Lehigh Football Nation

Many Patriot League football fans remember the 153rd meeting between Lehigh and Lafayette, one that ended happily for the Mountain Hawks. They might remember the MVP performance of QB Brad Mayes , or perhaps the halftime speech by OL Zach Duffy that seemed to spur the Mountain Hawks to victory. Or perhaps they might remember the spectacular single play of Mayes rolling right and finding WR Gatlin Casey in the end zone to give the Mountain Hawks a lead they didn't relinquish.  It was an incredible play by Mayes, who returns this upcoming year for his senior season, and Casey, who, having exhausted his eligibility at Lehigh, will be playing one more year at Middle Tennessee State. As great as those individual moments are, though, they are not my biggest takeaway of that game. Too many Lehigh people forget that Lehigh was down 31-21 at half, and that victory was no sure thing.  And they sometimes forget that so much of that victory came from the grinding of WR Troy Pe...

(Photo Credits: Lehigh Athletics) Just like that, the 2018 Spring Session comes to a close this week, giving us a taste of what is to come in the late summer and fall. Here are my quick observations about what I saw at Murray Goodman on Saturday.

The Lehigh coaching staff took a page from Ole Miss' spring game in their annual Brown/White scrimmage at Murray Goodman stadium. The scoring system Ole Miss used was to spot their defense a 23-0 lead, and the scrimmage's goal was to  have the offense drive on the defense just like a regular football game. It is the hope of every Lehigh football fan in every game in the upcoming 2018 season that the offense scores more than 23 points a game.  Last year, the Lehigh offense averaged for than 35 points per contest. But the Brown defense this Saturday was up to the challenge of containing the White offense. Twelve times, the offense lined up with a potential drive to score points, and nine of those times, the defense forced the offense to punt or stuffed a 4th down conversion. It's true that the offense scored three touchdowns, one from rising senior QB Brad Mayes , one from junior QB Tyler Monaco , and one from sophomore QB Addison Shoup.    It is also true...