Menifee to Marshall counties, high tide in Kentucky is autumn. Our pristine place in time is a weave of yellows and reds and vistas painted in hews and silhouettes so golden they take our breath and send storytellers to their keys and fiddlers to their picks.

A Thomas Kinkade-like canvas on which sport, in our case, football-morphing-to-basketball, is, for a fleeting moment or so, almost important.

At grassroots, Louisville Trinity, Fort Thomas Highlands and the rest embark on their real season this week. High school playoffs.

College? There is a flicker or two among the embers about to give way to hoops.

Flicker 1. Revival at Bowling Green is a beauty. A few autumns ago, Western Kentucky owned the nation’s longest losing streak. Today, the Hilltoppers own a four game win streak, each packed with fourth quarter lightning and overtime thrills enough to set stage for standing room only this week against Florida International.

In Louisville, Charlie Strong has a contract extention to take recruiting and the Cardinals have back-to-back wins heading to nut-cracking-time at Morgantown, West Virginia.

Low place on the totem? Football in Lexington. The Wildcats’ season faded to black-on-blue last week (pun intended). Losing its third of five home games with two left at Commonwealth does not feed the bulldog (no pun intended).

The Wildcats’ black duds against Mississippi State were handsome enough, even menacing opposite the Bulldogs’ emphasis-on-fat white uni(s). But UK’s performance was not handsome. Big and burly State rolled over the Wildcats like M1A1s on their way to Baghdad. Or, in this case, bowl eligibility.

This week Coach Joker Phillips is this close to labels beleaguered and hot seat. And, will take a dismal record to the recruiting trail.

Closer still, UK faces after-thought status as the calendar turns to Exhibition, (basketball against Transylvania and Morehouse).

Realities for Kentucky eight games along?

1. Four left, three are winnable. Georgia isn’t.

2. Eureka, a quarterback. Morgan Newton’s strained ankle forced Phillips to give fans rookie Maxwell Smith. With Tim Couch aplomb, the kid stepped in cold, heated up quick and moved critics to bash the coach with echoes of Turn-the-Deuce-Lose. Smith stood calm in the pocket, threw catchable passes, took his licks, made good decisions and completed 26 of 33 passes, and got a clear vote of confidence from his coach Randy Sanders.

3. Voila, a blue collar receiver. Matt Roark played as if the next snap was on his mind instead of trash talk or a pro contract. He caught 13 passes for 116 yards.

4. Last reality. Joker Phillips and his staff had better find and sign SEC caliber athletes and plenty of them and soon.

Another autumn will come and new M1A1s are coming down the road. Texas A&M and Missouri (probable).

NEWS & VIEWS

NEWS. Darius Miller is a better player this year because of Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, John Calipari said last week.

VIEW. In fact, Miller is a better player because he’s played college basketball three seasons against best of the best in the Southeastern Conference, across America and internationally. Kidd-Gilchrist is merely the latest challenge.

NEWS. Western Kentucky running back Bobby Rainey passed the 1,000 yards rushing mark last week making it back-to-back seasons for the Tops’ All-American. Rainey is third on WKU’s all-time rushing list, 136 yards behind second place Willie Taggart.

VIEW. Rainey is clearly the Sun Belt’s player of 2011. Too, if there were a Courage Award for Little Guy player of the year in Kentucky it would belong to Rainey and UK Danny Travathan.

NEWS. University of Kentucky’s board of trustees voted to abolish the committee that oversaw athletics association budget and spending the other side of Avenue of Champions.

VIEW. Applause, please. Long term, the athletics department operating independent of the University oversight should have never happened. Near term, the board’s decision is a watchdog on Mitch Barnhart decisions and ideally will channel profits to pay employees, improve or build new dormitories and cover educational needs. Thankfully, UK has a new president and board of trustees intent on academia as well as jockocracy.

NEWS. Texas Tech Coach Billy Clyde Gillispie was in the news recently. The ex-Kentucky coach told USA Today “I couldn’t be happier to be back in Texas. (But) I loved my time outside Texas.”

VIEW. Why wouldn’t he? Billy Clyde fleeced University of Kentucky of $3 million, plus lawyer fee compensation and had a DUI taken care of before leaving town three years ago.

After a stint in rehabilitation, a five year deal with Tech for $4 million is Gillispie’s latest windfall. Life is good.

NBA: THE LIST

As NBA Commissioner David Stern cancelled games through November last week, a quiz – What do these former NBA players have in common – Julius Erving, Allen Iverson, Scottie Pippen and Latrell Sprewell?

Answer: Along with Antoine Walker, Kenny Anderson, Vin Baker and Derrick Colemen, they made CNBC.com’s list titled Former NBA Players Gone Broke.

Walker frittered away $110 million, Sprewell $100 million. And, Hall of Famer Dr. J. was forced to foreclose on a $4 million home.

CNBC.com reporter Daniel Bukszpan wrote, “If the lockout jeopardizes the entire season and all of its players’ salaries, it’s not unthinkable that some of them may end up losing astronomical sums of money. It’s happened to several former NBA players before despite their gargantuan salaries, and they lost all that money on their own without even enduring a pay stoppage in the first place.

Brings to mind Brandon Knight and the ‘Free Enes’ movement among UK fans on behalf of Enes Kanter.

Knight, with no contract with the Detroit Pistons yet, has not wavered from his “no regrets” stance leaving Kentucky after a semester.

Kanter? Locked out along with the rest, (Free) Enes has the disadvantage of having not played competitive basketball for two years and counting.

And so it goes.