Lehigh Football Nation

  It's the spring, and what that means is that the weather (hopefully) is getting better, the flowers are blooming, and - most importantly - we're in the middle of spring football season. Soon I am planning on posting an update on what has gone on in FCS football since the end of last season (spoiler alert: it is a lot!), but first I wanted to take an initial look at Lehigh's fall 2022 football schedule, and what sort of fun we can expect. But before I do that, I wanted to highlight something that my Twitter pal Omar Rashon-Borja wrote about his beloved Holy Cross Crusaders.     In this piece , he talks about a special game Holy Cross played last year at Polar Park, the minor league home of the Worcester Red Sox (or the "WooSox" as they are commonly known up there).  The game was branded the EBW Classic, featured an important Holy Cross vs. Colgate league matchup, and attracted 9.508 fans to attend ( which was about 2,000 more than their average at Fitton Field ...

I wish I thought this would actually happen. I wish the Patriot League was proactive, and thinking several steps ahead. But as an observer of the Patriot League for more than twenty years, I don't think the Patriot League Presidents, or any of their athletic representatives, are nimble enough and proactive enough to actually take a look at what's happening with the CAA right now in regards to James Madison possibly leaving for the Sun Belt . If they were like me, they'd take a look at the CAA in football in a post-James Madison world.  They'd see an extremely unwieldy 11 team conference without much of a theme. Only four CAA members would be a part of "CAA Football" - Delaware, Towson, William and Mary, and Elon.  There would be just as many America East Members as CAA members - UNH, Maine, Stony Brook, and Albany.  The other three - Richmond, Villanova and Rhode Island - are in hoops-only conferences. Could they soldier on as a divisional conference?  Maybe. ...

2015 was a great year for Patriot League football.   It was a season where two Patriot League schools would qualify for the FCS Playoffs, and Dan Hunt's Colgate team would have a one of the Patriot League's most epic runs through the bracket on the road - beating New Hampshire 27-20, then becoming James Madison's Kryptonite in an epic 44-38 win over the perennial FCS powerhouse.   A third straight road game ended their run at Sam Houston State with a 48-21 defeat, but the Raiders had nothing to hang their heads about. At the time, there was no way of knowing that the 2015 season would be the high water mark for the league for the next six years - or that the drop would be so precipitous. What happened? 2015 was not only notable for its playoff success - it also featured four teams who finished above .500.  Fordham won the Patriot League with a 9-2 record, while Colgate barely made it as an at-large team at 7-4.  Lehigh (6-5) and Holy Cross (6-5) had plenty ...

For whatever reason, you didn't make the trip to Stony Brook, New York.  You've popped your popcorn, iced your Yuenglings, and put the meatballs in the crockpot - and then you panic. How do I watch the game?  What is ESPN3?  Can I watch it on my TV?  Do I need to subscribe to something?  WHAT DO I DO??? Never fear.  LFN's here to help.

By now, you know that Lehigh has drawn Stony Brook as their first round opponent in the FCS Playoffs. Let's get more familiar with them by starting with the basics. Stony Brook is a member of the CAA, the same FCS football conference that gives use Villanova, Delaware, New Hampshire, and James Madison. They're located near Oyster Bay on Long Island, in Stony Brook, New York, and were established as a part of the SUNY University system in 1957.  Since then, they have grown and expanded in leaps and bounds as a research University, and also collaborate with Lehigh on certain initiatives, most recently with their computer science departments to research machine learning . Their nickname is the Seawolves - which is apparently a real thing - and football-wise they finished 9-2 with their very challenging CAA schedule. They are ranked No. 11 in the country in the FCS coaches' poll and No. 12 in the country in the STATS poll. Oh yeah - they also gave a 9-1 FBS team ...

I don't officially vote in any of the FCS Top 25 polls, but I do share who I think deserves to be in the Top 25 .  And, well, was I completely wrong about Villanova and Richmond , who were two of my Top 10 teams that got upset this week? CAA fans will say that conference games in their conference are hard, but... Albany and Elon aren't known as being the giant-killers in the conference, let's just say.  It's great to see Albany do well, who were awful close to an FCS playoff team last season, and Elon as well, former home of former Lehigh head coach Pete Lembo as well as  the new home of former Lehigh offensive coordinator Drew Folmar .  But are they Top 25 teams?

I don't officially vote in any of the FCS Top 25 polls, but I do share who I think deserves to be in the Top 25, and let's just get all the drama out of the way now - James Madison is my clear-cut No. 1. I know, right?   Shocking. This week saw two Top 10 teams of mine last week go down - and Virginia, the games weren't close.  One might not have been too much of a surprise, as it came against a nationally-ranked team at their place.  But the other stunned a lot of people, including myself, and frankly, I hate missing the call of a Patriot League team upsetting a CAA team.

