First off, a note that we'll hold a live chat today at noon. It's May and all that, but there's still lots of stuff to chat about, so let's do so at noon.

Now for a few links. ...

--- GoHuskies.com writes about some of the recent off-field charitable activities of the UW football team.

--- SBNation takes a look at UW commit Sean Constantine of Bellevue.

--- Justin Davis, a running back from Stockton, Calif., considering USC, Cal and UW, is expected to make his decision public around 6 p.m. today. Davis is considered maybe the top RB prospect on the West Coast this year, and is also generally considered a pretty heavy lean to USC.

--- Senio Kelemete officially signed with the Arizona Cardinals on Wednesday.

--- Former Husky Ryan Tolar is now playing for the Tri-Cities entry in the Indoor Football League.

--- ESPN.com's Ted Miller lists James Johnson as one of the breakout players in the Pac-12 this spring.

--- Looks like Shaq Thompson hit .305 for his baseball season.

--- Jon Wilner with some always-interesting reaction to some recent developments around college sports.

--- USA Today details that Lane and Monte Kiffin earned $3.9 million last year from USC.

--- The Salt Lake Tribune with more on Cooper Bateman's commitment to Alabama.

--- CollegeFootballNews.com offers this preview of Cal.

I know we've been a little sporadic on these, but time for another round. ...

Q: I believe that the Thursday night game against Stanford is our most important game of the season. It will probably turn out to be the deciding game for second in the North and if we don't win here a three game losing streak would be very plausible. I like our chances for three reasons --- 1, Steve Sarkisian usually benefits with extra time to gameplan (bye week); 2, It's a home game; 3, Stanford graduated a lot of key positions. What are your thoughts?

A: Here are a few. ...

--- I'd agree completely that the Stanford game looms pretty pivotal since of the four games in the first half of the season in which UW may/will be an underdog (LSU, USC and Oregon being the others) it looms as the most winnable. As you note, Stanford has some key losses (namely, some guy named Andrew Luck) and catching the Cardinal early may be a lot more favorable than later when all the young guys get some seasoning. That said, Stanford could have a really good defense and still a pretty good offensive line --- I wouldn't assume the Cardinal necessarily takes a huge fall. But certainly on paper, they appear more beatable than the last two seasons;

--- The game could well be a decider for second in the North, though I wouldn't completely discount the role Cal might play in that race, as well, especially since the Bears get both Stanford and UW at home this season;

--- Since you said Sarkisian usually benefits from extra time to prepare, I thought I'd look up the stats on that. Obviously, he's 1-1 in bowl games, with the Nebraska 2010 Holiday Bowl win obviously a big upset and last year's Alamo Bowl probably about what was expected (not the score or the way in which it developed, necessarily, but Baylor was favored by 10 and won by 11, so ultimately the outcome was about what people thought). He's 1-2 in season openers, when teams have more time to prepare, with one of the losses a good performance against LSU in 2009 and one of the wins a not-so-good performance against Eastern last year. The other --- a 2010 loss at BYU --- might be regarded as about what was expected. And he's 3-1 after true byes (meaning a complete week off during the season, not just to a Thursday), though two were in games UW was heavily favored to win --- 2009 WSU and 2011 Colorado, each at home. The other win was the 2010 upset at USC. The loss was 2009 at UCLA, a 24-23 defeat in a game the Huskies could just as easily have won. He's also 1-0 in a situation like this will be --- a Thursday game following 12 days off, though that again was a game UW was generally expected to win, the 2010 contest against UCLA.

Q: A couple questions regarding the blog --- do you permanently hold the position of covering the Huskies? Can you please provide stats on how many people are regular posters? What sort of traffic comes to the website daily? Perhaps talk about seasonal traffic. How do the numbers compare to other blogs? Perhaps you can give a brief history of this blog?

A: These questions may seem a little self-serving. But May may be the time for that, so I'll do what I can to answer some of these.

First, my official title is "sports reporter'' and that can include all manner of duties, and often does, such as helping out with the Mariners or other things from time to time. My main beat responsibility is UW football and has been since 2002 at the Times. That could change at any time, as could any of our jobs, so it's not written in stone that I do this forever or anything. But there's nothing on the horizon.

