Had a fun interruption during halftime of Thursday's USF-Rutgers game: actor Mark Consuelos, one of USF's most recognizable alums from a pop-culture standpoint, had wanted to say hi while stopping in the press box.

We'd done a note on Consuelos a few weeks back, and he was amusingly honest about being a bandwagon fan -- USF didn't have football when he finished his college years there in the early 90s. Thursday gave him his first chance to watch the Bulls in person, attending with Jim Ornstein, a Rutgers alum and the agent for Consuelos' wife, actress Kelly Ripa. (I forget to check "Live with Regis and Kelly" this morning to see if she mentioned the game).

Give Consuelos credit -- he wore a dark green "FINISH STRONG" shirt in the middle of a red Rutgers section. He e-mailed me a great cellphone photo he took during the game -- that's Ornstein on the right ("He's keeping me safe over there," Consuelos said.) Anyway, just thought he was a good example of how USF's success in the past month has them reaching out to new fans, even within their own alumni base.

You can juxtapose Consuelos with the person generally offered as USF's most recognizable non-sports alum, comedian Gallagher, who was actually in New Jersey this weekend for a show. He declined to be interviewed through his publicists, who said he isn't a sports fan and didn't want to talk about USF's football team. I offered to talk to him solely about USF as a university whose exposure is growing nationally, but haven't heard back on that request.