I don't officially vote in any of the FCS Top 25 polls, but I do share who I think deserves to be in the Top 25, and for the second straight week - hold on to your hats - I think James Madison was, and still is, the No. 1 team in the nation. I know, right?   Crazy. Truth be known, the top layer of FCS teams did little to move themselves much.  When teams like New Hampshire were beating FBS teams and teams like Villanova were taking FCS teams to the wire, much of the Top 10 proved they were Top 10 worthy teams.

I don't officially vote in any of the FCS Top 25 polls, but I do share who I think deserves to be in the Top 25, and this week, unsurprisingly, I think James Madison was, and still is, the No. 1 team in the nation. Not exactly going out on a limb, am I? If you try to pick FCS games, one of the easiest picks of last week was to take the Dukes to upset the Pirates.  Pretty much all the experts across the board thought that James Madison, even with some suspended players, was stacked enough to take over rebuilding East Carolina, and boy, did they ever. Remember the days when FCS vs. FBS matchups were defined by the FCS teams "wilting" in the fourth quarter?  With upper-echelon FCS teams like James Madison, that myth has been debunked for a while, but it was brutally apparent in this game, when RB Cardon Johnson  easily eluded East Carolina tacklers on two 80+ yard touchdown runs. That didn't surprise me at all this weekend.  And they're still my No. 1 te...

One has been here before; the other has not, at least not lately. Over the course of the last few seasons, Villanova Stadium has hosted all sorts of games involving Top 25 teams.  James Madison, New Hampshire, Richmond - all of these CAA teams have been to the Main Line, at one time or another, at the same time the Wildcats have also been in the Top 25.  When it comes to hosting big football games, Villanova is no stranger to that situation. Not so, Lehigh. Sure, the Mountain Hawks have played a bunch of Top 25 teams over the course of the last several seasons.  And last year, Lehigh returned to the Top 25 as well. But the Mountain Hawks haven't hosted a game like this, a Top 25 tilt between two opponents that are both in the Top 25, since the Mountain Hawks beat New Hampshire 34-27 back in 2012. This year's season opener represents the cumulation of the long, hard road of building a Top 25, national-caliber FCS football team.  Last season was a year o...

(Photo Credit: Akira Suwa/Philly.com) Writing a season preview about Villanova used to be the easiest job in the world. Just grab your boilerplate biographical information about future hall-of-fame head coach Andy Talley , do a little Googling of the Wildcat's next up-and-coming NFL prospects, come up with a dozen synonyms for the words "tough" and "challenge", and the preview basically writes itself. But this season's task of facing Villanova is simply different than all of those other years.  Talley, the only coach Villanova has ever known since restarting their football program in 1985 after a failed attempt to pull the plug on it in 1981 in the middle of spring practice , has finally retired from the head coaching ranks.  While the same familiar trappings of high preseason rankings and potential NFL prospects remain, their new head coach, longtime Talley assistant Mark Ferrante , is now running the Wildcats and will be seeking his first win as a ...

One of the more interesting aspects of covering Lehigh football for so long is the fact that you end up seeing future NFL players on their rise to the big show. In fact, two players who squared off against the Mountain Hawks in particular have an excellent chance of being drafted on Day 2 or Day 3 of the NFL draft. But those not the only Lehigh football opponents that will be hoping to get a phone call from an NFL team this Friday or Saturday. Though few Patriot League, Ivy League or even CAA players enter their football programs with the NFL as their main goal, every football player that matriculates to these schools still harbor the dream of dominating their league and as a result get an opportunity to pursue their NFL dream. And it is true that NFL scouts come to FCS football games to look for talent that might have been overlooked.  Many years ago I was in Hofstra's press box, watching the Pride take on New Hampshire, with NFL scouts from the Colts and Saints there to...

Still bummed that Lehigh's Patriot League Championship season is over?  Yeah, me too. That doesn't mean that I've totally tuned out the college football landscape, though. Starting tonight, there's some terrific games on TV and online streaming that I'll be watching, both at the FCS and the FBS level.  Happily, the FCS Round of 16 games are not all going up against each other like last week, so the opportunity is there to catch one or more of those games - and you can bet that I will be. Below the flip, starting with the MAC championship game tonight, are my picks for games to watch, and - why not? - some picks as to who I think will win. (Yes, it includes Penn State.  Stop asking.)

