Lehigh Football Nation

  One of my guilty pleasures last fall during the Lehigh football season was watching the FX show "Welcome to Wrexham".  It was a surprising balm on a tough 2-9 year. It only came about - surprisingly - at the insistence of my wife. She had just returned from jury duty in Philadelphia, and one of the people she chatted with recommended the show.  She was excited to see it.  For my part, I thought, sure, a show about sports and English soccer?  Sign me up.   The story of how two Hollywood stars bout a Welsh soccer team is interesting.  During the pandemic, the British actor Humphrey Ker suggested to actor Rob McElhenny (creator, writer and star of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia) watch the excellent sports docuseries “Sunderland ’Til I Die,” which documented the doomed task of Sunderland and their fans as they tried to bring their club back up to the Premier League alongside international brands Manchester City, Liverpool, and Manchester Un...

How will you watch Bucknell at Lehigh this afternoon?  What a ridiculous question.  Like me, you're headed to the stadium for a 12:37 kickoff. Wait - really?  You're not going to Murray Goodman today?  Why not?  Unscheduled dental emergency?  Flying in from Buenos Aires?  Need to find out how to catch the game online, by a video stream or online radio? Never fear.  LFN's here.

The decision was made.  We were going up to my parent's house over Labor Day weekend. I knew it was the right decision, the correct decision.  My dad, who had suffered a back injury, was rehabbing, requiring for the first time in his incredibly active life to require the use of a walker to get around.  He and my mother wouldn't be driving down to Lehigh for any football games in the next couple of months, which effectively meant if I was going to spend any significant time with them, it was going to be this weekend - opening weekend.  The weekend that I wait for with fevered anticipation for more than nine months. But sometimes bubbles need to be burst.   For the last nine months, I've lived in bubbles: a bubble of Lehigh football, FCS expertise, and a focus on the football season.  I had lived in a bubble where I thought my father was still invincible, even in retirement unable to stay in one place, always able to come down with mom to vis...

Cruel doesn't begin to describe what Stan Kroenke has done to fans of the St. Louis Rams. He didn't only move the Rams back to LA this week.  "On his way out he decided he had to torch the city, saying 'Any NFL club who signs on to this proposal in St. Louis will be well on the road to financial ruin,'" a not-so-cheery recap from the fans recapped on MMQB .  "This from a guy who proudly claims he was named after two amazing St. Louis baseball players. It was a completely classless act of revenge from a little man who profited greatly by being in St. Louis. He not only made himself look pitiful, he also made the NFL look like a heartless organization that only cares about money." St. Louis is now left with a stadium that isn't yet paid off, the Edward Jones Dome, and no football team to play games there. Nobody asked me, but to me, this presents the opportunity of a lifetime for the private, Jesuit Division I school in St. Louis.

You didn't ask me, Alexis De Tocqueville wannabes, but to understand the American people you need to experience three things. First, you need to spend a day at Walt Disney World.  Not Disneyland, out in California, but Disneyworld in Orlando.  There you will see all walks of life, all shapes, all colors, all sizes, walking through an orgy of consumerism and fantasy.  Don't look or think too much about the park itself, which is simply giving the people what they want in the most capitalistic way possible, but observe the people walking around, the folks in the Ron Jon T-shirts, the low-cut tops showing off tattoos that shouldn't be there, the Florida Gator fans. You also need to spend a weekend at Las Vegas.  Not spending the time at the blackjack tables or poker dens trying to make it rich, understand, but watching the people, the paysan who acts like he's in control when the ace and the jack come out for him, the crying woman running after the man who ob...

Some quick thoughts about the opening college football weekend.

It is truly hilarious when people who don't know what they're talking about try to make news points, and news decisions, based on one side of the story. Such is the case with the breathless coverage of the Big 10's decision, led by former Wisconsin head football coach (and current athletic director) Barry Alvarez , who shared with the Milwaukee-Journal that Big 10 officials " recently agreed to stop scheduling nonconference games against FCS programs. " Of course, the first thing papers around the country do is pull a picture from such an FCS game involving Wisconsin from last season - surely a poster child for a blowout, right? Um, not exactly.  Northern Iowa gave Wisconsin " all they could handle " in a 26-21 nailbiter. Wait, it gets better.

