Hopscotching the sports world for headlines …

Item: Former Nebraska University football coach Tom Osborne, an icon in the Cornhusker State, fails in his bid to become governor, losing decisively to incumbent Gov. Dave Heineman in the state’s Republican primary.

Comment: Hardly a surprise. I mean, what has Osborne, who last coached the Huskers nearly a decade ago, done for them lately?

Item: Oklahoma University football coach Bob Stoops loses consciousness for a few moments while making an hourlong ride with the Navy’s Blue Angels flight team.

Comment: Just a hunch, but I’ll bet the executives of the company that has the life-insurance policy on the nation’s highest-paid college football coach lost a lot more than a few moments of consciousness when they heard about Stoops’ swoops.

Item: The College Football Foundation and Hall of Fame says it will announce its newest members next Tuesday in New York.

Comment: Don’t look for any former Kansas University players. Of the 77 players nominated, none are former Jayhawks. And of the seven coaching nominees, only John Cooper has a tie to Kansas. Cooper was a KU aide in the late ’60s.

Item: Royals owner David Glass vows to make changes – but doesn’t – and Kansas City sweeps a three-game home series from Cleveland.

Comment: Whatever works in baseball doesn’t go un-aped for long, so we can probably expect Indians’ ownership to vow to make changes any day now.

Item: Former Kansas University quarterback Bill Whittemore joins KU’s football staff as a graduate assistant.

Comment: Lexus feet. Mercedes arm. BMW leadership ability. Volkswagen body. The best injury-prone quarterback KU has ever had.

Item: Serena Settlemier becomes Kansas University’s first Big 12 Conference softball player of the year.

Comment: One of the best feel-good stories to come out of KU athletics in years. Once told she probably would never play softball again after having a steel plate placed in her right arm, Settlemier evolved into the softball equivalent of the young Babe Ruth – both a feared slugger and a quality pitcher.

Item: After McDonald’s All-American basketball player Darrell Arthur picked Kansas over Baylor, Bears coach Scott Drew said he was so despondent he just wanted “to go jump in Lake Waco.”

Comment: If Arthur had signed with Baylor, it probably would have been a good idea to dispatch a crew of lifeguards to Clinton Lake.

Item: For the second straight year, Kansas University holds its annual scholar-athlete dinner at an Overland Park hotel.

Comment: This makes about as much sense as Johnson County Community College using the Eldridge Hotel to honor its scholar-athletes.

Item: The National Basketball Assn. fines Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban $200,000 for criticizing the officials during the playoffs.

Comment: Further proof the NBA operates on a monetary level far beyond mortal comprehension.