Right from the opening drive it didn't feel like it was going to be Lehigh's day. With sophomore QB Brad Mayes in for senior QB Nick Shafnisky , who was unable to start due to an undisclosed illness, a pass that bounced off the hands of senior WR Derek Knott instead bounced into the hands of New Hampshire's first team all-CAA CB Casey DeAndrade . Six plays later, the New Hampshire offense converted that turnover into the very first touchdown of the day for the Wildcats, the first of many on a defense that clearly missed senior LB Colton Caslow , who got hurt in the second half against Lafayette last weekend. Four different New Hampshire players scored a grand total of six rushing touchdowns, two coming from RB Dalton Crossan , two coming from his backup, RB Trevon Bryant , one from the third-string, RB Evan Gray, and one on a scramble from QB Adam Riese . All in all, the Wildcats racked up 364 yards rushing on the Brown and White, rushing to a 36-7 lead on the...

In order to understand how UNH will be looking at this weekend's game against Lehigh, you need to go back to the narrative of last week. And then, you need to go back to the narrative from last year. But first, let's start with last week, where the Wildcats were not only battling their Rival Maine in the "Battle for the Brice/Cowell Musket", they were battling to keep their playoff dreams alive. The Wildcats, who had qualified for the FCS playoffs for twelve consecutive years, had fallen behind their bitter Rivals Maine, 14-7 at halftime. With both teams at 6-4. it must have had the feel of a playoff game as well as a Rivalry game.  The winner would likely have a good shot at a playoff game; the loser would likely be out. And the starter, sophomore QB Trevor Knight , was out of the game with a foot injury.  The backup, senior QB Adam Riese , would have to be the trigger guy to rally the Wildcats to the win.

"The Engineer football team once again showed their supremacy over the Yankee Conference leaders by defeating the University of New Hampshire (UNH) Wildcats, 16-3," read the October 26th edition of The Brown and White  in 1979. LB Jim McCormick intercepted a UNH pass early in the game, and returned it to the Wildcat 4, setting up an early touchdown.  After that, the Engineer defense would take over, crushing UNH's offense the rest of the way. That would be the last time Lehigh has won at Cowell Stadium - 1979, a year where Lehigh was one of four teams in the I-AA playoffs and made it to the championship, ultimately falling to Eastern Kentucky in the finals. So much has changed since then.  The I-AA playoffs have been renamed the FCS playoffs, and not have 24 teams instead of 4.  The Yankee Conference essentially was renamed to the Atlantic 10 Football Conference and now the CAA football conference, morphing from a Northeastern-based conference to one whose c...

By now you probably know that Lehigh is headed to New Hampshire on Saturday to face off against the Wildcats in the first round of the FCS Playoffs. About this, some of you are scratching your heads.   Lehigh is 9-2, you say.  Every single computer rating system has them ranked ahead of New Hampshire, every single human voter poll has them ranked against New Hampshire.  Lehigh won the Patriot League outright; New Hampshire weren't even co-champions of the CAA.  Why is New Hampshire hosting us ? The answer resides in the bidding process and some NCAA rules, both of which explain why it happened. I'll talk about this, and my other thoughts on the bracket, below.

Stop me if you've heard this before: As a reward for being the surprise outright winner of the Patriot League football championship, the reward is a trip to New Hampshire, the winner headed to seeded James Madison for a second-round game.  And somewhere, Sam Houston State looms on the horizon. This is the exact situation that Colgate found itself last season, and this year, Lehigh is poised to run through the exact same gauntlet and the exact same teams. Sunday morning, Lehigh found out their opponents for the FCS Playoffs; the New Hampshire Wildcats.  The game will be played at New Hampshire at 2PM EST, and will be available to watch on ESPN3 on your computer and possibly ESPN Gameplan Pay-Per-View on your TV.

Lehigh's bowl game comes next weekend, of course, as they take on Lafayette in the 152nd meeting of The Rivarly in Easton.  After that bowl game, though, comes the FCS playoffs, and until the FCS Playoff Bracket is announced on Sunday at 11:00 AM after the Lafayette game, we don't know where, or when, Lehigh will play their playoff game. Don't fret, football fans.  LFN is here with a warm cup of chicken noodle soup, a nice grilled cheese sandwich with the crusts cut off, and a schedule, complete with links, involving the most important FCS games on the schedule that will impact Lehigh's postseason schedule the most. Sit back.  Enjoy your soup.  LFN's here to help you for this Saturday.

For us Patriot League diehards, we know what the FCS playoffs are all about.  We know who's in line for the autobid, we know who the No. 1 teams are, and we have a pretty good idea about who can get in, and why. But you, dear Reader, might not be as dialed into the FCS playoff scene as the rest of us.  You know that Lehigh will be practicing on Thanksgiving, and will be playing a football game after the 152nd meeting on the gridiron between Lehigh and Lafayette. In the span of one blog post, let me tell you, new or old Lehigh fan, what you need to look for in regards to the FCS playoffs.