the wall.Conor Daly qualified a career-best seventh and just

The stakes werent quite what Houston fans were dreaming of in September, but the Cougars still made a major statement with last weeks 36-10 drubbing of a Louisville team that came to campus ranked third in the country and openly talking about a spot in the four-team college football playoff.After silencing that talk with their dominant performance, the Cougars were left to ponder what-might-have been. If they had made it to last weekend undefeated, they, too, would have had playoff hopes on their minds. But losses to Navy and Southern Methodist means that the Cougars will be spending their January elsewhere.Still, what better way to offer a state of the program address than with a dominating performance on national television.Im proud of our guys, Houston coach Tom Herman said. Im proud of our seniors to be able to say that in their junior and senior year, they are 6-0 against top 25 teams, 3-0 against top 10 teams and 2-0 against top 3 teams.They are the most winning class in the history of this great university -- theres a lot to be proud of there.The 18th-ranked Cougars (9-2, 5-2 AAC) now wind up their regular season with a trip to Memphis to take on the Tigers (7-4, 4-3). Kickoff is at noon ET Friday at Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium in Memphis with ABC telecasting the action.This marks the final regular-season game for the seniors Herman has been so eager to praise. While some will get looks at the next level, its still a day likely to be fraught with emotion.I cant believe it, senior linebacker Steven Taylor said. These years go by so quick. I was a redshirt freshman. Ive been here five years and its unbelievable how time flies. Im excited. I cant wait to go out there and ball out with my boys. Were going to come hard and prepare hard as well.Going on the road puts the game in a different light for the Cougars. Both of their losses have come away from home. Navy won 46-40 and SMU pulled a real shocker with a 38-16 romp in Dallas.We havent played as well as we liked on the road at times, Herman said., We have got to take the things that we learned the last couple of weeks in our wins and make sure they translate over to road games as well.Memphis is coming off a big 34-7 win on the road over Cincinnati.To get that seventh win is big and now it sets up a big matchup for us with a great Houston team coming in, Tigers coach Mike Norvell said. Its going to be a lot of fun here in Memphis Friday.The game could become an offensive show. It will feature the AACs top two passers in Houstons Greg Ward and Riley Ferguson of Memphis.A senior, Ward has had to contend with nagging injuries since early in the season but still has completed 67.1 percent of his passes for 284.1 yards a game. He has 18 touchdown passes against only eight interceptions.Ferguson, a junior, has completed passes at a 63.4 percent rate for 265.2 yards a game and has 24 touchdown passes against only nine picks.Houstons Linell Bonner is No. 3 in the conference in receptions per game with 76 for 841 yard and two touchdowns in 10 games. Anthony Miller of Memphis is No. 5 in receptions per game with 84 catches in 11 games and No. 3 in receiving yards per game with 1,114 yards.Ward also has rushed for 453 yards in his 10 appearances, which is a team high. He is the second-winningest quarterback in school history, trailing only Case Keenum, but his .871 winning percentage is the best-ever at the school.Houston defensive tackle Ed Oliver is coming off a huge performance in the rout of Louisville. Going against Heisman favorite Lamar Jackson, it was Oliver who was the dominant force, finishing with two of the teams 11 sacks, three tackles for loss, a forced fumble and two passes broken up. He has now had multiple tackles for loss in each of the past three games. Clearance Air Jordan 1 Australia . The Vikings announced Thursday that Priefer will be one of seven holdovers from the previous staff, along with offensive line coach Jeff Davidson, wide receivers coach George Stewart and others. Norv Turner will mark his 30th year of coaching in the NFL as the offensive co-ordinator, as widely reported for weeks, and George Edwards will be the defensive co-ordinator. Wholesale Jordans Shoes Australia . Capitals head coach Adam Oates said Ovechkin was injured in the first period against the Vancouver Canucks on Monday and clarified it was not a head injury. http://www.airjordan1clearanceaustralia.com/ . -- Quarterback Will Finch threw for 252 yards and three touchdowns, and Yannick Harou rushed in two scores