Four seniors who have been close to winning a national title might get it on their last try

No one's making fun of 7'1" Luke Schenscher anymore--and watch out for his posse

Do-it-all guard Gerry McNamara will do less, which means the Orange may do even better

The Huskies lost their top two players, but Charlie Villanueva is ready to become the go-to guy

There's only one Chuck Hayes, but that may be enough to take the young Wildcats a long way

Led by one of the nation's best backcourts, the Illini look poised for an unforgettable year

The young, talented Terps need power forward Travis Garrison to show some muscle

After losing their best player and top recruit, the Blue Devils turn to Shelden Williams

After absorbing painful lessons last year, Taquan Dean and the Cardinals are ready to roll

Center Chris Taft is a superstar in the making, and he has the Panthers poised to strike

A newly dedicated Paul Davis is looking to match expectations for himself and his team

For the Wildcats to be top cats, Salim Stoudamire's shooting and head must be straight

Double Whammy

LETTERS

After flirting with the NBA, forward Lawrence Roberts returns to power the Bulldogs

The Longhorns boast the nation's best crop of recruits and a new wingman in P.J. Tucker

Sooner or later indomitable Curtis Withers won't be the best player nobody knows

The 65-team NCAA tournament includes 31 automatic bids and 34 at-large selections. SI predicts the 45 teams to round out the field

The Tide could rise higher if Kennedy Winston holds up and a rookie point guard excels

COLLEGE FOOTBALL

With a ground game that averages 243 yards and dominated Wisconsin, how can Michigan State be only .500?

1 Give the players at Colorado (6-4) credit for sticking together and becoming bowl-eligible in the wake of the off-field turmoil that surrounded the program over the last year. The team was...

EAGLES EYE FIESTA

PROLIFIC FRESHMAN

WASHINGTON-BOUND?

The rebuilding Bucs are making progress, but a loss to the Falcons showed they still have work to do

At last season's NCAA tournament speedy point guard Tim Smith and East Tennessee State nearly pulled off a huge upset of fourth-seeded Cincinnati. In frightening the Bearcats, the Buccaneers...

The Mark Brunell era in Washington appears to be over after only nine games, and, boy, did it end ugly. The handpicked choice of Joe Gibbs to quarterback the Redskins in the coach's second...

Eddie Drummond, a backup receiver for the Lions, returned two punts for touchdowns in the fourth quarter of Detroit's 23-17 overtime loss at Jacksonville. A rookie free-agent pickup out of Penn...

HOT TOPIC

Is it possible to come up with a handicapping formula that takes emotion into account? How a team feels would be factored in the way oddsmakers figure things like home field advantage, which is...

After overcoming a kidney transplant, Alonzo Mourning is thriving with the Nets--even as he plots to leave them

On the Kings, who were off to a 3-4 start at week's end:

With a couple of goals in MLS Cup, D.C.'s Alecko Eskandarian conjured up images of his father's glory days

IS U.S. SNIPER Clint Mathis headed for Real Salt Lake, the 2005 expansion team run by former Madison Square Garden president Dave Checketts? Sources told SI last week that RSL was seeking to...

Almost nobody yells for my favorite football team. Their coaches never give them a single encouraging word. Their cheerleaders rarely make a peep.

Scott Boras spent five nights last week at the Ritz-Carlton in Key Biscayne, Fla., and the only palm he saw was the bellhop's. "I arrived on Sunday and didn't leave the building until Thursday...

Months after a basketball mess, Ohio State AD Andy Geiger is trading accusations with an exfootball star. Now the NCAA has arrived. Welcome to college sports hell

Our intrepid NFL reporter plays a scribe in the remake of The Longest Yard

36 Consecutive games in which Texas running back Cedric Benson has scored a touchdown, an NCAA record.

A DUI bust could take Olympic champ Michael Phelps out of the fast lane

After 20 years and two kids, a runner returns to collegiate competition

Pummeled by 37-year-old journeyman Larry Donald (4232), former heavyweight champ Evander Holyfield, 42. Fighting on the undercard last Saturday at Madison Square Garden--where his pro career...

Lennox Miller was an elite sprinter, and a proud papa

Do I have this right? Ron Artest wanted two weeks off to attend Arafat's funeral?

The 53-year-old die-hard Indiana sports fan recently released Words & Music: John Mellencamp's Greatest Hits.

