The Houston Cougars survived Cincinnati on a short week thanks to a stellar performance from quarterback Greg Ward Jr.Unlike the last big Cougars win, however, Ward wont be following that with a week on the sidelines when they travel to San Marcos, Texas, to take on Texas State at Jim Wacker Field at Bobcat Stadium on Saturday night.Ward, who finds himself in the conversation for the Heisman Trophy after passing for 321 yards and two touchdowns in Houstons 33-23 season opening upset of then No. 3-ranked Oklahoma, took a lot of hits in the 40-16 win over the Bearcats last Thursday night.The No. 6 Cougars won despite struggling most of the way, and the lopsided final score doesnt reflect how the game was played. Houston trailed 16-12 early in the fourth quarter before scoring the final 28 points on two Ward touchdown runs and two defensive scores.Credit to the leaders on the team, Cougars coach Tom Herman said. We were down by four points in the fourth quarter, and there wasnt a difference on the sideline as if we were up by 16 on Oklahoma.Ward sat out the Lamar game two weeks ago to rest his shoulder after the victory over Oklahoma. But as Herman noted in his weekly press conference, this weeks opponent, Texas State (1-1), is not Lamar. Its a quality foe that the Cougars cant look past, so Ward will take it easier in practice during the week in order to be ready to go on Saturday.Hes one of the best competitors Ive ever been around, and hes taken a lot of big hits in his day, Herman said. Once he got hit in the shoulder, yeah it hurt, but did his arm fall off? No. Was he able to throw another pass? Yes. That kind of gave him some confidence, like hey what these doctors and coaches have been telling me is true.Ward, who owns a nations best streak of 16 straight wins as a starter, went through a full practice Sunday, including a 7-on-7 session that he threw a bunch and threw it well.Its a volume thing, not what kinds of throws, Herman added. If he feels like its too much then well settle down, and if he feels like he can handle it well give him everything he can handle.It will be a challenging week for the Cougars, and not just because Texas State opened with a victory over Ohio before dropping a decision to Arkansas. Former Houston director of football recruiting Adrian Mayes is now the offensive line coach for coach Everett Withers at Texas State.That will be a big challenge for us, Herman said. We are having to change every signal, call and check. We are trying to get ready to win a game, and yet we are having to spend this amount of time to mask what we are doing. Its not a matter of only changing the plays. Its a matter of what we are calling our plays, how we are communicating and signaling them.Herman and Withers have their own history together, at previous coaching stops at Texas and Ohio State.(We worked together) two years (at Ohio State), and way back when I was a graduate assistant at Texas he was a DB coach there, Herman said. I consider him a close friend. My wife and his wife are really close friends. They got to know each other quite a bit in Columbus and continue to talk to this day. We were excited when Everett got the opportunity to move back to the great state of Texas and excited to see him off to a good start.Texas State opened the season and the Withers era with a 56-54 triple overtime win at Ohio. The Bobcats fell behind 35-0 at halftime in an eventual 42-3 loss at Arkansas last week.Although Ward gets most of the national attention, Houstons defense has been a major reason for the hot start. 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Collaros, 25, was solid last season, posting a 5-2 record as the starter while incumbent Ricky Ray was injured. Collaros also started Torontos 23-20 regular-season finale loss to Montreal — Ray didnt dress because the Argos had already clinched first in the East Division — but was one of three quarterbacks to play that day. Brandon McCarthy Jersey . Sulaiman, 44, was chosen unanimously Tuesday in a vote by the leadership, the World Boxing Council said. Sulaiman becomes the sixth president of the organization. RIO DE JANEIRO -- Go to bed, my grandmother implored. It is late, and these Olympics are very far away.I was 6 years old, a boy in working-class Sao Paulo already obsessed with the Olympics, staying up to watch the 1988 Games in Seoul, South Korea. Grandmother Lazinha -- we called her Zica -- was right. It was indeed late for a kid. But what she also meant, I understand now, was that no one living in the Brazil of those days was expected to go very far. Nor was my homeland itself.Now the games are here, and with that debut comes a renewed sense of possibility and hope -- a feeling that perhaps Brazil has finally arrived. Yes, there is economic and political turmoil, Zika, crime and the many other blemishes outsiders see. But for us brasileiros, hosting the games itself is like winning gold. As one volunteer, an unemployed engineer, said to me after the opening ceremony: We can do great things here, too.It wasnt always that way.As I watched my first Olympics on TV, Brazil suffered even more than it does