Trevor Born writes for GopherIllustrated.com and has authored his own blog, TwinsJunkie, for more than two years. And you know what? He’s only 17. Yes, he’s a senior at Bloomington Kennedy High School. At an age when RandBall was riding on the roofs of cars and stealing road signs — don’t do that, kids — Trevor has been putting together a resume that many J-school graduates would be happy to have. He’s hanging out at the Star Tribune office today, and we thought: What the heck, let’s let Trevor have some space here. So here he is:

Well first of all I’d like to thank Michael for letting me pound at his keyboard during his incredibly busy day (as evidenced by the assorted empty coffee cups and Mountain Dew bottles lying around) and giving me an opportunity to post on one of the best blogs around [RandBall note: He was paid handsomely to say that].

I’m the TwinsJunkie, but the hot topic around town seems to be the firing of coach Mason and who he should be replaced with. A lot of names have come out, some of them crazier than others (whenever someone says suggests Tony Dungy, I typically reply “Why not Bill Belichick?”), but I’d like to make my case for a guy that grew up just a few minutes away from me: Lane Kiffin.

Mr. Kiffin is a 31-year-old graduate of Bloomington Jefferson who is now serving as the offensive coordinator at USC. During his tenure he has coached two Heisman Trophy winners (Matt Leinart and Reggie Bush) as well as three first round draft picks (Leinart, Bush, and Mike Williams). He was ranked by Rivals.com as one of the top 25 recruiters in the nation and is busy grabbing the top talent around the country as we speak. And at 31, he could lead the Gophers for quite a while, Joe Paterno-style.

That’s what it says in today’s Los Angeles Times. Kiffin, 31, has local ties and is currently the offensive coordinator at USC. It’s an intriguing name, to be sure. You can do your own background check on the young man right here.

About a month ago, for the Newspaper of the Twin Cities, we wrote a short item about Wesley Colley, who compiles one of the six computer rankings used in determining the order of BCS teams. His Colley Matrix was the only one of the six at that point to have Florida No. 1 and Ohio State No. 2, even though the Gators had one loss while the Buckeyes were undefeated. He reasoned that the Buckeyes had played a softer schedule and that Florida was simply the better team. This is what he said in a telephone interview at the time: “I’ve had a few e-mails asking how I can have Ohio State below Florida. It’s not surprising to me when a an undefeated team is below a one-loss team.”

Wesley Colley 1, RandBall 0

The huffing, puffing bowl season comes to an end tonight with the big one: Ohio State. Florida. Two teams will go in. Only one will come out. Or something like that. As mentioned earlier, we don’t generally follow college football with the white-hot intensity of 1,000 burning suns, but that won’t stop us from making a prediction. For some reason, 38-20 Ohio State keeps popping into our heads. Feel free to check in here during the game, particularly if that prediction turns out to be either horribly wrong or wonderfully accurate. If it’s neither of those extremes, you stay away from this blog, got it?

When it comes to college football, we here at RandBall don’t claim to have much expertise. In general, we prefer pro sports. That’s just the way it is. That said, we will be watching tonight’s BCS title game with interest. No. 1 against No. 2 gets our attention every time. And we also wanted to share some knowledge with you. So we asked Star Tribune college football writer Chip Scoggins for a quick pick. He is a man of few words, and none of them are wasted:

“I’ve voted Ohio State No. 1 with my AP vote since day one, and I’ll stick with that pick. I think Troy Smith will be the difference. He seems to play his best in big games and never looks rattled. His confidence carries over to the rest of the team, both on offense and defense. I see the Buckeyes winning by seven to 10 points.”

Your thoughts?