Lehigh Football Nation

"Oh, no!" If you heard the radio call by Matt Kerr, the voice of Lehigh on the radio (and you can still hear in on lehighsports.com ), his call summed it up best. Up 24-19 with under 10 seconds to play, at the Lehigh 20 yards line, all Lehigh needed to do is stop the Big Red for one play. One play. Never mind the play of sophomore QB J.B. Clark , who acquitted himself well in his third game as a starter. Never mind the play of the defense, which bended but didn't really break for thirty-three minutes and about thirty seconds of the thirty-three minutes and thirty-seven seconds that the Cornell offense had the ball. Never mind the punt returned for a touchdown by sophomore DB Jarard Cribbs at the end of the first half. Never mind any calls from the referee. Never mind the disorganization on special teams at the end of the first half that led to the missed extra point. Never mind the fumble. Never mind the good, or the bad. It comes down to one play. One play to learn ...

Before I get into my Patriot League picks, admit it: this is a great weekend for the water cooler. There's simply so much to talk about. Want to talk playoff baseball? (Well, maybe not if you're from New York.) Want to talk about Patriot League football weekend matchups? (Well, maybe not if you're from New York.) Want to talk NFL? (Okay, you got me there.) In addition to the always-full buffet of weekend sports in the fall, there was something equally as fascinating last night: the vice-presidential debates. Admit it; you watched them. There were 70 million viewers of the vice-presidential debate yesterday. Don't cha know. You betcha. I talked about them with my family at the kitchen table, wondering how we're going to pay the heating bills this winter. But we'll be OK. We're mavericks; and we'll get extra credit for watching them. too. If the rest of America is like me, I didn't watch the debates out of any civic duty. The issues? Do...

(Photo Credit: Cornell Athletics) This weekend, Lehigh is celebrating Young Alumni Reunion weekend . Starting at the Bethlehem Brew Works at Friday at 9 p.m., it continues on Saturday with a pre-game tailgate starting at 11 a.m and going until kickoff (and probably beyond) at 12:30 p.m, followed by dinner in the Gander room at the Goosey Gander and the Brown & White bash on campus at 9:30 p.m. If you check out the website, though, nowhere does it say some key elements for Saturday. Namely: who we're playing. Maybe that's a function of our record, 1-2. Maybe that's the function of our offense, who haven't scored more than three touchdowns in a game since Bucknell last year. Maybe it's because Cornell is looking a lot stronger at 2-0 this year. On paper, this game isn't a must-win. Although wins against the Ivy League are good for the league and good for Lehigh, the game the following week vs. Fordham is much more significant in terms of our chances for ...

In the closest voting in Player of the week history, junior LB Matt Cohen barely won LFN Readers' "Player of the Week". The quiet local defender from Allentown Central Catholic doesn't always get the press and attention he deserves, but with 7 tackles last week, including 3 tackles for loss and 2 sacks he was a monster out there. All three tackles for loss were in key spots: one on a fourth down gave possession to Lehigh; another knocked Princeton out of field goal range; and the third pushed the Tigers back from a 1st and goal on the 2 yard line, and set up the blocked field goal attempt that set up our only score. This week, game balls go to: Readers' Choice: Junior LB Matt Cohen Offense: Senior WR Mike Fitzgerald (5 receptions, 70 yards, 1 TD) Defense: Senior DB Brendan VanAckeren (10 tackles, 4 solo tackles) Special Teams: Junior LB Heath Brickner and Junior LB Al Pierce for the blocked field goal attempt (Brickner) and runback (Pierce). Congratulation...

Somewhere along the way to the CAA title and the FCS national championship game, Richmond was going to have to take a trip to the Main Line. And apparently somewhere crossing the busy intersection to Villanova stadium, the Spiders were squashed 26-20 by a Villanova team that, according to head coach Andy Talley, has found it's "focus". "I just felt like we were a team with issues," he said. "We weren't focused. From what I saw at Thursday's practice, we weren't ready to play. Now I don't think we're a team with issues. This team stepped up and played the way we've been expecting this team to play." The Wildcats got the job done by stuffing Richmond's running game, holding Richmond to 82 yards - and Villanova may have also benefitted by the absence of the Spiders' most exciting offensive player, sophomore WR Kevin Grayson , early in the second half with a shoulder injury. And they kept the Spider defense unbalanced wi...

The official release of the Lehigh game on LehighSports.com : Lehigh’s defense did all it could to give the Mountain Hawks a chance to win on Saturday evening, but a 32-yard field goal by Connor Louden as time expired lifted Princeton to a 10-7 win at Princeton Stadium in front of 8,836 in attendance. I've added my weekly poll for the "Player of the Game" to your left, and I'll be adding the pertinent game recaps to the Lehigh football ticker to your left, too. Later tomorrow I'll be posting game pictures from the game on both my Webshots gallery and Facebook galleries, too.

This weekend, I saw the Lehigh/Princeton game in a variety of areas around Princeton stadium, as I always do: in the stands, on the sidelines, and in the press box. Princeton's press box is a particularly nice one, and for the press corps this evening was something you don't see often in a press box: gourmet "soup". It was delicious: a potato horesradish "soup" that could have come from any fine restaurant off of Princeton's main street. On a damp evening, two bowls of that "soup" were probably the only thing keeping me from catching pneumonia as I was rushing in and out of the press box. "Soup" is what Lehigh fans need right now. "Soup" is comfort food, a taste of something that takes you back years ago - when mother had you stay home from school and eat a hearty cup of Campbell's Chicken Noodle instead of facing the dark, cruel reality which is the world. For Lehigh fans, "soup" means the traditions that fa...