"I haven't told this to anybody," she says. "At least not anybody in the media."

Yes? "It's such a big deal for me to sit in the big-girl chair on College GameDay. It's a pinch-yourself moment."

Oh. Andrews debuts Saturday as one of the anchors for the first hour of GameDay, which this year starts an hour earlier, at 9 a.m. ET on ESPNU, and shifts to its traditional slot on ESPN, at 10 a.m. On ESPN, Andrews will continue to appear on-air as a reporter, including having a feature on Texas quarterback Garrett Gilbert and his coach, Mack Brown.

Her role is part of her new ESPN deal, which will include what she says will be some "serious features" on ABC's Good Morning America. Andrews, who says she'd get in the crowd hours early when the show visited Florida's campus when she was a student there, says she told ESPN higher-ups during contract talks that "you need to know how much this show means to me."

In Atlanta at the site of the LSU-North Carolina game Saturday, the outdoor show known for drawing thousands of onlookers likely will be mobbed given that Andrews is probably more famous than anybody she'll interview. She was a sort of Internet It Girl even before drawing unwanted headlines for being stalked by a peeper — then was a finalist this year on ABC's Dancing With the Stars.

During that dance-athon, she got encouraging tweets from sportsmen such as Kentucky men's basketball coach John Calipari, cycling's Lance Armstrong and her Saturday interview subject — Texas' Brown. "Women never cared much about me until that show. But that demographic grew during Dancing. I was no longer the girl on ESPN, or the girl who had that thing happen to me. I'd be in airports and malls and woman would say, 'I voted for you.' Hysterical."

Upcoming Dancing contestants, announced this week, include ex-NBA player Rick Fox and Kurt Warner, the ex-NFL quarterback who'll be a rookie Fox NFL game analyst this season. Both, she predicts, "will make it to the end," although Warner's "itty-bitty" partner will present a challenging height differential. But she's talked to Warner and he's "already putting his shoulders back and walking differently" to prepare — "and he's such a good-looking guy that moms are going to love him."

TV football has come a long way from the days of, say, Keith Jackson.