As for numbers of readers, etc., I don't have those sort of specific numbers to give out. In terms of your specific question on posters, however, that would be hard to decipher, anyway, since there's nothing stopping one person from posting under multiple names, etc. Suffice to say that during the football season, the UW football blog is generally among the most-viewed blogs at the Times --- traffic also picks up during recruiting periods, so late January and into LOI Day tend to be big. Whatever teams are in season tend to have the highest readership, as might be expected.

As for the history of the blog, it began with the 2006 season, about the time when the Times began regular blogs for all of its sports beats. The UW men's basketball blog began with the 2005-06 season when I also covered that team, and that was the first true sports blog at our paper, kind of a trial run at the time to get blogs off the ground.

Q: Most people believe that if the UW defense gets drastically better then Justin Wilcox will get many head coaching offers. If this happens sometime in the next two years do you see the Huskies promoting Tosh Lupoi, Peter Sirmon, or Keith Heyward to the Defensive Coordinator or do you think they will hire from outside?

A: The first part is definitely true. Wilcox is already on everyone's radar --- he was mentioned for the Arizona State job this year when he was still at Tennessee, for instance, and his name is sure to crop up every year now. Obviously, if he does good things at UW, it will only enhance a star that is already burning pretty bright.

As for the second part, that's so hard to answer definitively at this point. Certainly, if the Huskies are having lots of success on defense, they may indeed want to promote from within -- Lupoi already has a title in officially being the "defensive run game coordinator,'' so he's probably be the leader in the clubhouse if they looked in-house.

Q: Any word on game times for the first two games of the season (San Diego State and LSU)? When can we expect?

A: There's nothing definitive yet, but it should come soon as more and more times for games around the country are released every day. Today, for instance, the WSU-BYU game, also originally set for Sept. 1, was moved to Thursday, Aug. 30, making the Sept. 1 Pac-12 lineup a little lighter. As we wrote in this space last week, the Pac-12 said it hoped by mid-June to release its fall lineup for the new Pac-12 Networks. So I would expect at that point that most games would have TV times --- and the UW-San Diego State game seems like the kind that might fall onto the conference network.

The UW-LSU game will be on ESPN and it's thought it will be somewhere in the 4-6 p.m. range Seattle time (so 6-8 p.m. in Baton Rouge). I would also expect that to be announced sometime soon.

We'll start this morning with the news that Cooper Bateman of Salt Lake City, regarded as one of the top QB prospects for the Class of 2013, has committed to Alabama.

Here's a story noting that Bateman made his announcement simply by sending a statement to members of the Alabama media.

Bateman was among those who visited UW for Junior Day and had said he was seriously considering the Huskies. However, many recruiting analysts had predicted he might ultimately pick Alabama, so this isn't a huge surprise. The Tide may have more of an easier path to starting (and yes, Bateman's announcement also means former Husky OC Doug Nussmeier, now at Alabama, helped lure one away from the Huskies).

UW obviously appears pretty well-stocked at QB going forward, with Keith Price and Derrick Brown there now and Jeff Lindquist and Cyler Miles arriving in the fall.

But the Huskies want to sign a quarterback for this class. UW has also been aggressively pursuing Troy Williams of Narbonne High in Harbor City, Calif., and some have portrayed the Huskies as the favorite for him. UW also has an offer out to Johnny Stanton of Santa Margarita, Calif. But that is apparently now as an athlete and not a quarterback.

UW is expected to find out on Thursday if it has won the battle for running back Justin Davis of Stockton, Calif. He has said his finalists are UW, Cal and USC, with the Trojans still regarded as the favorite despite getting a commitment Tuesday from RB Ty Issac of Joliet, Ill.

IN OTHER NEWS. ...

--- I'm told the planned interview with UW coach Steve Sarkisian on ESPN 710 Seattle did not run Tuesday but is expected to run today. I'll post a link to the podcast when it does.

--- Pacific Takes has more Pac-12 recruiting updates.

--- The Salt Lake Tribune updates what's going on with the Pac-12 Networks.

--- Ted Miller offers his take on the USA Today breakdown of college athletic finances.

Simply put, a few links worth passing along tonight. ...

