Lehigh Football Nation

I didn't watch this game yet. It's likely I'll be watching it at some point tomorrow - all I have seen is the box score as of this point. I was at the 37-7 drubbing for Fordham by Columbia instead. But that won't stop me from making a few observations. 1) Now, Bucknell (very surprisingly) is beating Cornell right now 20-3, but the Ivies spanked us this week. At best the Patriot League will be 2-5 against the Ivies. Guess what that means? The Patriot League, as a whole, is simply not a great league this year. Look at the facts. Two wins against lower-tier Ivy teams. One A-10 victory by Lehigh against Villanova who is now sitting at 0-3. The PL will have (at best) six out of conference wins. One against 0-3 Villanova, three NEC wins, and (at best) two weak Ivy wins. We are going to be a one-bid conference come playoff time, and that team will probably be playing Thanksgiving weekend at New Hampshire. 2) I was trying to say that Princeton is a good team. Unfortu...

I'm undecided as to whether to keep this "Water Cooler" graphic to your left. Maybe it's because I've worked for too many large companies in my time, but there's something about it that reminds me of "harassment training". ("Is Bill is making unwanted advances towards Candy by asking her to see his coffee cup collection in his cubicle tonight?") Anyway, if you're seeing this graphic it must mean that it's "Friday Water Cooler" time, where we make one last go-around the picks of the week, last-minute news about Lehigh/Princeton, my plans, and maybe even a joke about Kanye West. Kanye, Where Are Ye? The answer to that is: Touring with the Stones. That's right, the Rolling Stones . (Brought to you by Cialis and Lipitor.) Hard to understand the motivation behind this. Trying to get break into that "white 50-and-over" market? Granted, the Stones somehow (inexplicably) still sell out concerts, so it is a moneymaker...

Has it really been two weeks since the season has started? In ways, it feels like two whole seasons have past us. With the rollercoaster ride of emotions the past two weeks, we now see our beloved Hawks return home to enter into the part of their schedule where we challenge the best teams the Ivy League has to offer. This week, it's the Princeton Tigers playing in their opener. I won't be at this game or blogging about it since I'm going to be covering the Fordham/Columbia game for I-AA.org that day. I thought it appropriate with the 5th anniversary of 9/11 that I finally go see what the "Liberty Cup" is all about. (On a related note, my piece on 9/11 and I-AA was just published on I-AA.org, that goes into the history of the Liberty Cup and how 9/11 affected some of the schools in the area.) Rest assured, though, I'm going to watch the replay of the game online and weigh in Saturday night with my thoughts. (Ah, the magic of the internet.) Lehigh brings a ton o...

We're going to permit ourselves one little look back on the "week that was" before devoting ourselves 100% to the upcoming game at home versus Princeton. Namely, a quick look at the press roundup, a distribution of game balls (trust me, there will be plenty), and maybe a word about Atlantic 10 TV coverage. Reality TV Even though I'm a Mountain Hawk fan (and unashamed to admit it), when I do my pieces here and on I-AA.org I believe I go to pains to give respect to the opposing teams in regards to their ability. If Albany makes good plays, I'll say it. If Lafayette has good players, I'll say it. I *will* call announcers out when I see that Lehigh doesn't get the respect. And I felt like CN8's TV coverage of Lehigh didn't really give it to the Hawks until about 3:00 left in the game with a 31-28 lead. Only semi-joking yesterday I mentioned the following (paraphrased) typical exchange on CN8: Announcer #1: Oh my GAWD, Lehigh looks like they're goin...

Well, kids, this weekend we didn't only learn coach Coen's message to the team this week, we also learned about the strange world of I-AA football. Coach Coen's pregame speech this Saturday involved trust. Trust in each other, trust in the program, trust in the coaching staff and everything will turn out alright. Awfully hard to argue against it last week. As a result, Lehigh got the sort of big-ticket win they have been looking for with a 31-28 win over Villanova, where a lot of kids did a lot of things right. It was far from perfect, but coming back from three deficits and coming on top showed a lot. A lot. The CN8 announcers were thinking Villanova would blow them out midway through the second quarter - Lehigh proved them wrong. Elsewhere around I-AA, we also learned to trust that it's early in the year, and strange things happen in college football. Fordham, who looked so bad against Monmouth in Week 1, turned around and beat Albany, who beat us last week. (...