college football roundup | News and notes

Florida: Head coach Urban Meyer says he is leaving one of the premier jobs in college football for the second time to spend more time with his family. In a campus news conference, Meyer said: “I think you’re going to be judged on how you are as a husband, as a father.” The 46-year-old coach led Florida to two national titles but briefly resigned last December, citing health concerns, but returned the next day. He had been hospitalized with chest pains after the Gators lost to Alabama in last season’s Southeastern Conference championship game. “I don’t have any second guesses about what we did last fall,” Foley said. “He’s at peace with his life. He wasn’t at peace a year ago, and this institution helped him get there.” Meyer was hired away from Utah by Florida after he led the Utes to an undefeated season. In his second season in Gainesville, he led the Gators’ to a national championship. Two seasons later he won another, the third time overall the school topped the final AP Top 25.

Big Ten: The Big Ten commissioner insists his conference has already sacrificed much for the good of college sports by giving up some access to the Rose Bowl, and he sees no reason why it should give even more to create a football playoff. Jim Delany was joined by several other commissioners Wednesday in Manhattan at the IMG Intercollegiate Athletic Forum. The topics ranged from conference alignment to the NCAA to the Bowl Championship Series. The BCS debate led to a lively defense of the system and the Big Ten’s place in it. Delany, a hard-line opponent of a major college football playoff, said many conferences made concessions to form a system that could benefit all the leagues. “Now some of the people who’ve received the most have put in the least,” he said after the panel discussion. He was referring to the five nonautomatic qualifying conferences. The BCS was born in 1998 after the Big Ten, Pac-10 and Rose Bowl agreed to join the Southeastern Conference, Big 12, Atlantic Coast Conference and Big East and the Sugar, Fiesta and Orange bowls in a venture to have a No. 1 vs. No. 2 matchup for the national title every season. In the 13 years since, the BCS has expanded access to the big games for teams in the five other major college conferences and increased the amount of money those leagues receive. “Others were included, but they never had access to any of this before,” Delany said. “You have to understand who brought what to the table, who is continuing to give and who’s continuing to get.”

Auburn: While Cam Newton is crisscrossing the country picking up postseason awards, representatives of the Mississippi secretary of state’s office are heading to Illinois to interview the man at the center of the infamous pay-for-play scandal involving the quarterback. The officials want to talk with Kenny Rogers to see if Agent Act laws were violated during Newton’s recruitment. Rogers, the former Mississippi State player who the NCAA ruled assisted Newton’s father with the failed payment scheme to get his son to sign with that school, is scheduled to meet with officials Thursday in Waukegan, Ill. “We’ll certainly cooperate and answer whatever questions they ask,” said Doug Zeit, Rogers’ attorney and whose offices are in Waukegan. “Kenny Rogers isn’t hiding anything from anybody.” The ongoing Newton investigation has involved everyone from the NCAA to the FBI, though the Auburn quarterback has been cleared to play by the NCAA as the top-ranked Tigers prepare to face No. 2 Oregon for the national championship on Jan. 10.

Associated Press