Sportswriters never get the chance to hit a game-winning homerun, make a game-winning basket or score a game-winning touchdown.

We do, from time to time, get to throw a gopher ball, dribble the wrong way and fall down flat on our faces during a big race.

Sportswriters, like athletes, make mistakes. Sometimes these are clumsy mistakes--misspelling a name, giving the wrong score of a game played three years ago. These mistakes are equivalent to dropping a first-quarter pass or missing a free throw. Nothing big.

Occasionally, we make big mistakes. We drop passes in the endzone with no one around. I made one last Wednesday in a column I wrote about college football. I said the reason the current bowl system is no good is that it hinders the best teams from playing each other. For instance, I said, it might make a Notre Dame-USC match impossible, since USC, if it wins the Pac-10 conference, is required to play the winner of the Big-10 conference in the Rose Bowl.

I forgot, of course, that Notre Dame and USC, the top two teams in the country, are scheduled to play each other during the regular season this year.

An athlete, Katie McAnaney, co-captain of the field hockey team, reminded me of this fact in a letter.

"I write this letter in part out of disgust, since I thought all real sports fans knew about THE GAME, and at the same time out of pity, since Mark has been missing out on some amazing football."

I have made more ridiculous mistakes. In a hockey story once, I said the Beanpot Tournament--the February battle between Harvard, Boston College, Boston University and Northeastern--was being held in Madison Square Garden. Why a bunch of Boston-area schools would play a tournament in New York City apparently never crossed my mind.

In defense of myself, I was a freshman at the time. I grew up in Washington, D.C., and never appreciated the difference between Madison Square Garden (where the New York Knicks play) and Boston Garden (where the Celtics play and where the Beanpot is held). During my freshman year, confusion came naturally, as it does to most freshmen.

However, such a mistake as I made Wednesday seems to bely excuses. Wouldn't someone with even the remotest interest in college football know about the Notre Dame-USC battle?

The mistake did not hinder the point of the column. It's quite possible, for instance, that Wyoming will go undefeated this year and never get the chance to play in a big-time bowl with the chance to win the national title. A playoff system would allow teams such as Wyoming and West Virginia, also undefeated this year, a chance to prove how good they are.

Still, McAnaney has a point when she says any `real' fan of college football would be aware of, even passionately look forward to, the Notre Dame-USC showdown.

My excuse is this: for years, I have been an Ohio State fan. With the Buckeyes sunk in the mud of a mediocre year, I have lost my passionate interest in the college game. I retain a certain intellectual curiosity. But the intellect, as I demonstrated Wednesday, is faulty, capable of making major blunders. The heart is perfect.

If only Ohio State were playing Michigan this year, I might rediscover my passion.