Is it Lauren's year?

This may finally be the year that the WB's "Gilmore Girls" breaks through with an Emmy nomiation, according to Tom O'Neil, who lives the trophy life on his Gold Derby website.

As you may know, the nomination process for Emmys was changed this year to allow more peer review. An interim step was added that will whittle a finalists' list of 10-15 per category down to the requisite five. And according to a rumor sheet posted by O'Neil, Lauren Graham of "Gilmore" as well as Kirsten Bell of UPN's "Veronica Mars" are on the finalists' list. Won't know if they make the top five till next Thursday.

The Emmys are early this year -- August 27, so NBC won't have to pre-empt "Sunday Night Football."