as the No. Air Jordan 1 Australia Outlet . Oaklands loss to Seattle clinched the ALs best record for the Red Sox with one day to spare in the regular season. "I think everybody was kind of watching," catcher David Ross said. "Demp (Ryan Dempster) came out before he went to the bullpen and was just yelling that they lost. Cheap Air Jordan 1 Australia Outlet . The team says the Spain international has a muscle pull in his right leg. Barcelona hosts third-division side Cartagena in the return leg of their round-of-32 tie after winning their first meeting 4-1. TORONTO -- Scott Dixon used a fast final lap to snatch the pole away from Helio Castroneves at the buzzer in qualifying Saturday for Indy Toronto.Dixon turned a lap of 59.9073 seconds to win the pole for the race Sunday. It was his 24th career pole and first since Mid-Ohio last year. Castroneves wound up second with a lap of 59.9425 on the temporary street course at Exhibition Place.Whenever you can start on the pole, especially on the street courses, its a big help, said Dixon, who squeezed in his final lap.I was just trying to get the most out of it, man. Each lap just kept getting a bit better. Its not what we planned on, we just planned to do three laps. We luckily had a little bit more gas in the car to do a fourth. Worked out nicely for a change.The pole moved Dixon ahead of Johnny Rutherford for 12th on the career poles list. Dixon is one pole victory behind Toronto native Paul Tracy.Castroneves thought he had the pole until Dixons final lap flier.What can I say? he asked before praising Dixon and his Chip Ganassi Racing team. Ganassi is not a rookie team. Theyre champions. They know what theyre doing. Good job by Scott.IndyCar Series points leader Simon Pagenaud qualified third and Will Power was fourth as Team Penske took the three spots behind Dixon.Sebastien Bourdais qualified fifth while Toronto native James Hinchcliffe was sixth to earn his best career start in his home race.Its really tough to win races from outside the top 10 in this series, especially at a track like this, Hinchcliffe said. Theres good opportunities for some passes here. The guys in front of us have pretty solid pace, were going to have to find a little bit in ourselves over the course of the evening and warmup. (But) definitely were in as good a position here this weekend as weve ever been here.Hinchcliffe was the highest qualifying Honda driver as Chevrolet teams took the top five spots.It was a rough qualifying session for the quartet from Andretti Autosport. Carlos Munoz qualified a team-best 15th, Ryan Hunter-Reay was 18th, Alexander Rossi was 19th and Marco Andretti waas 22nd -- last in the field.ddddddddddddhat were missing is overall grip and compliance. Thats so important on a track like this, Hunter-Reay said. Were not even on the same planet as the front runners when it comes to grip. Were fighting the car. Really swatting at flies.Rossi called the qualifying effort abysmal and noted how challenging it will be for the Andretti drivers to salvage the weekend.As a team we have to work on it, because we shouldnt be here, said Hunter-Reay. Its really unfortunate. Its not fun at the moment.Rahal added, I (went for it) and we hit the fence. The car is still ill-handling. I told the guys it was going to take a magic lap to advance, I knew it. Our basic balance, all weekend, weve been killing the rear tires, cant put power down at all. . I went for it and the sucker went straight and we just tagged the wall.Conor Daly qualified a career-best seventh and just missed advancing into the final round of six.Everyone is so good in this series, he said. Its just cool to be in that group and kind of fighting for those positions.Josef Newgarden, the defending race winner, was eighth. He led all but 18 laps a week ago to win at Iowa, where he moved to second in the IndyCar standings behind Pagenaud.Im always optimistic. Theres always something that can happen in the race, he said. This is our best session, qualifying is the highest weve been this weekend. You hate to say eighth is the best weve been this weekend, but Ive always got faith we can figure it out. Thats what happens when you get to racetracks, you try to solve the puzzle.Were going to have to figure it out, man, were the defending champs. Well see what we can do.IndyCar on Saturday morning altered the course so that the wall in Turn 8 was changed to the configuration used in previous years. The change provides an additional six feet on the inside of the track, and concrete patches in Turns 1 and 9 were worked on to provide more consistent grip. ' ' '