Lehigh Football Nation

So I came to a realization during this bye week. That realization is: online advertising ain't what it used to be. Once upon a time, I thought that it would be just fine for me to write all my great stuff on Lehigh football for free, and to have the magic of affiliate ads, context banners, and maybe some other doodads to compensate me somewhat for the time and energy that I put in. But I'm afraid I've come to the conclusion that this business model will no longer work the way things stand right now. It is not a conclusion I came to easily. But I do have an idea for a somewhat alternative business model for the content that you like on LFN.  How it ends up working will ultimately determine whether I will be able to keep providing my great LFN content for free, or ultimately put it behind a subscriber firewall. Read on.

Well, well. Before I could try to predict Lehigh's two-deep on the year, the game notes for the Villanova game came out and beat me to the punch. Interestingly, the "injury report" has been removed from the game notes, so it's hard to figure out who might be starting due to injury and who isn't. But without any further ado, it's time to print out the starting two-deep and to show how the starting lineup was different than mine (the differences are highlighted ) QB: Sedale Threatt (Sr.), Chris Bokosky (So.) RB: Josh Pastore (Jr.), Kwesi Kankam (Fr.) FB: Adam Watson (Jr.), John Piascik (Sr.) LT: Jimmy Kehs (Sr.), Frank Giacalone (So.) LG: Chris Tiefenthal (Jr.),Ricky Clerge-Appolon (Fr.) C: John Reese (Sr.), Ben Harden (So.) RG: Ben Caffery (Sr.), William Rackley (Fr.) RT: Kevin Bayani (Jr.), Alex Kuziel (Jr.) TE: Joe Sutherland (Sr.), Troy Healion (Jr.) WR1: Sekou Yansane (Jr.), Pete Donchez (Sr.) WR2: Mike Fitzgerald (Jr.), Nick Johnson (Jr.) DT: Kyle Adams...

No, really. The subject of this blog posting is dizziness . Could it be from the 24-hour stomach flu that caused me to sleep about 17 hours of a 24 hour day yesterday? For sure. Could it be the final push to help get the College Sporting News magazine out the door? Definitely. Could it be the amount of references to "Lehigh Nation" in the latest Alumni Bulletin? Definite maybe. Could it be the amount of brand-new features available in the run-up to September 8th, when Lehigh takes on Villanova? Most definitely. Could it be the new poll I need to make for "Goodman's 20th", and the shirt design out in time for September 8th? And the breakdown of position battles for preseason camp? Dizziness. The Alumni Bulletin does seem like the logical place to start. Lest you think I sit around and simply count the references to "Lehigh Nation" in the magazine every month (note: two of which were mentioned in President Alice Gast's "From the P...

"News You Need to Know" sounds like a good blog posting title for a list of those dibs & dabs around the world of Lehigh, the Patriot League, and FCS Football that good Lehigh fans ought to be aware of. Even though kickoff is 86 days away, it doesn't mean that there's no news to speak of. As a matter of fact one huge development could be occurring today in Chicago. Expansion with Bryant? One fact in which there is no doubt is that Bryant University, based in Smithfield, Rhode Island, is beginning an exploratory year where this D-II school out of the NE-10 conference is hoping to join Division I. “Filing this application shows the seriousness of our intent,” Bill Smith, director of athletics, said yesterday. Bryant has had informal discussions with the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference (MAAC), Northeast Conference (NEC) and Patriot League ... “The next step is to continue conversations with the commissioners, athletic directors and presidents. We have to see if...

This is a very quick blog posting to let you know that the blog has undergone a major facelift. It's gone through a long-overdue template upgrade, reorganization of special features, and (the biggest job of all) undergone some "FCS Map Surgery" which involves my re-jiggering (a technical term) of the FCS Map to become a shareable map on Google MyMaps, which can then be ported to other websites. It will probably take some time to get all the data in there and make it look great. Please leave comments on the new layout, the FCS Map, or anything else you'd like to see on this page.

In this holiday time when we're sweeping out 2006 and ushering in 2007, it's a time to look behind, pick Lehigh Football Nation's players of the year, and also to peek ahead a little. 2006 In Review In a season where the Mountain Hawks were picked to finish third in the preseason, you would think Lehigh fans would have been happy with a co-championship in head coach Andy Coen's first year. But in a season with tough losses to the Ivy League and NEC, and Lehigh's third straight loss to Lafayette (and losing a D-I playoff bid in the process), it sure as heck didn't feel like a championship. Yet the fact remains it still was a championship year as coach Coen slowly brought his brand of football to South Mountain, going 5-1 in the league after a 1-4 out-of-conference record. Coming off an offseason which saw the offense and defense have major shifts in phlilosophy, it could have been expected that the Mountain Hawks come out of the gate a little slowly. But after a ...