Q & A with... Lehigh DB Brendan VanAckeren

We start out the blog with my interviews of the Lehigh football players at Media Day this past week. First up: senior DB Brendan VanAckeren, senior leader on the defense - and someone who loves to hit.

LFN: Tell me a little bit about your high school career. You're from this area, right?

BVA: I went to Liberty High School here in Bethlehem, and I've been here all my life. I was always a Lehigh guy growing up - I was always kind of around the program, seeing it in the paper and all that, so it was good how it all turned out. I had some close family friends that played for Lehigh, so they took me to games over there and I had a good idea of what it was about. I had been to the Lehigh/Lafayette game a couple of years before I came here, which was also a big draw.

When I got into my junior and senior year of high school, when I got into the recruiting process, I got over to Lehigh, loved the coaches, loved the players, and the whole academic/athletic [balance]. It was definitely a great fit, I'm very glad I ended up at Lehigh. I've enjoyed my three years here (going onto the fourth), so I'm just trying to make the most of my last year.

It's great having known about Lehigh and then to become a part of it, just to experience everything that the community has. It's been a great ride so far. Lehigh and the rivalry, it doesn't get much better than that.

LFN: Do you think it's different for Lehigh players who haven't spent their whole life in this area knowing about Lehigh?

BVA: They definitely have a different perspective. My freshman roomate was from Austin, Texas, who hadn't heard about Lehigh until they called him the fall of his senior year, a situation where he didn't know about Lehigh until the whole recruiting process. They're coming into a whole new culture. I knew what I was getting into, I knew the whole community around me, and I had friends at school that I grew up with.

You really see the differences freshman year when everyone comes from different backgrounds, but by the time you're a junior or senior you see everyone's become acclimated to it. Everyone's been on campus for years, and everyone feels the same way and has had the same experience.

LFN: Are you excited about the defense this year?

BVA: Yes, very excited. I know were return most of our front seven. We return a couple of new faces in the secondary, but overall I feel we should be very strong. Our linebackers are as good as they get. I feel we can do a lot of great things out on the field to help the team win.

LFN: What's your leadership style?

BVA: I lead more by example, trying to put everyone in positions and making sure everyone's doing their assignment every play. If I'm not the one making the play, helping them so they can. And then, just trying to be around the ball as much as you can. That's where the plays happen, so I can make plays when I have the opportunity.

I'm more of a quiet leader. I get vocal when it's needed, but I definitely lead more by example.

LFN: You have to be itching to beat Lafayette...

BVA: Absolutely. It's been four years in a row now. I know the class last year, it killed them knowing they went their entire career without beating them. We're in a similar situation coming into this year. It's about time we make that happen and we're very excited for that game. It's a great game to play, a lot of fun and a lot at stake. This year, we're hoping to be at the other end of it.

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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