The Cupcake Report: Letterman and Whitlock were thisclose.

You can probably tell by now that I’m rooting for at least one cupcake to win each week, and so far, I’ve been pretty happy.

This week, it was oh, so close, as Ball State fell one field goal shy of beating Nebraska at home. I went to Kansas, so I was pulling hard for the upset. Seeing Nebraska give up 40 points to Ball makes me salivate for the upcoming Big 12 North battle – especially since my Jayhawks are 4-0 and have allowed only 23 points so far this season. It could come down to that old Missouri/Kansas rivalry this year. I wish.

Some readers felt I focused too much on the small conference teams as being cupcakes. Some week when the cupcake action is kind of light, I’ll explain why that’s the NCAA’s fault and not mine. But for now, I’ve compiled a few scores that look cupcakey now that we know what we do about some of these teams:

#23 South Florida 37, North Carolina 10

Michigan State 31, Notre Dame 14

Navy 46, Duke 43

Toledo 36, Iowa State 35

Miami (FL) 34, #20 Texas A&M 17

In the last two instances, in my opinion, the cupcake won out.

The only other scores that seem noteworthy to me from last week are these: Oklahoma continues to beat up on opponents like they owe them cabfare. They laid 62 on Tulsa on the road, no less. Hawaii is the only team to beat that margin, by dialing up a 66-10 victory over Charleston Southern. Look at it this way, Buccaneers, at least you got a tan.

This week, things start to ease up a bit as conference schedules come into full swing:

North Texas (0-3) @ Arkansas (1-2): Having lost both of their conference matchups so far, Arkansas is in danger of being the cupcake themselves very soon. But I’m sticking with UNT as the underdog here, based largely on the fact that OMDQ has declared the Sun Belt to be the Worst Conference in College Football.

Southern Miss (2-1) @ Boise State (2-1): I am officially declaring this one “up for grabs”.

UMass (4-0) @ Boston College (4-0): Umass has done some fine things up in New England, but this is a play-for-pay game any way you slice it. BC must be grinning ear to ear – their next three games are Umass, Bowling Green, and Notre Dame at home.

Cincy (4-0) @ San Diego State (1-2): This is a puzzler, actually. SDSU looks like a weak team, but their two losses were on the road to Pac-10 competition. Still, only a cupcake would ever be scheduled that way. This could be a tough one, with the Aztecs playing at home for pride.

Florida Atlantic (3-1) @ Kentucky (4-0): FAU beat Minnesota this year, so they could put up a fight, but Kentucky has shown us too much recently to go down to the likes of the Owls.

Northwestern State (2-1) @ Texas Tech (3-1): After a wild and wooly loss to OSU and their media critic coach, Tech is probably drooling for this game. But beating up on NWSt is just bully behavior. The Demons play 1-AA ball in the Southland Conference, and have already lost in a super-directional game to Northeastern of the CAA. The Red Raiders might gain a W out of this game, but they won’t regain their swagger. That makes them the Reach of the Week (sorry I can’t find my graphic, and I’m too lazy to make it again).

In other news, for the remainder of the season, every… single… Notre Dame… game… will be considered a cupcake contest. They’ve earned it. Therefore:

Notre Dame (0-4) @ Purdue (4-0): This one looks like the fifth L for the Domers. Coincidentally, Charlie Weis wears a 5XL shirt.