College football: Play it forward

Five things to watch this week:

1. Stanford at Oregon next Saturday night in Eugene is suddenly a mega-meeting of top-10 schools worthy of being moved off its 8:15 p.m. time start into 5 p.m. prime-time position on ABC.

2. UCLA, by popping Texas in Austin, took the pop out of next weekend’s Texas- Oklahoma game at the Cotton Bowl. The game coincides with the State Fair of Texas, so at least the food will still be good.

3. Florida at Alabama in Tuscaloosa pairs the last two BCS national champions in what could be an early-season epic in the Southeastern Conference. Alabama rallied to beat Arkansas on Saturday while Florida finally worked out the kinks with a lopsided win against Kentucky.

4. Lane Kiffin and Steve Sarkisian, former “Boy Wonder” co-offensive coordinators on Pete Carroll’s staff at USC, meet for the first time as opposing head coaches when Washington plays at the Coliseum. USC seeks to avenge last year’s upset loss in Seattle.

5. The Big Ten, coming off one, last ramp-up weekend against lower-tiered schools, finally digs into league play with a couple of good early-season matchups: Penn State at Iowa and Wisconsin at Michigan State.