Skip to main content

FCS Playoffs and Some Basketball Notes

The FCS playoffs, second round, have started. My predictions are posted on the College Sporting News website, which you can check here. The big upset prediction? Southern Illinois upsetting Montana. As for TV, you can watch New Hampshire at UMass on CN8 (or watch it live here), and at 4PM on ESPN2 you can watch Montana State get hammered by Applachian State. (Well, that's what I think will happen.)

The Lehigh Women's basketball team is currently on a swing through Ohio. After losing last night to powerful Ohio University 57-40, the Lady Hawks have fallen to a disappointing 2-5 after a 2-0 start (including a surprising win over Syracuse of the Big East). Hopefully 1-5 Akron will prove to be a good chance for a win, whose only win came over Binghamton this year, but the Lady Hawks will have to overcome some woeful shooting from the past few games to get this thing turned around.

Predictably, the men dismantled D-III Swarthmore 96-33, which stopped a three-game slide to Quinnipiac (who almost upset UConn earlier this year), Harvard, and Notre Dame. The game against the Fightin' Irish was a close affair that the troops really wanted for coach Taylor, which hopefully will turn into some positive momentum into December. A win tonight against Central Conneticut State would really get some positive momentum for the 3-6 Mountain Hawks going into the "real season". Surprisingly, Bucknell has struggled somewhat at 2-6 while Army has surprised a 5-2. I'm used to Army not eclipsing the 5 win barrier all year, so it looks like a wide-open race this year. The team to beat in the early going? 6-1 Holy Cross.

Finally, Lehigh's wrestlers beat Drexel and hopefully have put their early-season struggles behind them. At 3-3, there's lots to still get excited about.

Comments

Anonymous said…
I think that Lafayette and Lehigh have played the toughest schedules of PL Mens BB this season.
Lehigh played Oregon, Portland St., CS Northridge, N. Dame and Harvard.
The N. Dame game was a quality loss, if you can call any loss quality.
Lafayette has played Indiana (leading 1/2 way through the 2nd half before getting blown away), Notre Dame, Miami (FL), St. Joes and Princeton. The Princeton game being a quality loss.

Army and Navy have not beaten or played competitvely with ANY quality teams yet. Certainly better than your typical Army or Navy teams of recent history but not a threat yet. HC played well against Syracuse and beat Harvard soundly but their other games have been against weaker teams.

The only quality win for a PL team this season was yesterday's upset of George Mason by Bucknell.
Bucknell is still the team to beat in the PL.
Anonymous said…
I agree with Bucknell being the team to beat. But, Lehigh has not played the hardest schedule. Bucknell has played the hardest schedule which includes Albany, UNI, George Mason, St Joes, Penn St, Wake Forest. Lehigh will at best finish 3rd. Holy Cross v. Bucknell will be the title again once again. I think we should keep this blog going with other Lehigh sports over the "off" season.
Anonymous said…
i'm still waiting for your all patriot-league post.
Anonymous said…
I would unequivocally state Indiana, Notre Dame, St. Joes, Miami (FL) and Princeton is a tougher schedule than Albany, UNI, George Mason, St Joes, Penn St, Wake Forest.

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.