IT'S IMPORTANT for an expansion team to make its fans feel loved, but Charlotte Bobcats backers looking to buy tickets last week might have felt the team was going a little overboard. Customers...

Upset at a call, the chairman of a Moldovan soccer team drove his car onto the pitch and tried to run over the referee.

Dolphins interim coach, on how his new gig is different from his last head coaching job, with the USFL San Antonio Gunslingers in 1985: "I know I'm going to get paid this time."

What to watch and watch for

In January 1912 Robert Falcon Scott, a British naval officer, and his team of four men arrived at the South Pole, only to discover that Norwegian Roald Amundsen had five weeks earlier become the...

Whom should SI name as its golfers of the year?

Jacob Luft's Top Free Agents

Josh McDougal PERU, N.Y. > Cross-country

Broncos Cornerback

WHO'S Hot

Based on a survey of 354 players

• For daily Web-only Leading Off galleries, go to si.com/scorecard.

DARNELL DOCKETT CARDINALS DT

Kicked off season by stylin' in chic Gap ad campaign that ran till mid-October

Vikings Defensive Tackle

How Pittsburgh quarterback Ben Roethlisberger builds a muscular middle

Can you guess who owns these abs? (answers below)

Who knew This Side of Paradise was written in the land of purple pros?

Lions DE Jared DeVries On Visiting Minneapolis

JEFF FAINE, BROWNS CENTER

Hungry for exposure, mid-major schools bow to TV and play any day of the week. On a four-day, four-game road trip, SI found that players, coaches and fans dislike the midweek disruption but will...

IT'S SAFE to say that more than a few folks on the San Jose State campus were snug in their beds when the Spartan Stadium gates opened at 8 a.m. for last Saturday's game against Boise State....

ALTHOUGH THE lights dimmed on Utah last Saturday, the school's BCS bowl prospects brightened considerably the same day. A power failure at War Memorial Stadium in Laramie delayed the start of the...

AS THE DEBATE OVER their Orange Bowl worthiness intensified last week, Auburn players sought refuge in the quiet of the team's video room, spending extra time studying game tape. The film fest...

With Brett Favre working some of his old magic, the Packers held off the Vikings for their fourth straight win and moved into a first-place tie in the NFC North

When he spurned the Cavaliers and bolted for Utah, Carlos Boozer knew what he'd be getting: a heftier paycheck and a system well-suited to his skills. So did his wife

Damn the turnovers and full steam ahead! Today's coaches covet speedy players like never before, and swifties such as East Tennessee State's Tim Smith are changing the game--in a hurry

After spurning Tennessee to play in her hometown, Seimone Augustus has LSU eyeing its first national title, a fitting coronation for the queen of Baton Rouge

In a wide-open women's championship race with as many as 20 bona fide contenders, expect a pair of SEC stalwarts to be the last ones celebrating

Is he upbeat or upset? Approachable or guarded? Glowing or glowering? Mercurial scoring machine Rashad McCants of No. 1 North Carolina has all of Tar Heel Nation worriedly trying to read him

A quick run through the top players, coaches and games to watch this season

TOP 20

If the Tar Heels can just play a little defense to go with their potent offense, they'll win it all

With talent, depth and a new pilot (literally) at the wing, this team is ready to soar

Electrifying sophomore point guard Chris Paul has put a charge in the Demon Deacons

SI's TOP 20

Eagles linebacker and Renaissance man Dhani Jones is as likely to expound on Zen as on the zone blitz

Here's what's stacked on Dhani Jones's nightstand

Returned from a Mormon mission in Canada, Ben Olson is the hottest quarterback prospect in the country

How three athletes fared upon returning to sports following their Mormon missions

Ken Burns turns his documentary eye on Jack Johnson, the champ who was a half century ahead of his time

Harvard-Yale is still one of the most passionate rivalries around

In what has become a regular showdown for Ivy supremacy, Harvard ended Penn's conference winning streak

A stricter enforcement of the rules has brought something new to college hockey--some of that old-time scoring

1 BOSTON COLLEGE (4-1-1) EAGLES COACH JERRY YORK, THE WINNINGEST ACTIVE COACH IN COLLEGE HOCKEY, CELEBRATED HIS 700TH CAREER WIN LAST MONTH, AND AT WEEK'S END HIS TEAM WAS NO. 1 IN THE POLLS.