More Clues from Saturday's Media Day

As we Lehigh fans get more clues on what our football team may be like in 2006, this picture to my left seems to show something: #11, senior ILB Travis Stinson, isn't fighting for a job - he's pencilled in. After the first scrimmage of 2006 this past weekend, some more answers... and more questions.

Announcing media day this year were three online articles, one from LehighSports.com, one from the Morning Call and one from the Express-Times. (There's a nice photo gallery as well from Media Day on the school website - but you may want to ask coach Coen why Kevin Ackler, Brannan Thomas, Greg Fay and Lee Thomas are *gasp* sitting down in their respective shots... a little winded, are we, from the picture-taking?)

Nothing really new enough to warrant a press mash-up, but there are some interesting developments to take note:

* The big bombshell from the Morning Call is that senior DT Royce Morgan is going through "personal and academic issues", and his status is uncertain. Of course we're all pulling for Royce to get through, but the prospect of having a 255 lb gap in the defensive line is one I'd rather not face. Coach Coen did single out DL Erik Rakus for praise, however, so it looks to me like he will get the nod at NT. His role will increase if Morgan is unable to play.

* Senior DB(/LB?) Rusty Campion appears to be impressing in camp, with a stint with the first-team offense on Saturday. Also catching coach Coen's eye are DBs Aaron Gilliard and Daynin Blake. It's got to be good news that we have plenty of depth throughout our secondary. I think Campion will be getting more looks through practice...

* The Morning Call said that senior CB Brannan Thomas was still recovering from a separated shoulder, but it sure didn't look like it from the media day photos....

* Junior OL Ben Caffery had a major knee injury, with early returns showing he could be out 4-6 weeks. A terrible blow to a good kid who was looking at a backup tackle role.

* Our three RBs - senior RB marques Thompson, sophomore RB Matt McGowan and junior RB Josh Pastore all look very good. I still think creative ways will need to be devised to get the ball in the hands of all three guys. All looked great Saturday from all reports.

* P/K Jason Leo is getting high marks both with a strong and accurate leg.

* Is "Air Lehigh" finished? There were no "wristbands" at practice with the complicated Lehigh aerial attack from years past. As of yet, there's no real "burner" on the edge like WR Gerran "G" Walker. Though I like the new emphasis on running, will the passing game be the same again?

I think the real unwritten story this offseason is that last point - the possibility that Air Lehigh will be grounded in 2006. Are we seeing a run-first mentality? No more hurry-up offense? No more complicated spread shotgun formations? All key questions in face of Lehigh's home opener September 2nd, now a scant 12 days away.

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....

UMass 21, Lafayette 14, halftime

Are you watching this game? UMass had this game under control until about 3 minutes in the second quarter, and then got an interception, converted for a TD. Then the Leopards forced a fumble off the return, and then converted THAT for a TD, making this a game. It's on CN8. You really should be watching this.

Examining A Figure Skating Rivalry: Tonya and Nancy

It must be very hard for a millennial to understand the fuss around the Nancy Kerrigan and Tonya Harding figure skating scandal in the run-up to the 1994 Olympics. If you're of a certain age, though - whether you're a figure skating fan or not, and I am decidedly no fan of figure skating - the Shakespearean story of Harding and Kerrigan still engages, and still grabs peoples' attention, twenty years later. Why, though? Why, twenty years later, in a sport I care little, does the story still grab me? Why did I spend time out of my life watching dueling NBC and ESPN documentaries on the subject, and Google multiple stories about Jeff Gilooly , idiot "bodyguards", and the whole sordid affair? I think it's because the story, even twenty years later, is like opium. The addictive story, even now, has everything. Everything. The woman that fought for everything, perhaps crossing over to the dark side to get her chance at Olypic Gold, vs. the woman who...

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