Priest Charged With Selling Coke From Campus Rectory

A Catholic priest was charged this week with selling cocaine from his office and residence at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, local news organizations report.

The Rev. Christopher Layden, 33, was arrested Wednesday after police found “about 3 grams of powder cocaine and items of drug paraphernalia” while executing a search warrant on the campus, according to The Pantagraph.

Layden pleaded not guilty to three charges, the paper says.

The News-Gazette reports an informant told police that he has used cocaine with the priest “40 to 50 times” since 2007. [Dlisted]

Perfect Fit: Holtz Leads East Carolina Revival

The early-season resurgence that has made East Carolina the darling of the 2008 college football season has its genesis in an eight-month stretch four years ago.

In May 2004 Steve Ballard was hired as university chancellor. One of his first decisions was to reject the three finalists for athletics director advanced by an advisory committee and begin a new search. That led him to Terry Holland, the highly respected former basketball coach and athletics director at Virginia and a native North Carolinian.

Holland arrived in October and two months later hired Skip Holtz to revive a Pirates football program that was 3-20 the previous two seasons. ECU football has been on the rise ever since. [USA Today]

College Football’s Highest-Paid Losers

When the Florida Atlantic Owls marched into Austin, Texas, on August 30, they likely didn’t have any expectation of beating the mighty Texas Longhorns, one of college football’s best teams.

They did, however, expect to get paid.

By delivering its team as a so-called sacrificial offering to Texas’ chances at an undefeated season, Florida Atlantic was paid $900,000, a figure it will receive again for playing the Longhorns in 2010. [Forbes]