ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- Michigan and Texas are tied for blocking the most kicks this season in major college football.The fourth-ranked Wolverines are also one of two teams, along with Akron, to lead the nation with two touchdowns off punts.Coach Jim Harbaugh, knowing how important special teams are, often keeps his best player on the field even when Michigans offense and defense are on the sideline.Do-it-all Jabrill Peppers was named Big Ten special teams player of the week on Monday after returning a punt 54 yards for a score, capping a 21-point run the Wolverines had to pull away and beat Colorado 45-28 on Saturday.Special teams have been contributing greatly, Harbaugh said. It was our best unit in the last game.Harbaugh raved that Peppers has played a few positions on defense and a few on offense in addition to returning punts and kicks and covering punts and kickoffs. Peppers shared honors for Big Ten defensive player of the week.I cant think of another player like Jabrill, Harbaugh said.The Wolverines, though, will have some thinking and correcting to do this week as they prepare to open the Big Ten season at home against Penn State.Kenny Allen missed two field goals -- from 37 and 44 yards -- against the Buffaloes after making his first four this season.Well get that improved this week, Harbaugh said.Michigans punt team, meanwhile, has stayed under the radar just as it would want to after a botched punt by the unit led to a heartbreaking loss to rival Michigan State.The Wolverines rank in the middle of the Big Ten pack in net punting this season.Theyre excelling when teams have to punt.With Michigan needing a boost during its slow start against Colorado and trailing 14-0 when Michael Jocz blocked a punt, Grant Perry eventually scooped up the football and returned it 6 yards for a score.Harbaugh, unsolicited, said that while he was with his pregnant wife at an ultrasound appointment Monday morning, her doctor described the play as a slippery watermelon.The ball was loose, a lot of people had their hands on it, Harbaugh said.Michigan has gotten hands on punts but hasnt gotten credit for blocking them because the footballs ended up getting past the line of scrimmage.I know we have three that dont count as blocks, Harbaugh said.Deflected punts dont show up in box scores like other statistics such as broken-up passes, but Harbaugh suggested that getting hands on a punt should be recorded.They track everything else, he said.Chris Wormley has blocked two field goals, both in the 51-14 win over Central Florida.Maurice Hurst doesnt show up in the box score for either block by the 6-foot-6 Wormley, but the 6-2 defensive tackle felt like he was part of the accomplishment as an interior lineman on the play.I was close, Hurst said. Our goal inside is to get the guys knocked back. Chris is a tall guy, so his hands can get to the ball a little bit easier.It hasnt been easy, Hurst insisted, to improve Michigans ability to make plays on special teams through three games this season. He said the coaches, including Jay Harbaugh and Chris Partridge, who are in charge of special teams, have made blocking field goals and making plays elsewhere on special teams a point of emphasis.I think its practice with more intensity and I think people are really paying attention to what special teams can do, Hurts said. When you see the results weve had, it makes you want to work even harder to try to make big plays happen.---AP college football website: http://collegefootball.ap.orgSaucony Outlet On Line .Y. - New Orleans forward Anthony Davis was chosen Friday to replace the injured Kobe Bryant in the NBA All-Star game that will be played in his home city. Scarpe Saucony Offerta . The defence is doing its part, too. Drew Brees threw a pair of touchdown passes in the first half and the guys on the other side made sure that was enough, sending the Saints to a 17-13 victory over the Atlanta Falcons on Thursday night. http://www.scontatesaucony.it/ . MORITZ, Switzerland -- Fog prevented downhill racers from getting their Olympic dress rehearsal. Saucony Scontate . Scott won the Australian PGA last week in his first event in Australia since winning the U.S. Masters in April. American Matt Kuchar, ahead by two strokes with four to play and even with Scott with one to go, double-bogeyed the 18th after taking two shots to get out of a bunker. Saucony Zalando Italia . But Bourque, who has missed three games with a lower-body injury, wont be in the lineup when the Habs travel to Buffalo to take on the Sabres on Wednesday.After 15 rounds, there they are again at the top of the AFL ladder, just as they have been for much of the past decade, looking down on the rest of the competition.Hawthorn and Sydney sit first and second respectively, and on Thursday evening play off in one of the most eagerly anticipated home-and-away matches of the year.Longmire extends Swans dealWhile most neutral observers will enjoy watching two potential grand finalists going toe-to-toe, there is another appeal - the knowledge that, come 10.45pm on Thursday, one of those two powerhouses will have suffered a defeat.Thats what its come to: the dominance of the same two or three clubs (Geelong is up there, too) each season is affecting the codes popularity. People are getting bored by the utter predictability of the competition which is beginning to have echoes of the Scottish football league, when Celtic and Rangers shared the championship between them virtually every year.For all the AFL Commissions attempts at levelling the playing field, through the draft, salary cap and equalisation payments, Hawthorn and Sydney continue to defy the social engineering. Like two cockroaches, they just march through the AFLs stream of Mortein and saddle up for another season of success.Hawthorn officials were understandably jubilant after winning the grand final last season, thumping a pathetic West Coast to claim their third premiership in a row.Yet when the leagues two heavyweights, chief executive Gillon McLachlan and chairman Mike Fitzpatrick, walked into the rooms afterwards, their faces hardly radiated happiness and the joy of life.The pair was privately furious that the Hawks had again scuppered their best-laid plans at producing a vibrant, exciting, even, fair-for-all competition. Hawthorn officials were nonplussed by the lack of magnanimity.This is one area where the NRL has had it all over the AFL in recent seasons: the variety of premiers.In the past nine seasons, three clubs have dominated the AFL competition - Geelong, Hawthorn and Sydney - with Collingwood breaking the nexus in 2010. Yet the NRL has produced six different premiers in the past six seasons alone - and four different clubs again that have finished runner-up.There is not the same entrenched superiority among the rugby league clubs. Even fans of the smaller, leess established teams know at the start of each season that, if the coach and administration are half-decent, theyve got a fighting chance of featuring in the grand final.dddddddddddd That North Queensland, based in tiny Townsville, can knock off the mighty Broncos of Brisbane in the big one - and what a contest last year that proved to be.Of course there is universal respect - and sneaky admiration - for the way the footy operations are run at Hawthorn and Sydney. With peerless administrations that boast clever recruiters and brilliant coaches - and foster rock-solid cultures - the two clubs are the envy of many.But if they play off in the grand final again this year, the collective groan from most non-aligned footy supporters in Melbourne will be heard all the way up the Hume Highway, and across the Nullarbor.This remains the AFLs great challenge. Yet when theyve needed to show a bit of backbone and defend their equalisation policies, and stand up to the rampant self-interest of powerful clubs such as Collingwood and the Hawks, they have tended to cave in like jellyfish.Because of the bleating of the Pies and Hawks, among others, we are now lumbered with a hopelessly compromised system where those two uber-rich clubs are paying not much more each year in equalisation monies than middle-tier clubs such as Richmond and Geelong. And that means the smaller clubs, who have been routinely shafted on the matter of free-to-air TV exposure, Friday night timeslots, lack of blockbuster fixtures and woeful stadium deals, are again short-changed.The Western Bulldogs, or Footscray as they once were, have not tasted final-Saturday success since 1954 - their one and only premiership. Only St Kilda fans with long memories will recall their sole triumph, in 1966, while Melbourne - in spite of a lengthy period dominating the competition in the 1950s and early 60s - have not lifted the premiership cup since 1964.Thats an excruciating wait for three disenfranchised generations of fans at those three clubs.Yet here we are again with those brown-and-gold Hawks, and Sydneys red-and-white Swans, perched atop the ladder and once again leading the charge towards September. ' ' '