Skip to main content

Catching up with QB Chris Lum Before Frisco

It's a few days before what could be a spectacular finale to senior QB Chris Lum's Lehigh football career.

This weekend, he's headed to Frisco, TX, where he will discover if he'll be Lehigh's first-ever winner of the Walter Payton award.

The Payton Award, offered by the Sports Network to the most valuable player in Division I Football Championship Subdivision, has been called the "Heisman Trophy" of FCS.

So what was the first thing he mentioned to me when I contacted him?

His grades from the past semester.

"I'm currently on winter break and my last exam of the semester was Dec. 20," was the first thing Chris told me by email.  "I just found out I earned a 3.92 GPA this past fall semester."

Of all the record-breaking football-related statistics he could have mentioned - 4,378 yards passing, 35 touchdowns, his 22-6 record as a starter - it's telling that the first thing he mentioned was his GPA.

Just another sign that we do things different in the Patriot League.

But that doesn't mean that he's any less proud of the achievements on the gridiron in the past couple of years, including the third and fourth straight wins over Lafayette, and winning back-to-back Patriot League championships with perfect Patriot League records.

"Last year was an awesome year and I'm very proud of what our team accomplished," he said.  "It's a great feeling to know my senior class helped bring this program back to where it belongs. We've been a part of the bad seasons of 5-6 and 4-7, and it feels good to leave our mark with what we've accomplished the last two years."

Outside the circle of the Patriot League, those accomplishments also included a 14-7 playoff victory against Northern Iowa, the Missouri Valley champion in 2010, and a thrilling 42-40 win over Towson, the CAA champion in 2011.

"I think this past season proved that we did have a lot of talent and could play with and beat some of the nation's best FCS teams, " he said. "We always thought we were the underdog, which gave us a lot of motivation to prove people wrong."

Along with all his team success came two single-season Patriot League records, completions (breaking the record held by Holy Cross QB Dominic Randolph) and passing yards (held by Towson QB Joe Lee, a record that seemed like it might never be broken).  He also beat Lehigh's single-season touchdown pass mark, previously owned by QB Glenn Kempa.

Since the end of last season - and after final exams, of course - Chris has been a lot of places, including his hometown in Michigan for Christmas, Florida, and New York City.  He'll head to Frisco, TX on Friday for the Walter Payton Award ceremony, and will stay to watch the national championship game at Pizza Hut Park on Saturday."

He's not rooting for one team or another, but he's expecting a great game.

He does, of course, know one of the teams playing in Frisco quite well.

North Dakota State was the team that ended Lehigh's run at the national championship with a very impressive 24-0 victory on December 10th - only 10 days before Chris' last final exam.

"North Dakota State was a very good team," he said.  "We found out right from the beginning that it was going to be a very physical, hard fought game. They brought a lot of pressure in a variety of ways. There was some disappointment in that game, but I know our players gave it all we had. Even if our performance and execution wasn't sound, we know we left it all out on the field."

After Frisco, he'll eventually return to Lehigh for classes to start on Jan. 16.   Chris has four classes remaining before he graduates on time in May - he didn't redshirt, as in the Patriot League the only way to get an extra year of eligibility is through medical hardship - and then he's looking to train to "go through the process of pursuing a professional team," as he puts it.

"I'm very excited and motivated to keep my football playing days alive and doing all that I can to make sure they do," he said.  "I took a couple weeks off after the season to heal up, but I am now beginning my pursuit to the NFL or possibly another professional league and have begun training."

As for the Payton award, what are his thoughts?

"I hope I win! The other two finalists are outstanding players and had outstanding seasons."

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

How The Ivy League Is Able To Break the NCAA's Scholarship Limits and Still Consider Themselves FCS

By now you've seen the results.  In 2018, the Ivy League has taken the FCS by storm. Perhaps it was Penn's 30-10 defeat of Lehigh a couple of weeks ago .  Or maybe it was Princeton's 50-9 drubbing of another team that made the FCS Playoffs last year, Monmouth.  Or maybe it was Yale's shockingly dominant 35-14 win over nationally-ranked Maine last weekend. The Ivy League has gone an astounding 12-4 so far in out-of-conference play, many of those wins coming against the Patriot League. But it's not just against the Patriot League where the Ivy League has excelled.  Every Ivy League school has at least one out-of-conference victory, which is remarkable since it is only three games into their football season.  The four losses - Rhode Island over Harvard, Holy Cross over Yale, Delaware over Cornell, and Cal Poly over Brown - were either close losses that could have gone either way or expected blowouts of teams picked to be at the bottom of the Ivy League. W

Made-Up Midseason Grades for Lehigh Football

 We are now officially midway through the 2023 Lehigh football season.  The Mountain Hawks sit at 1-5 overall, and 0-1 in the Patriot League. I thought I'd go ahead and make up some midseason grades, and set some "fan goals" for the second half. The 2023 Mountain Hawks were picked to finish fifth in the seven team Patriot League.  In order to meet or exceed that expectation, they'll probably have to go at least 3-2 the rest of the way in conference play.  Their remaining games are vs. Georgetown, at Bucknell, vs. Holy Cross, at Colgate, and vs. Lafayette in The Rivalry. Can they do it? Culture Changing: B+ .  I was there in the Bronx last week after the tough 38-35 defeat to Fordham, and there wasn't a single player emerging from the locker room that looked like they didn't care.  Every face was glum.  They didn't even seem sad.  More frustrated and angry. That may seem normal, considering the agonizing way the Mountain Hawks lost, but it was a marked chan

Fifteen Guys Who Might be Lehigh's Next Football Coach (and Five More)

If you've been following my Twitter account, you might have caught some "possibilities" as Lehigh's next head football coach like Lou Holtz, Brett Favre and Bo Pelini .  The chance that any of those three guys actually are offered and accept the Lehigh head coaching position are somewhere between zero and zero.  (The full list of my Twitter "possibilities" are all on this thread on the Lehigh Sports Forum .) However the actual Lehigh head football coaching search is well underway, with real names and real possibilities. I've come up with a list of fifteen possible names, some which I've heard whispered as candidates, others which might be good fits at Lehigh for a variety of reasons. UPDATE: I have found five more names of possible head coaches that I am adding to this list below. Who are the twenty people?  Here they are, in alphabetical order.