(Photo Credit: Michael Conroy/AP via the New York TImes) In the end, it stopped short of the "death penalty", but in ways, it was tougher than the penalties the NCAA delivered to SMU football back in the 1980s. In NCAA commissioner Mark Emmert 's 9AM press conference this morning, he stopped short of forcing the disbanding of the Nittany Lion football program for a period of years, thanks to the Freeh report which concluded that key people in the football program, at a bare minimum, covered up strong accusations of child rape. He instead imposed a web of different punishments on Penn State in order to make an example of their program, however, which was unquestionably the correct course of action for the NCAA.

(Photo respectfully taken from CrossingBroad and @jon_wertheim) To say Joe Paterno was a college football legend - the word "legend" just doesn't seem legendary enough to describe the man who had coached at Penn State for 46 years in Happy Valley. I have been to Happy Valley to see "big-time" college football at Beaver stadium. I have seen up close the near cult-like behavior Penn Staters had for the guy they called JoePa - a personality cult that seemed goofy and a little harmless. But I don't think it's goofy or harmless anymore. The resignation of a leading Penn State fundraiser, the athletic director, and even the president of Penn State evoked sadness, outrage, and a call for justice.  But when the Penn State board of trustees fired the coach that had been given God-like powers, it set forces in motion that are as frightening as they are sickening.

Say this about Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany - he knows how to get an audience.   Yesterday, Delany put himself front and center once again after picking up a topic that two NCAA commissioners, the late Myles Brand and Mark Emmert , had floated but never pushed - the idea that scholarships to play collegiate sports should include the "full cost of attendance". Currently, the "full cost of attendance" of an athletic scholarship includes tuition, dorms, classroom materials and other expenses. But Delany's endorsement of the proposal to include transportation and a stipend for personal expenses as scholarship money turned a whole lot of heads for a lot of different reasons. (more)

It's never news that Patriot League teams receive awards about their Academic Progress Rate from the NCAA. Since instituting the measure in 2005 to track athletes' progress in reaching graduation, Patriot League schools have consistently, alongside the Ivy League, been honored for the number of teams that have scored a 977 or above. (Broadly, it means that 97.7% of the the team has made academic progress towards their degree.) That Patriot League schools are consistently at the top or near the top of their institutional peers in APR rates is not news. Buried in the numbers, however, are two items that should not be ignored - a subtle change that has robbed the Patriot League of some national recognition, and a case for football scholarships that you might have missed. (more)

(Photo Credit: Dave Burbank/The Ithaca Journal ) When it comes to Ivy League double standards, you can't do much better than comparing football and lacrosse. In football, there is a ban on playing postseason football in the FCS playoffs. Aside from language in the original Ivy Agreement intimating a ban on postseason play, "interference with final exams" is one of many popular rationales for maintaining the ban that has been repeated over the years. Such restrictions might be fine - if they were applied consistently to all Ivy League sports. But they're not. And all you need to do is look at the sport of Lacrosse to see why the Ivy League holds true to ideology... unless it benefits the bottom line. (more)

For the first time since 2005, Lehigh had a player in college football's longest-running all-star game. OL Will Rackley 's trip to Orlando, Florida to compete in the Florida Citrus Bowl was the first since  TE Adam Bergen 's, who is currently playing football professionally with the Las Vegas Locomotives of the UFL. While it's an honor to simply be invited to the 85th meeting between the East and West collegiate all-stars, Rackley by all published accounts made a very positive impression in the game. Whispers continue that his name will be called in April in the 2010 NFL draft. I caught up with Will and asked him about his experience. See what he had to say below the flip. (more)

Yeah, I'll admit it's, um, a bit presumptuous to start a blog post with "Saving the Patriot League".  And to follow it with a photo of Benjamin Franklin goes beyond audacious. But I am coming to the inescapable conclusion that the Patriot League is in deep trouble.  And a Mr. Franklin, whose political skills were instrumental in the founding of our nation, would certainly be welcome in helping forge an acceptable compromise between the different world views of the Patriot League presidents. I'm going to split this blog post into two parts: my analysis of what I think happened last week; and then I'm going to do my best, pale imitation of Mr. Franklin to attempt - nay, plea - for a compromise solution that all interested parties can accept. Consider it... my Patriotic duty... to try to do something. (more)

