Skip to main content

Patriot League Media Day Q&A: Keith Sherman and Nigel Muhammad

On Wednesday at Patriot League Media Day, I sat down with two senior co-captains, senior RB Keith Sherman and senior LB Nigel Muhammad, and talked to them about the upcoming season.

It's a credit to Lehigh that year in and year out the expectations are so high.  This season, Lehigh was picked a very close second, right behind defending champions Colgate.

What's sort of odd about that is only Nigel, and senior OL Ned Daryoush, made the first team all-Patriot list, yet they still were picked second.

What did Keith and Nigel have to say about that?


LFN: Were you surprised that Lehigh was picked second in the league this year?

Senior LB Nigel Muhammad: It's not really surprising to us.  We know we have a lot of expectations, it's kind of a regular thing for us.   we let the coaches and the media look at that stuff.  But for us, we've had the same message since Day One.  That started the day after we lost to Colgate.  We've had our motto since the start of the offseason last year.  Regardless of where we're ranked in the preseason, we're going to get after it.

Senior RB Keith Sherman: Every year there's one champion, and no matter where you're ranked, everyone's going after that one championship shot.  Polls are good for the outsiders, but at the end of the day all teams are going to be competing for that one championship.  I think that's going to speak more than just polls.

LFN: The disappointment of a 10-1 season last season: does the bitterness of that carry over in any way to this year?

NM: We definitely use that as motivation.  With a 10-1 record, we definitely felt like we should have made it.  But regardless, if you win the Patriot League, you don't have any worries about making it or not.  That's always our goal.  Also, this year we want to make it clear that we don't just want to win the Patriot League championship.  We want more than that. We want to be champs at the national level, shooting high to compete for a national title.  That's our motto and that's our goal for the team.

KS: The way last season ended wasn't the best, obviously.  We always have a lot of high expectations.  It's always our goal every year to win a Patriot League title.  Last year, we had a great season.  We were kind of disappointed of course that we didn't make the playoffs, but we had an opportunity to have an automatic bid, and we didn't make it.   But that's why we have a new year to compete, because we know that opportunity is there, and we're going to whatever we can to make it this year.

NM: "No Opportunities Wasted."  That's our motto.

LFN: Keith, you're going to be lining up with your third starting quarterback in the last four years.  Is that a tough adjustment for you?

KS: I don't think so.  I know that our coaches [Andy Coen and Dave Cecchini] will put together a gameplan that maximizes our abilities on the offense.  Whether it's a running quarterback like QB Mike Colvin was or more of a pocket passer like QB Chris Lum, there was a gameplan that matches them.  Whomever it's going to be this year, it's going to be a great game plan.  We're going to be in a position to win games.

LFN: Keith, do you see your role being basically the same as it was?

KS: This year, just because the new QB isn't going to have had as much experience as Chris or Mike, I think I might have an expanded role.  I might carry the ball a lot more than in years past.  But I think at the end of the day whatever game plan the coaches come up with, I'll just do my part, and help the team win.

LFN: How did you hear about Lehigh initially?

KS: I had a friend in high school whose older brother who went to Lehigh.  But I didn't know much about it.  Coach Sawyer same and visited me junior year, but I didn't think much of it then since I was being recruited by bigger schools.  Senior year, though, I got injured, and Lehigh was still there.  I came and visited and I absolutely loved the campus, I felt great with the team, felt great with the coaching staff, and I think it's one of the best decisions I've ever made, going to this University.

NM: [Then] coach Matt Sanders came to my high school and started to talk to me.  I hadn't really heard of Lehigh, it was kind of vague to me then, but I had heard of Lafayette somewhere in that area.  I remember Lafayette coming there and not really giving me the time...  but then Lehigh came in and talked to me, and then I talked to my mom the next day, we looked it up and saw how good of a school it was.  They were very interested and they were one of the top schools.  I took my visit, and I loved my visit.

LFN: Tell me a little about your role on the defense.

NM: Defensively, our goal is simple, to hold them to zero points.  If we do that, it doesn't matter really who our starting quarterback is, we feel like we're getting the job done.  At the beginning of the year we might be leaned on more, our expectation is always to shut the other team out.  That's our goal.

LFN: Last year there was an adjustment with the transition to co-defensive coordinators, Donnie Roberts and Gerard Wilcher.  Will it be smoother this year?

NM: To an extent.  The coordinators are the same but we still have changing from within.  Coach Sanders, he went to UAB, so coaches come and go, so as players, we're kind of used to that.  It's really about the players, and playing together.

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.