Lehigh Football Nation

(Photo Credit: College Football Performance) When Lehigh lines up against Columbia on October 6th, they will be facing their third first-year head coach in the third consecuttive week. Had you asked Columbia fans back in December whom they wanted that coach to be, the overwhelming fan favorite - according to the folks at Roar Lions , the Columbia fan community - was Holy Cross' Tom Gilmore , a face that Lehigh fans know very, very well. Columbia athletic director Diane Murphy , however, had other ideas, ultimately deciding on Pete Mangurian , a former head coach at Cornell as well as an assistant coach with Bill Belichick and Raheem Morris . It will be interesting to see what Mangurian does when he takes his Lions, who finished 1-9 last year, to Lehigh.

Technically, it could be considered a non-conference game. While Fordham is a part of the Patriot League, and their players show up in the preseason and postseason league all-America teams, since they started to offer merit-based aid for football players, they continue to be ineligible for the league title, and their wins and losses against teams in the League only serve to break ties. But they're not just a non-conference game. Fordham's players know what this game means for their program in 2012.  Rules might determine that they can't win a Patriot League title, but they know if they sweep the Patriot League they have an excellent chance to make the field as an at-large team. The centerpiece of that argument would be a win over nationally-ranked Lehigh.

Lehigh's first three contests of the 2012 football season all, arguably, have specific themes attached to them. The first game, against Monmouth, is "introductions".  It will be the first glimpse of the 16th-tanks Mountain Hawks, also has a local flavor, as the Hawks are relatively close by in West Long Branch, NJ. The second game, against Central Connecticut State, is "bullseye".  The Blue Devils, opening their newly-renovated stadium, will see Lehigh in what's likely to be the biggest crowd ever on the New Britain campus. The third game, against Princeton, is "bragging rights".  Locally, many high-academic recruits are asked to pick either Lehigh or Princeton, and wins against the Ivy League have a special, backyard feel to them. But this game against Liberty unquestionably has as its theme: "national".  It's going to be the one game, most likely, that the Mountain Hawks will be able to showcase their program to not just t...

When Princeton head coach Bob Surace took over as the Tigers' head man in 2010, it was all puppy dogs and ice cream as to how he was going to turn around the program from Roger Hughes . There was talk of a "tougher, smarter, better conditioned" defense.  There was talk about a new, cutting-edge "fast-break offense" - "85 plays a game", Surace mentioned - and a new attitude that would propel Princeton to consistently be in the running against Harvard and Yale. It didn't quite work out that way. Two wins and eighteen losses later, Surace goes into 2012 with much more modest expectations.  Part of that is due to the struggles of the past two years, but part of that also is due to something totally unexpected - and tragic.

Most casual Lehigh football fans recognize a lot of schools on the schedule. I mean, everyone knows who Princeton and Columbia are - they're Ivy League schools. Liberty?  Not only were they members of the FCS Top 25 last year, they have a decidedly national reputation as a conservative, faith-based institution of higher learning, where Willard Romney makes speeches in the run-up to the Presidential election. But aside from knowing where Central Connecticut State is generally located - hint, it's about 20 minutes southwest of Hartford - I think most Lehigh fans might be able to be forgiven if they look at September 8th on the schedule and say, "Who are these guys?" The answer to that question is that the Blue Devils have tasted a lot of success over the last six years under head coach Jeff McInerney , with signature wins over Georgia Southern and Lehigh, both on the road. And with a newly-revamped Arute Field, which will be able to hold upwards of 6,500 fa...

There's only a couple months until the beginning of the 2012 season, and it's time to get to know Lehigh's first opponent on this year's slate: Monmouth University.  (September 1st, 12:30PM, Murray Goodman Stadium, Bethlehem). What is known, indeed, about the Hawks? They've had one football coach throughout their young history - Kevin Callahan , now in his 19th year at the reins. They've had some true NFL-caliber talent to go through their ranks, most notably Cowboy WR Miles Austin . But what else do we know about this nearby university?