton admits comping any and all Duck athletes who have wanted to gain admission. The cover charge is only $10, but good luck trying to explain that to the unblinking NCAA. According to the article, any benefits under $100 can be forgiven if paid back, but what happens to Oregon if many of its athletes were regulars with dozens of visits to Taboo over the year?

That kind of payback will cost the athletes a pretty penny. It's an almost impossible to navigate situation determining exactly how many visits each of its hundreds of athletes possibly made to that night club. Now USC's also getting roped in, as Gaulton says O.J. Mayo and several USC basketball players also came in gratis.

Have fun with all of that, Oregon and USC. In the meantime, it's a stupid rule. It discourages booster funny business, but if the NCAA wants to get serious about smaller perks it should expand its enforcement wing instead of placing heavy burdens on institutions to monitor these difficult to catch (until it's too late) situations.

(Belated H/T to DuckSportsNews)

College football's offseason is wonderful. It's a time when fans fret for upwards of eight months about how a team full of 18-21 year-olds will perform in a pressure-packed, abbreviated season while simultaneously taking classes* In the downtime, said players tend to get into trouble. Lots of it. The best of them entertain and/or frighten us.

Today's amusement comes from Oregon receiver Derrick Jones, last seen flying down the Michigan sidelines (0:35) (03:00) and proving once again Michigan's defense could probably afford to pull its safeties back against teams with vertical pass offenses. But we digress.

Jones was arrested last weekend for the unusual charge of "maintaining a drug house".

Less than an ounce of marijuana was found at the residence at the time of Jones' Jan. 25 arrest, Eugene police Sgt. Rich Stronach said.

Jones was taken to jail on a contempt of court charge for failing to appear for a Eugene Municipal Court hearing, Stronach said.

Jones, a sophomore from Gardena, Calif., also was arrested in October for driving with a suspended license and missed one game when coaches suspended him for the arrest.

How one gets cited for that when seemingly half the population of Eugene may in fact operate drug houses is beyond us. A swift booting off the Oregon team is likely since coaches tend to cut bait with guys whose legal troubles escalate instead of dissipate.

*One assumes

Right: a certain subset of Michigan, Ohio State, and Penn State fans.

National Signing Day -- which is a holiday for that guy in your office who's constantly muttering about his stapler -- is February sixth. On that day, virtually every high school recruit in the country will sign a binding letter of intent to attend a particular college.

Those who hesitate risk being left out in the cold, unless you're the nation's #1 recruit:

"I'd say it's about 50-50 that I'll push things back," Pryor said.

Aw, Jesus. More waiting? More bated breath? More pictures with Corvettes? Pryor's stated reason for the delay is a potential visit to spread-friendly Oregon. This would seem to refute the rumors that Pryor is an Ohio State lock... though not much.

Pryor's visit with JoePa went "OK" according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, which in normally effusive recruit-speak means "get that crazy old man away from me." Meanwhile, even Ohio State fans are getting on the preemptive sour grapes bandwagon.

Where's he going? Tune in Wednesday! Or sometime after Wednesday!

Sure, things looked bleak when Dennis Dixon collapsed in a heap against Arizona and Oregon soon went on to three straight defeats. Oregon's quarterbacks looked like garbage and they were presumably left for dead against South Florida in the Sun Bowl.

I guess they didn't get the memo.

A nobody reserve named Justin Roper has been magnificent for the Ducks this afternoon, leading them to a 46-14 third quarter lead against an above average Bulls defense. Turnovers have helped, but Roper is 15/26 for 181 yards and 4 touchdowns in just three quarters of work. Not bad, huh?

I think Oregon got silly in sticking with its dropback veteran Brady Leaf instead of taking its lumps with the more mobile Roper and it cost them several winnable games and ultimately the Pac-10 championship. Contrary to the concerns of some, the spread can go on when a quarterback gets injured. Just like with more pro-style offenses it is up to a coaching staff to find and develop the appropriate style of quarterback to run the system in case a starter goes down.

In doing so, Oregon found its mojo in a big way as the run/pass game is clicking. Johnathan Stewart, aided by a functional quarterback for the first time in a few games has gone off for over 200 yards (a Sun Bowl record) including a 71-yard touchdown run.

Although it seemed unlikely as their season unraveled earlier this month, the UCLA Bruins are still in the running for the Rose Bowl Game after defeating the beleaguered Oregon Ducks in Pasadena 16-0.

For the first half of the game, it looked like neither injury-riddled team wanted to win the ballgame. Converted wide receiver Osaar Rashaan completed none of his 7 passes in the start, resulting in Karl Dorrell bringing "emergency substitute" Ben Olson off the bench at haltime--providing a spark to make the UCLA offense look merely mediocre. Meanwhile, the Bruin defense showed just how important Dennis Dixon was to the Oregon Ducks.

If UCLA beats USC, Oregon beats Oregon State and Arizona defeats Arizona State next Saturday, the Bruins will have the tiebreaker in the four-way race, sending the 7-5 Bruins to the Rose Bowl Game, Oregon to the Holiday Bowl, USC to the Sun Bowl and Arizona State to San Francisco's Emerald Bowl.

Then again, the Oregon loss puts USC in the drivers' seat for the Rose Bowl game--win and they're in. Even if the Trojans lose to UCLA, they could back in to the Rose Bowl is Oregon and Arizona State also lose.

That's kind of how it goes in this crazy college football season. I'd like to take credit for at least suggesting Arizona's seemingly improbable defeat of Oregon (and offering justification), but really Dennis Dixon's leg injury did more than enough that night to seal the Ducks' fate.

Elsewhere, BCS #4 Oklahoma was felled by swashbuckling Texas Tech. Oklahoma experienced a similar setback to Oregon as they lost quarterback Sam Bradford to a concussion and struggled offensively much of the night once he departed.

ESPN/ABC also brings us this great fact: an unranked team has defeated a top five team 11 times this season which is the most in college football history. This lays bare the obvious feeling that these upsets are almost trite at this point. Fortunately we're down to the nitty gritty of the season dominated by rivalry games and conference championship battles which give a new flavor to the 2007 mix. Oh, and there's also that simmering rivalry game between Kansas and Missouri that greatly affects the BCS Championship race.

Finito. No mas. Retire the jersey time. Done.

Dennis Dixon completely tore the ACL in his left knee in Oregon's win over Arizona State on Nov. 3, and convinced Oregon's coaches and doctors to let him try and play in the Arizona game last night.

After leaving last night's loss in the first quarter when the knee faltered again, Dixon will now have season-ending surgery, bringing his UO career to a close. That was the word on a conference call featuring UO coach Mike Bellotti and team physician Dr. Bob Crist this evening.

It was fun while it lasted but that show just came to an end. Oregon's a different team without him and it showed last night. Their runaway Pac-10 Championship and BCS game hopes are now teetering. Dixon's Heisman Trophy crashed the minute he crumpled to the turf last night and Arizona's victory obviously ended their BCS Championship Game hopes.

What a cruel blow to both Dixon and the team. The senior was a middling draft prospect to begin with but this late-season injury will deeply interfere with his ability to train and test ahead of next April's draft. Fortunately for Dixon he has a minor league baseball opportunity to fall back upon, but even that won't last much longer unless he learns to hit the curve ball.

Dixon's final line:

172/254 passing (.677), 2136 yards, 20 touchdowns, 4 interceptions,161.2 rating
105 carries, 583 yards (5.6 average) 9 touchdowns