Skip to main content

Two Deep For Villanova... Released

Well, well. Before I could try to predict Lehigh's two-deep on the year, the game notes for the Villanova game came out and beat me to the punch.

Interestingly, the "injury report" has been removed from the game notes, so it's hard to figure out who might be starting due to injury and who isn't. But without any further ado, it's time to print out the starting two-deep and to show how the starting lineup was different than mine (the differences are highlighted)

QB: Sedale Threatt (Sr.), Chris Bokosky (So.)
RB: Josh Pastore (Jr.), Kwesi Kankam (Fr.)
FB: Adam Watson (Jr.), John Piascik (Sr.)
LT: Jimmy Kehs (Sr.), Frank Giacalone (So.)
LG: Chris Tiefenthal (Jr.),Ricky Clerge-Appolon (Fr.)
C: John Reese (Sr.), Ben Harden (So.)
RG: Ben Caffery (Sr.), William Rackley (Fr.)
RT: Kevin Bayani (Jr.), Alex Kuziel (Jr.)
TE: Joe Sutherland (Sr.), Troy Healion (Jr.)
WR1: Sekou Yansane (Jr.), Pete Donchez (Sr.)
WR2: Mike Fitzgerald (Jr.), Nick Johnson (Jr.)

DT: Kyle Adams (Jr.), Paul Bode (Jr.)
NT: B.J. Benning (So.), Joe Dancho (So.)
DT: Brian Jackson (Jr.), Jon Warren (Jr.)
LOLB: Matt Cohen (So.), Tobi Showunmi (So.)
LILB: Tim Diamond (Jr.), Travis Stinson (Sr.)
RILB: Rashaun Gasaway (Sr.), Bradley Thomas (Jr.)
ROLB: Heath Brickner (So.), Justin Weaver (Sr.)
CB: Brannan Thomas (Sr.), Julian Ahye (Sr.)
FS: Ernest Moore (Sr.), Brendan VanAckeren (Jr.)
SS: Daynin Blake (Sr.), Quadir Carter (Jr.)
CB: Aaron Gilliard (Sr.), Laquan Gasaway (Sr.)

KR: Brannan Thomas (Sr.), John Kennedy (Fr.)
PR: Brannan Thomas (Sr.)
P/K: Jason Leo (Jr.), Tom Randazza (Fr.)

You'll just have to trust me that this is who I picked. I'm real happy I managed to pick the starting four on the linebacking unit, which was excruciatingly hard. This leads to my "five observations" on the two-deep for Satruday and my initial thoughts:

  1. Our linebacking unit seems talented and deep - these seem like awfully tough choices for these four positions since there's a lot of good players to choose from. I'm wondering if coach Coen will rotate a bunch of linebackers in the game to keep them fresh, which (if true) is very good news for sophomore LB Tobi Showunmi, senior LB Travis Stinson, senior LB Justin Weaver and junior LB Bradley Thomas. (Not to mention the guys just off that chart as well, like senior LB Rusty Campion and sophomore LB Al Pierce (who I had picked in my two-deep).
  2. There is an incredible amount of freshmen on this two-deep. Count 'em: seven on the list if you count special teams players like RS John Kennedy, P/K Tom Randazza, LS Brad Walter and holder J.B. Clark. I have never seen so many freshmen on a Lehigh opening roster.
  3. Is junior RB Matt McGowan hurt? I was very surprised to see freshman RB Kwesi Kankam on the opening-day depth chart since I thought that either McGowan or senior RB Richard Forman would be available. As it turns out, we may get to see exactly how good this freshman is sooner rather than later.
  4. I was glad to see senior OL Ben Caffery make the final starting "O" line, with coach Coen going with senior OL Jimmy Kehs and junior OL Kevin Bayani as bookend tackles. This looks like it's one of the beefiest Lehigh "O" lines I've seen. Have we ever had a pair of 300 lb bookends before?
  5. Two switches in places in the depth chart that I had reversed were interesting: senior SS Daynin Blake won the starting job over junior SS Quadir Carter, and senior TE Joe Sutherland won out over junior TE Troy Healion. It looks like coach Coen took senior experience and leadership when the race was close.
As I'm extremely pumped for the season, look for my Villanova/Lehigh preview on Thursday this week. I plan to have my previews out on Thursday (well, as long as I have a Wednesday deadline for my FCS picks for College Sporting News), and my picks on the rest of the Patriot League on Friday. And of course, over the weekend I'll be talking about the games as well.

Comments

Anonymous said…
what is the status of Mcgowan 9-24-07

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.