--- Bud Withers writes a little about the USA Today report I linked in the earlier entry today examining college athletic finances. One question I've seen is the nature of UW's listed $2.4 million subsidy. I wrote about that a few years ago when we did a series of stories examining college athletic financial issues. Here's that story.

--- UW sophomore defensive tackle Danny Shelton is rated No. 2 by Bruce Feldman on his list of the top 10 biggest surprise players of the spring.

--- The Philadelphia Daily News offers a column on Chris Polk.

--- Brock Huard says he likes Oregon's chances at winning the BCS title.

--- ESPN.com's Ted Miller examines the 3-4 defense in his latest mailbag.

--- SI.com says many California players are waiting to commit this year.

--- Heisman Pundit makes an interesting case about whether the scholarship reductions have actually helped USC.

--- Big Ten athletic directors said today they prefer to keep the existing bowl games for potential playoff sites.

Catching up on a few things. ...

--- UW coach Steve Sarkisian will be a guest on the Kevin Calabro Show today on ESPN 710 Seattle, sometime between 4:30 and 6 or so (kind of depends on when the show begins as it will follow the Mariner game). You can listen here.

--- USA Today's annual look at college sports finances was published today. Here's the main story as well as a sidebar on how finances could create divisions in football. Here's the data base, which lists UW showing a profit of $2.4 million for the 2010-11 academic year with $70.2 million in revenue and $67.9 million in expenses (and this is obviously all before the new Pac-12 TV deal, which could change the dynamic quite a bit --- none of that money begins to roll in until the 2012-13 year, though schools have kind of started to spend it already in salaries promised for coaches and all of that).

--- CBSSports.com deftly breaks down some of the more interesting numbers from the USA Today date base.

--- USC has gotten a commitment from running back Ty Issac of Joliet, Ill. It's hard to know how that might impact the recruitment of Justin Davis of Stockton, Calif. --- regarded as maybe the top RB prospect in the West this year. Davis is expected to announce on Thursday and has said his finalists are UW, Cal and USC, with the Trojans thought to be the favorite.

--- The ESPN Pac-12 blog looks at what was learned in the spring. ESPN also details the best of the spring and says UW's defense has the "best chance for dramatic improvement.''

--- Here's an update on Dashon Goldson's contract situation with the 49ers.

There are multiple reports today that cornerback Derek Babiash of Poway, Calif., has backed off of his commitment to UW.

The 6-1, 170-pounder is rated four stars by Scout.com and had committed during his trip to UW for Junior Day, which coincided with Washington's spring football game.

Scout.com reported that Babiash said he had "made a decision based on my emotions'' and immediately began having second thoughts. Scout.com reported he recently called UW coaches to tell them of his new plans.

He said he is still heavily considering UW but will also consider schools such as Oklahoma, Arizona, Arizona State, Wisconsin and Utah, among others.

Babiash's decommitment drops the known number of commits for UW's Class of 2013 to five. It's a group that Scout.com currently ranks 35th in the country and fifth in the Pac-12.

It's becoming the time of year in college football where real news can be scarce. That's a way of noting that the daily morning links blog may not be quite as daily for a little while --- or could fall to later in the day at times. Or, simply, not be quite as link-filled. But for this morning, there are a few things to pass along. ...

--- I'm sure an obvious question for many is how did things turn out for the former Huskies who were participating this weekend in tryout camps, such as Cort Dennison with the Raiders, E.J. Savannah with the Seahawks or Erik Folk with the Falcons. The easiest answer is that things went really well if they ended up signing. Unfortunately, at the moment I don't see that any of them did sign contracts. NFL teams can have 90 players on their roster, and most will have tryout camps at which they invited 30 or so, but usually having room to sign only a couple. Here's a story, for instance, that details Atlanta's signees from its camp, and its roster situation.

--- Danny Shelton finished ninth in the shot put at the Pac-12 Track and Field championships over the weekend at 49-05.75. He was the only UW football player to participate.

--- ESPN.com's Pac-12 blog is offering spring reviews for every team in the conference today. Here's its entry on UW.

--- Portland State became the last UW opponent of 2012 to wrap up spring football. Its Spring Game Saturday included five turnovers.

--- Opposing Views debates potential breakout stars in the Pac-12 this season. They also debate the Pac-12's most intriguing teams.

--- Pacific Takes has updates on some of the top recruits on the West.