College football season ended a few days ago when college basketball season began, but here’s a few things I didn’t get to mention earlier this week from the world of college football, the NFL, and the NBA.

• Darren McFadden = the man. Very impressive 300+ yards put him back in the Heisman race. It was probably the South Carolina game last year where he started his run. If he could have an impressive game in a win over Tennessee tomorrow, he might take a few more eyes off Oregon’s Dennis Dixon, the current frontrunner.
• Navy over Notre Dame – Great game. Glad to see Navy end the streak. And, as usual, glad to see Notre Dame lose. I wonder if they’re starting to wish they’d given Ty Willingham a little bit more time. Funny moment during the Arkansas/USC game on ESPN2: the play-by-play guy (can’t remember who it was now) mentioned the game to Bob Davie, who was doing color, and Davie made some comment and kind of chuckled. I know he was really thinking, “Even I didn’t lose to Navy!”
• New England over Indianapolis – No, not college, but a much-hyped NFL game I tuned in for on Sunday. I rarely watch the NFL until the playoffs, but despite the hype, this was a pretty good one. Impressive comeback win by the Patriots. It seems hard to imagine them losing to anyone when they go to the other best team in the league’s home field and come out with a win. But, Indianapolis wasn’t supposed to lose a couple of years ago, and they didn’t even make the AFC championship game.
• I made no secret last year of the fact that I was not a Joakim Noah fan. So, obviously, this story made me laugh. After hearing the Chicago rookie’s assessment of the Bulls’ early season problems, Coach Scott Skiles had the following comment: “If I had just played my first game, I’d probably keep my mouth shut.” Priceless.

Moving from the sports world (more on college basketball in a later post) to the music world, a few offerings from this week…

Check this out immediately: a recent Josh Ritter concert recorded in Washington DC and available free at NPR. It is just tremendous. I dare you to download it and not listen to it over and over.

Also, I downloaded a copy of the album Living With War by Neil Young earlier this week. Young doesn’t really beat around the bush (no pun intended) regarding his feelings about the war in Iraq or the current administration. The songs are pretty direct. (Just check out this song and you’ll get the idea.) The songs are also very good, and I’m liking the album a lot.

Finally, from my newest download, Matt Nathanson’s most recent disc, Some Mad Hope. Not sure what is up with this video, but this is the first track from the album, “Car Crash”, for your listening pleasure. There’s also a video of Nathanson singing the song “Bulletproof Weeks” at Amazon (click here.) I’m enjoying this album more and more with each listen.