Nice job Huskers. So Texas A&M and Mississippi haven???t done a great job of adhering to diversity standards with regard to hiring head football coaches this off-season. While it???s certainly important to discuss and critique how those programs could have provided more equitable interview opportunities, it???s also necessary to laud those programs that are doing it the right way. For example, Nebraska and interim athletics director Tom Osborne have done an admirable job during their search for a new football coach and have apparently narrowed their candidate pool to two ??? Buffalo head coach Turner Gill and LSU defensive coordinator Bo Pelini. Gill, a former assistant at Nebraska, was the MAC Coach of the Year this season and happens to be African-American. Osborne and the Huskers aren???t obligated to hire Gill instead of Pelini because he???s black, but they do have the responsibility to interview and consider a diverse slate of candidates. They seem to have done a good job of that.

Check your watches. What a day to be a fan of the Massachusetts Minutemen. Faced with the daunting task of playing top-seeded Boston College in the second round of the Division I Men???s Soccer Championship, UMass rose to the challenge and beat the Eagles in Chestnut Hill, 2-1. Mike DeSantis converted a Douglas Rappaport corner kick in the 85th minute to knock home the game-winner and send the Minutemen into the tournament???s third round. As if that wasn???t enough excitement, just a couple hundred miles away, the university???s basketball team was engaged in a track meet with the Syracuse Orange. Behind 25 points from Ricky Harris and 23 from Gary Forbes, UMass hammered out a 107-100 win. Let the celebrations begin at The Hangar.

Remember. The ACC won eight of 11 games in its showdown with the Big Ten, but the most important news came out of University Park, Pennsylvania. Prior to Penn State???s Blue-White football scrimmage last spring, locally-owned Family Clothesline raised funds for victims of the Virginia Tech massacre. Last night, a special presentation was made to the family of Jeremy Herbstritt before the game between Penn State and Virginia Tech. Herbstritt, a Penn State graduate, was killed in the shootings. A check for $55,000 was presented to the Herbstritt Memorial Fund and another check for $55,000 was presented to the Hokie Spirit Memorial Fund.

Big-time performers. The National Football Foundation announced its 2007 Scholar-Athlete winners and Draddy Trophy finalists: Alex Brink (Washington State), John Carlson (Notre Dame), Nick Clark (Texas State), Brandon Cramer (Dayton), Dennis Dixon (Oregon), Michael Eubanks (Delta State), Dallas Griffin (Texas), Mike Klinkenborg (Iowa), J Leman (Illinois), Brandon Renkart (Rutgers), Eric Safran (Mount Union (Ohio)), Paul Smith (Tulsa), Jacob Tamme (Kentucky), Jake Weller (Illinois College), Danny Woodhead (Chadron State). All 15 are team captains, and the group also boasts two perfect 4.0 grade point averages, eight academic all-Americans, five all-American performers, nine all-conference picks and the NCAA???s all-time career rushing leader. The finalists maintain one of the highest average class GPAs in NFF history, with a 3.74.