Top Ten: Things you may have missed from the past weekend

1. Tom Brady’s Season Is Over. In case you live under a rock or are suffering the clutches of AT&T not setting up your cable yet, heralded QB and reigning league MVP Tom Brady is done for the year after tearing his ACL in the first quarter of the New England Patriots’ season opener. This means Matt Kassel, who struggled in the preseason, is the Patriots’ starting QB. While the Pats will still be a tough task for any opponent, the AFC East just got a whole lot more interesting. They may not be going 16-0 again, but at least we don’t need to see Mercury Morris on “Sportscenter” every night saying the 1972 Dolphins were better. Your reasons for watching the Patriots have just been decreased 20-fold.

2. Michael Turner. Casual NFL fans and fantasy owners may have been unaware of Turner (and the rest of the Falcons roster) before week one. They all hate themselves today. Turner had about as a good a day as any in history, racking up 220 rushing yards and two TD’s in the Falcons’ romp of Detroit. He set the Atlanta franchise record for rushing while also showing that his squad, which is led by rookie QB Matt Ryan, won’t be the pushover everyone thought. Side note: the Lions have not been a good team in my or any current college students’ lifetime. One more year of mediocrity and they should lose their perennial right to play on Thanksgiving.

3. The Red Sox have quietly climbed to within 1.5 games of the Rays. While football has taken center stage in the last few weeks, the Red Sox have been erasing their deficit in the AL East. While injuries to key Tampa starters like Evan Longoria have helped, the Sox have picked up their play, winning five of seven and setting up a key week in which the two teams play six times. The team who wins this week takes the division. As a Yankee fan, I am also obliged to report that (when this was written) they are currently 10 games out and sit behind the Blue Jays in fourth place.

4. Serena Williams won the U.S Open. Unless you are a devout tennis fan or read ESPN.com more than your schoolwork, you may have missed Serena’s dominance throughout the past few weeks in Flushing. She beat her sister Venus quite easily in the Quarter final, and then battled past Jelena Jankovic in a great Championship final. She won the title in straight sets, 6-4, 7-5. With the win, she regains the top spot in the world. In other news, I can say with some certainty that she could also easily win a fight vs. the entire school.

5. Notre Dame still looks as bad as last year. If you are as large a Notre Dame fan as I am, you may have been ready to drown yourself in one of the puddles created by Tropical Storm Hannah on Saturday night. For those of you who didn’t tune in to this JV High School football game NBC was kind enough to broadcast for us, you correctly saved four hours of your time. All of the talk that ND was much improved was shattered by perennial cellar dweller San Diego State. ND was inches away from being put away before the Aztecs fumbled on their way to the goal line. While Notre Dame won the game, the team’s performance better pick up this week against Michigan.

6. Billy Wagner is out for the year. Mets closer Billy Wagner is done for the year, which is not good news for Mets fans. In his absence, the Mets bullpen has been as impressive as Ferris Buehler’s attendance record, blowing a considerable amount of games it should have won. That said, the team has thrown an impressive 23 scoreless innings since Sept. 1, which is a good sign. Look for the race to go down to the wire in the NL East as the Phillies are only two games out. But if Delgado and Santana continue their play, the Mets should pull it out.

7. Will Forte. Kudos to all of you fantasy owners who took a chance on the Bears rookie running back from Tulane. He had a day (or night, technically) against the Colts, rushing for an impressive 123 yards and a score in the Bears’ surprising upset of Indianapolis. As long as the Bears keep throwing out Kyle Orton or Rex Grossman, expect Forte to keep getting touches.

8. Favre and the Jets. I was tempted not to say a word about Brett Favre this week because the coverage he received this summer was enough to make me never want to hear the words “Brett Favre” again. However, with Favre, the Jets looked fairly impressive. While they had to pull out a win against Miami, Favre was up to his old tricks, converting fourth downs into touchdowns by doing what he did in Green Bay for all those years: closing his eyes, throwing up a prayer and getting very lucky it wasn’t picked off. I’m not sold on the Jets, but I was sold on Notre Dame being good this year, so what do I know? We will know more next week when they face off against New England.

8b. Chad Pennington changed his facemask. The former Jet and now Miami QB changed his facemask. Thank God. He suddenly looks 10 times more athletic.

9. Washington-BYU controversy. In an extraordinarily entertaining game that none of us on the East coast saw live, Washington Huskies QB Jake Locker scored on a three-yard scamper to put his team in position to tie the game and send it into OT with the extra point. After the touchdown and in the midst of the euphoria, Locker threw the ball above his head and began celebrating with his team. This drew an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty for excessive celebration, knocking the extra point back to the 35-yard line, where the attempt was blocked. Most are saying the refs blew the game, and they are exactly right. Excessive celebration? I should hope you are celebrating excessively if you just tied the game with almost no time left. That penalty was meant to stop teams from rubbing in scores in their opponents’ faces. This was the opposite. It was legitimate excitement for potentially tying the game. Come on.

10. Coach Don Haskins passed away. Legendary college basketball coach Don Haskins passed away at the age of 78 on Sunday. Haskins was famous for winning the National Championship at Texas Western in 1966 by beating Kentucky with the first all African-American starting five. His story was recently told in the movie “Glory Road.”