(Photo Credit: The Muncie Star-Press) You might vaguely remember, don't you, when RB Jonathan Hurt positioned himself under a desperation fourth down heave by the Leopards' backup QB and - after Lehigh's defensive back slipped on the play - side-stepped into the end zone for the game winning score. That would end up being Lehigh head coach Pete Lembo 's final game coaching the Brown and White, a bitter end to his hugely successful run in South Mountain where he would go 44-14 and secure the only home playoff game in Murray Goodman history.  (And until this season, his win over Hofstra in overtime was the last postseason victory by the Mountain Hawks.) Almost five years to the day when Lembo left to coach the Elon Phoenix of the SoCon, Lembo left North Carolina to take on a new, exciting challenge: as the coach of an FBS team. Today, Ball State announced Lembo as their 16th head football coach , replacing former coach Stan Parrish . (more)

Yesterday, I attempted to expose one myth: about the supposed guaranteed riches and benefits that await a school like Montana should receive if they go to FBS and a WAC that's currently on life support.  If they want to roll the dice and go ahead, that's fine with me: but do it for the right reasons, and don't intimate that the FCS playoffs system is dying and blame it for all your financial woes. Today I'm going against the other threat to Football Championship Subdivision: the schools that pick up their ball, their tradition, their scholarships for a bunch of kids who just want to get an education - and pull the plug on the entire program. That's exactly what happened at Northeastern University and Hofstra University this past offseason, and was recently applauded by a reporter at the Boston Globe . Whenever the subject matter in the larger world of college football turns to TV contracts, larger and larger athletics programs and out-of-control spending, ...

(Photo Credit: Kurt Wilson of the Missoulian) You can get plenty of hits on Google if you combine the two words "WAC" and "trouble". But probably not as many as there would have been even just a few weeks ago. That's because the WAC - who has two teams currently ranked in the Top 25 in Boise State and Nevada - has announced in the next 30 to 60 days that it will be offering bids to four, and perhaps five, potential members . If you came back from Mars and read these statements, you'd probably think that the future for the WAC is rosy.  Unfortunately for the WAC, however, Boise State and Nevada will be bolting for the Mountain West conference starting in 2011 - and while the WAC might attempt to reload with a combination of basketball-only schools and FCS football-playing schools, make no mistake about it: the WAC is still in a real struggle for its survival. It's in this atmosphere that Montana athletic director Jim O'Day sent an email to a...

(Photo Credit: The Providence Journal) Two days ago, I blogged about Rhode Island's thoughts on leaving the CAA in order to join the NEC . Yesterday, I talked about the impacts on that move on the CAA and NEC .  Today, I'll talk about whether the Patriot League is affected at all by this move by Rhode Island - because as things stand right now with the league and their stance on offering largely need-based aid, it doesn't appear to be. The problems are neatly summed up by a member of the Providence Journal 's URI Forum , a meeting place for fans of the URI program.  Reaction to the Rams' football move to the NEC have been mixed there, and some members were motivated to ask the Rams' athletic director, Thorr Bjorn , about his thought process.  He was specifically asked, "why the NEC?  Wouldn't the Patriot League be a better option for URI, with games versus A-10 leaguemate Fordham and nearby Holy Cross?" "I would have preferred URI going...

(Photo courtesy the South County Independent) Yesterday, I blogged about Rhode Island's thoughts on leaving the CAA in order to join the NEC .  Today, I'm blogging about the effects of their move on the rest of Northeast football - including the Patriot League. Interestingly,  Northeastern's discontinuation of football was certainly bad news, and Hofstra's president pulling a "Sonny Corleone in the tollbooth" on football a week later was also a seismic event concerning football in this area. But URI's decision could have an even greater impact in the long run for all three Northeastern FCS football conferences. It could have an impact that affects directly or indirectly all three conferences: the NEC, CAA, and Patriot League. (more)

I learned one thing, really, on my ten day vacation from my day job, blogging and writing: in college football, there truly is no offseason. I planned a vacation in the mountains right before the Fourth of July, thinking that it's generally a dead time for college sports.  I'm not alone, either.  Most sportswriters do the same thing. So what happens the week I'm gone?  Mike Szoztak, the longtime Rhode Island beat writer from the Providence Journal , drops the bombshell that the Rams are looking at moving their football team from the CAA to the NEC starting with the 2013 season. Ram sightings at Delaware's Tub, seen in this picture, might be less and less frequent. At the beginning of 2009, the CAA had twelve teams and had split into North and South divisions. The main discussion point back then was how they were going to be able to accommodate Old Dominion and Georgia State in their powerhouse conference - and how many at-large bids they might have in the futur...