The Sacramento Bee from Sacramento, California • 16

The Sacramento Bee inside SPORTS On the backburner sacbeecomsports Section WL or SUNDAY December 5 2004 Baseball's steroids scandal is overshadowing an interesting hot stove season Page Cl 1 COLLEGE BASKETBALL C3 NBA BEAT C8 SCOREBOARD Cl 5 HSffi THE DAY OF BCS RECKONING No 3 Auburn 38 Tennessee 28 No 2 Oklahoma 42 Colorado 3 No 1 USC 29 UCLA 24 Kings try to plug up defense Associated PressJohn Amos Associated PressCharlie Riedel Associated PressMarkJ Terrill Reggie Bush scores twice and the Trojans look like a lock for the national title game Story Page C4 Carnell Williams and the Tigers playing in the national title game will be a stretch Story Page C4 Adrian Peterson carries the Sooners to an almost-certaln matchup against USC Story Page C4 Coach Rick Adelman worries about his team guarding the pick-and-roll By Martin McNeal BEE STAFF WRITER It could be called nit-picking when one looks for weaknesses in a team that has won 10 of its last 11 games It could also be called looking at the big picture with the knowledge that good enough in December might not be good enough to take the team into June Kings coach Rick Adelman knows how quickly things can change His team is 11-5 after starting 1-4 For Adelman each game is a potential misstep or a steppingstone He knows opponent the Boston Celtics has won three consecutive games after losing its previous four He also notices little things such as the last two losses coming by only two points each to Cleveland and Miami (Adelman brings up defense and rebounding as the obvious weaknesses but really nothing new because one of his strengths is seeing the big picture He talks about first making the playoffs But if not thinking about advancing in the playoffs the sense in making them? the two areas got to continue to talk about are certain things defensively and the Adelman said got to find a way Obviously the defensive situations put into a lot of times are KINGS page C9 Associated PressRogelio Solis Cal's JJ Arrington runs away from Southern Mississippi's Kevis Coley for a portion of his 26 1 rushing yards during the Golden Bears' 26-16 victory over the Golden Eagles fate up to whims No 4 Cal struggles to shake Southern Miss until a blocked extra point turns the tide in the final quarter By A1 Jones BILOXI (MISS) SUN-HERALD HATTIESBURG Miss Southern Miss had fourth-ranked Cal right where it wanted But with a national television audience on hand and the game on the line the Golden Eagles pull enough magic from the hat and the Golden Bears held on for a hard-fought but perhaps devastating 26-16 victory at MM Roberts Stadium Now up to the voters in the Associated Press and coaches Top 25 polls to determine whether a Rose Bowl berth awaits Cal (10-1) The Bears in a fight with Texas for the final BCS at-large berth could be left out of the BCS if three voters move the Longhorns currently No 5 in front of Cal tough to lose when you play as hard as we Southern Miss coach Jeff Bower said is a good team and you take anything away from Southern bid for one of the biggest upsets this college football season dwindled with 5:56 left in the game Following CAL page C5 MARK KREIDLER home its schedule already complete I could explain this polling quirk in detail but that could take years and cost millions of brain cells that might otherwise be put to a more productive use (and here I speak almost exclusively of racking up a serious score on PlayStation ATV Off-Road Fury) But suffice it to say: six votes six out of 126 or three voters in each of the two national Top 25 polls Not that a playoff makes more sense but: six votes KREIDLER pageC5 nd the loser potentially is: A clean and unmarred memory of best football season since Abe Lincoln was wearing Huggies the math for those keeping book at home and still trying to come to a conclusion as to whether college Bowl Championship System is an entertaining muddle or just a hopeless one: If even six of the 126 voters in the two major polls looked at 10-point road victory Saturday night and yawned loudly then the Bears are done as a Rose Bowl thought In other words No 4 Cal might be punished for beating Southern Miss by only 26-16 while No 5 Texas could be richly rewarded to the tune of securing the final open spot among the four major BCS games for sitting idly at game RAIDERS VS CHIEFS Time: 1:05 pm TV: (32) Raiders improving slowly By Gregg Bell BEE STAFF WRITER ALAMEDA A1 Davis will again assess address and re-dress his Raiders in about four weeks immediately after their second consecutive playoff-free season Players and others will lose their jobs new people will sign and a blueprint for 2005 will take shape But Davis and his team can save themselves all the plotting and head-banging Just lie down for next opener Yep get absolutely tortilla-pressed embarrassed and ridiculed in Week 1 of 2005 Oakland might go say 14-2 with that approach It has worked wonders for the 2004 bunch anyway Finally mercifully these Raiders have responded but only after the San Diego Chargers smacked them 42-14 on Oct 31 -sending Oakland to last place at 2-6 And only after the NFL chuckled then just plain howled laughing at how pitiful the Super Bowl entrants from two seasons ago hadbecome Afweek after the San Diego debacle the Raiders recorded their firsfroad victory in 13 games a RAIDERS pageC13 Sac-Joaquin Section Football Playoffs Nevada Union rallies tops Granite Bay for City title By Melody Gutierrez BEE STAFF WRITER In a huddle of players family and friends Nevada Union High School football coach Dave Humphers said he never stopped believing Sure his team had lost its last two Metro Conference games And yes the Miners had dealt with injuries and personal tragedies But Humphers said he knew there was something special about this group of guys And Saturday they proved it With a new game plan Nevada Union rallied to defeat Granite Bay 42-27 for the City Championship in front of an estimated 5000 fans at Hughes Stadium The Miners (9-3) will face St of Stockton (12-1) at 1 pm Saturday at the University of the Pacific for the Sac-Joaquin Section Division I title thrilled for our Humphers said had more than our share of adversity We had three kids with a death in their family had injuries just really proud of these guys Starting with seniors Rich and MINERS jpage C7 fifi thrilled for our team had more than our share of adversity 39 Dave Humphers Nevada Union coach ZZzx Sacramento Bee Andy Alfaro Tight end Matt Burcham shows his disappointment after Metro Conference champion Gfanite Bay lost the City Championship gSme at Hughes Stadium.