now. There was hyperinflation, with everyday items costing up to 600 percent of their worth. After decades of military dictatorship, we had returned to civilian leadership but under an unpopular president we blamed for the economic crisis.A renowned economist referred to us as Belindia, a country where the rich lived like those in prosperous Belgium and the poor like the worst off in India. And yet ... we have always been far more complex, and better, than that.Flash forward to 1992. Im 10. The Olympics were in Barcelona that year and still a personal obsession as I began to dream of a career as a journalist like my uncle. At home in Brazil, my mother was a maid. And a manicurist. And a door-to-door saleswoman. The state school I attended in the South Zone of Sao Paulo was not that bad, but others in the same region were more a territory for gangs than places for learning. Brazil was still stumbling.That year, our Congress impeached President Fernando Collor over a money-for-influence scheme. Protesters then, like now, took to the streets to demand an end to government corruption. Those Olympics in Spain were truly a world away for us. With inflation still high, my mother would run to the supermarket each payday to stock up on supplies for the month, not knowing if the cost of milk might skyrocket the very next day.In those next few years, change did come. Brazil adopted a new currency and an economic plan that brought some stabilization and growth.By the time the Atlanta Games opened in 1996, my family had saved so much that we started a little restaurant near Rio de Janeiro. College, and my dreams of reporting, seemed closer. When Sydney played Olympic host in 2000, I was teaching English and taking a college preparatory course. Two years later, I managed to enter a good private university. Then came Athens in 2004, and the chance at a sports internship that included a special assignment: Helping to cover the Olympics from afar.From 2004 to 2008, Brazil improved so much that we started feeling overconfident. Social programs and a minimum wage policy dragged tens of millions out of poverty. We felt as if we were abbout to become a global player.ddddddddddddAmid a commodities boom, we spent big on flat-screen TVs, cars and expensive vacations. Lost your job? You could get another quickly.Thats what led me to wave goodbye to steady work and pay my own way to Beijing for the Summer Games of 2008. I wasnt even accredited to cover sports, so instead I wrote about protests and Brazilian spectators as a freelancer. All I wanted was to tick that box and tell my grandmother that the Olympics were indeed far, but I could now go there. And so I did.It only really sank in that I was at the Olympics the night Usain Bolt won gold in the 100 meters, setting a world record. I was in an area of Beijing called Sanlitun, and I celebrated with fans from all nations. In a way, that seemed to be what the Olympics are all about: an excuse to bring different people together.When I returned home, the global economic crisis began and Brazil, like everyone else, was hit -- although not nearly as hard as others. When the world sneezed, Brazil usually caught pneumonia. Now the world had pneumonia, and Brazil only a cold.Another remarkable thing happened that year: Rio de Janeiro was picked as a finalist to host the 2016 Olympics, alongside Chicago, Tokyo and Madrid. In modern times, Brazil had bid -- and lost out -- on the games three other times, for 2000, 2004 and 2012. We Brazilians never thought we really had a shot, especially against President Barack Obamas city of Chicago.So on Oct. 2, 2009, when then-IOC President Jacques Rogge opened the envelope and the card inside read Rio de Janeiro, back in my newsroom in Sao Paulo I yelled: YEAH!Because I walked the same rocky but successful path of so many Brazilians of my generation, I never felt that the International Olympic Committee was making a concession when it awarded the games to Rio. We did not get this honor because the IOC took pity on us. It was a deserved victory for a country that was more promising then than it is now. As a nation, Brazil should have the opportunity to show our rise, resilience and, yes, the shortcomings that remain.Friday night, when the fireworks went off and the games of the 31st Olympiad were declared open, I saw it all from the press box -- where I helped write the story of the first Olympic opening ceremony in my beloved Brazil. I felt proud, but tense. I wanted us to put on a good show. We didnt hide our flaws even as we exhibited what we do best through our love of music and dance, and in the message about our environment.Brazil celebrated the Olympics as it needs to be celebrated.My grandmother did not live to see the games come to our native soil, but I am sure that if she were here, shed smile knowing that the Olympics are no longer so very far, and that Brazilians like me helped make faraway so close.---Mauricio Savarese is an Associated Press reporter who writes about politics, crime and, yes, sports. He is a native of Sao Paulo, based now in Rio de Janeiro. 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