By Bob Markus

The extended opening week-end of the college football season had everything--the good, the bad, and the ugly--and that was just opening night during and immediately following Boise State's 19-8 victory over Oregon. The good: Boise State's defense, which held the supposedly high-powered Oregon offense without a first down until midway through the third quarter. The bad: that Oregon offense, which performed like a wounded Duck. The ugly: Oregon running back LeGarrette Blount's sucker punch of a Boise State player as the teams were leaving the field. Is that what they mean by "assault with a Blount instrument?" Blount may have been provoked. The recipient of his straight right to the jaw had tapped him on the shoulder and said something to the Oregon runner. So far as I know nobody has yet revealed what was said. Could it have something to do with Blount's pregame statement that Oregon would exact revenge for last year's loss to Boise State, that they were going to "whoop their ass?" Could it have been something on the order of "put your money where your mouth is?" after Blount spent most of the night going backwards and finished with negative rushing yards? ( Would Joe Namath have punched out Johnny Unitas had the Jets lost Super Bowl III?) Regardless, it was about as ugly as it gets in college football and it cost Blount his career and could impact on his future earnings in the NFL.

The game was surprising not so much for the fact that Boise won it, but in the way the Broncos won it. After sitting through South Carolina's stultifying victory over North Carolina State in the first game of the new season, most tv viewers were anticipating a wide open wingding. Boise State is noted for its innovations on offense and the Ducks had hung 63 points on Oregon State and 42 on Oklahoma State in their last two games a year ago. This game was the most important on Boise State's schedule, which is not entirely good news for Broncos fans. There is a pretty good chance that Boise will go undefeated in the regular season, but with that schedule, perceived to be as soft as a whisper, there is no chance the Broncos will play for the national championship. That is not the case with Brigham Young, which pulled off the upset of the week-end, not only knocking off No. 3 Oklahoma 14-13, but sending Heisman Trophy winning quarterback Sam Bradford to the infirmary. Bradford may return at some point in the season, but his bid to become only the second two-time Heisman winner is over. BYU is another team not noted for its defense but the Cougars were containing the high-powered Sooner offense even before Bradford's injury in the second period. On this night the Sooners were not the better. BYU has a tough enough remaining schedule: Florida State , TCU, Utah --all in the preseason Top 25--to make a case for its inclusion in the national championship game should it run the table. All three of those games will be played in Provo, as is the game against Air Force, unranked but dangerous. The Falcons opened their season with a 72-0 scorching of Nicholls State, which might not be very good, but. . . .72-0?

There are some interesting implications to be drawn from the results of the first week-end: The first is that the Atlantic Coast Conference is not very good . Duke and Virginia both lost to Division IAA schools. Virginia Tech, supposedly one of the powers of the conference and ranked No. 7 nationally, lost to Alabama, an SEC power and North Carolina State lost to South Carolina, definitely not an SEC power. In addition, Maryland was overpowered by California, which has hopes of ending USC's reign of terror in the Pac 10. But the ACC did provide THE game of the week-end and possibly of the season. It will be hard to top Miami's 38-34 win over Florida State, which wasn't over even when it was over. The final play was reviewed by officials after both teams declared themselves the winner, kind of like two boxers throwing their arms in the air while awaiting a decision. While Doak Campbell Stadium was wracked with tension while awaiting the decision, it was clear to viewers at home that Jarmon Forston had dropped quarterback Christian Ponder's pass in the end zone on the final play. Florida State players jumped up and down when it appeared Forston had caught the ball, but Miami's players saw immediately that he had not held onto the ball. The officials finally confirmed it. The game made instant stars of both Ponder and Miami quarterback Jacory Harris. Harris threw for 386 yards and two touchdowns and led the Hurricanes back even after a devasting interception return put the Seminoles in front 31-24. So it looks as if Miami may be back on track, although the Canes have as tough a four-game opening stretch as there is in the country.The next three games are against Georgia Tech, Virginia Tech, and Oklahoma, which could have Bradford back by their Oct. 3 meeting.

Two other teams that made a statement Saturday are Notre Dame and Michigan, which both won handily and relieved the pressure on their embattled coaches. Notre Dame's Charlie Weis has been under fire for the better part of two years for the simplest of reasons--the Irish have lost 15 games over that period, Michigan's Rich Rodriguez had two strikes against him. Not only was his first year as Wolverines coach a disaster, but just last week he was accused of abusing NCAA rules on the amount of time student athletes can spend being athletes. The two will meet Saturday in Ann Arbor and the loser will go back to being abused. The other big game involving a Big Ten team finds USC visiting the Horseshoe in Columbus, with a true freshman quarterback. But the Buckeyes will have to play a whole lot better than they did last Saturday, when Navy came within an intercepted two-point conversion attempt of taking the Buckeyes to overtime.

The question of which is the best conference in the country was hardly settled by Saturday's events. Alabama came up big for the SEC with its win over Virginia Tech. The Big 12 took a hit with Oklahoma's loss, but Missouri drubbed Illinois 37-9 in a mild upset and Oklahoma State whipped SEC heavyweight Georgia 24-10. As Bette Davis famously said in "All About Eve," "hold onto your seats, boys, it's going to be a bumpy ride."