Lehigh Football Nation

The Patriot League only managed to win two out of their five Ivy League matchups this week, with Fordham and Colgate winning over two Ivy teams picked in the preseason to finish in the lower half of the league. Colgate was tied 20-20 with Dartmouth at the end of the 3rd quarter before pulling away for a 34-20 victory, while Fordham had to rally with 2 touchdowns in the final quarter to eke a 29-22 victory over Columbia in the annual "Liberty Cup". Bucknell was unable to squeak out a victory over Cornell in a 21-20 defeat, who was picked to finish fifth in the Ivy League, and Holy Cross and Georgetown, respectively, fell to the two teams picked to vie for the Ivy League title: Harvard (losing 25-24) and Yale (losing 47-7). What might be even more revealing, however, was how the three Ivy League games that didn't involve the Patriot League went. Brown beat Stony Brook 17-7, a team that pounded Colgate 42-26 the first weekend of the year. Princeton actually led at Johnso...

I realized just today (on Lehigh's bye week, unsurprisingly) that I've neglected to make Patriot League picks for the first three weeks of the year. This is largely because I've been such a maniac in doing stuff for the College Sporting News , this blog, Facebook , and (oh yeah) the rest of my life, too. (You should see my garage.) But for those of you that are unaware I write the CSN Way at the College Sporting News, and I make picks over there. This week I pick several games in my regular CSN Way column , and I'll reprint them here for everyone's enjoyment. And I'll add in exclusive coverage of the other games this week. (Besides, I made the poll over there picking how the Patriot League will do this weekend, so I'd better be honest and say what I think too, eh?) For those that care, I'm 4-3 on the year in Patriot League games so far. Holy Cross at Harvard. Holy Cross quarterback Dominic Randolph won’t have Harvard’s Stephen Williams to pick on ...

For the second straight week it was not much of a contest: you, the fans, picked senior LB Tim Diamond in a landslide as LFN Readers' "Player of the Week". (Full disclosure: he was my pick of the week, too.) You're not alone, either: the Patriot League also game Diamond Patriot League Defensive Player of the Week honors as well for his 14 tackle performance against Villanova. It's hard to see what more he could have contributed with 14 tackles (including an eye-popping 10 solo stops), 1 1/2 tackles for loss, an interception, a pass break-up and (oh by the way) a strip of Villanova RB Aaron Ball which he recovered and returned to the 1 yard line, setting up Lehigh's first touchdown on the day. This week, game balls go to: Readers' Choice: Senior LB Tim Diamond Offense: Senior WR Sekou Yansane (5 receptions, 47 yards, 1 TD) Defense: Junior LB Matt Cohen (5 tackles, 2 tackles for loss, 1 sack, two big tackles to stuff 4th down conversion and big 3rd do...

(Photo Credit: Jonathan Wilson, The Philadelphia Inquirer) The press links are all in on last week's game, as well as exclusive photos from The College Sporting News ' own Mark Campbell on the 33-14 defeat to a team that reminds me of the world's most beloved ice cream flavor. Lehigh Athletics: No. 21 Wildcats hand Lehigh first setback of 2008 "We talked a lot about overcoming adversity and dealing with challenges, and I think our defense epitomized that today," Lehigh head coach Andy Coen said afterwards. "The defense was out there for 82 snaps, on a hot day, and I think they competed tremendously and kept us in this football game." He went onto say, "I think our kids competed well today, and that's a great start. We played a great football team and certainly made our share of mistakes, but now we'll go forward from here." Philadelphia Inquirer: Opportunistic defense helps Villanova win Young, a junior who suffered a season-ending ...

When my family and I left Villanova on Saturday, I left with more questions than answers. While I still overall feel sophomore QB J.B. Clark will grow into his job as Lehigh's quarterback and overall I am still bullish on Lehigh's chances in the Patriot League this year, I still sometimes look at that glass and see it as half empty rather than half full. But the reason I feel that way is not specific to Lehigh football in general. It's something else. Every Sunday night I go through my tasks and work on ranking my Top 25 for the upcoming polls. As a national writer, I am a voter in multiple polls and I try to do the work to truly represent the FCS landscape as I see it. What I generally do is I rank the Top 20 more or less how I feel they actually are nationally and then use 21-25 to put some of my "stretch picks" - the Albany's, the Stony Brook's, the Liberty's - that I'm keeping an eye on for the future and deserve some recognition. I also g...