Lehigh Football Nation

Can you tell that I haven't really wanted to finish this report card for last week's game? Like a teacher a hour before pacing break, I didn't want to go through the film, the grades, and the play-by-play of the Penn game, but eventually, I did, even though it wasn't exactly pretty. The true hope with this report card, more than usual weeks, is that it's seen as a springboard to getting to the season that all folks associated with Lehigh will want.  With nationally-ranked Princeton looming ahead this week, it takes on added importance.

It's a lot less fun to go through the "Players of the Week" and report card after a loss, but it's still got to be done.  Last week's somewhat humbling 31-9 defeat comes at a point of the season where it's more of a learning experience than a death blow to the season, and also came against one of the very best teams in all of FCS. It wouldn't surprise me to see Villanova win the CAA this season. In any event, here we go.

According to the FCS record books for 2017, there are 123 Division I schools listed in the team statistical Rankings.  Out of 123 teams, Lehigh was ranked 119th in total team defense, allowing 477.7 yards per game. And the defensive numbers don't get much better the more you look. Rushing defense, 117th.  Passing yards allowed, 89th.  Team sacks, 118th.  Red zone defense, 103rd.  Total sacks in 12 games: 10, or 0.8 per game.  Total interceptions in 12 games: 4, or 0.25 per game.  Total takeaways: 13, or a little over 1 per game. Though the final defensive numbers from 2017 are unable to be sugar-coated, nobody involved with Lehigh's defense is running away from the facts this spring.  In fact, they feel they are better than this. "When you hear so much about your defense not being good," defensive coordinator Craig Sutyak said this week , "you start to believe it, and I think our kids started to believe it too the last couple of year...

Not headed to the the frozen tundra at Murray Goodman Stadium to catch the critical Holy Cross/Lehigh game? Why?  THIS IS IT, FOLKS.  This is one to catch in person. Yeah, I know it's going to be cold.  Yeah, I know that life is busy.  But it's a home game, it's win, and stay alive for a Patriot League Championship.  It's a big game; there's no doubt about it.  You need to be there for big games.  Future generations of your family are counting on you to say that "I was there on that freezing cold day at Murray Goodman". So after that sales pitch, you still can't make it, and still want to know how to you catch the game? Never fear.  LFN's here.

After the Bucknell victory, senior OL Zach Duffy said something that cut through the entire 2017 Lehigh football season. "We have 14 days to stay locked in and do whatever it takes to win another championship," he said to the team. And it's true.  It really doesn't matter what happened Week One, Week Five, or even last week.  When this Mountain Hawk team goes to bed, and wakes up again during the next six days, they are in the Patriot League Championship race.  If they win, and stay locked in for the next fourteen days and win two football games, they will win the Patriot League. It will require being locked in for fourteen days.

(Photo Credits: Mike Geer/Lehigh Athletics) "We went right at 'em." That was head coach Andy Coen talking to Lehigh Sports' Steve Lomangino after the Mountain Hawks' 42-21 win over Bucknell. With their Patriot League title hopes on the line, and the No. 1 defense in the Patriot League the opposition, it seemed like the Mountain Hawks might enter into the type of defensive struggle that defined last year's game against Bucknell. But after junior LB Mark Walker forced and and grabbed a Bison fumble and returned it to the Bucknell 9 yard line, junior QB Brad Mayes didn't mess around.

The 2017 Lehigh Mountain Hawks are known for having a great offense, a high-octane group that features stars like junior QB Brad Mayes and junior RB Dominick Bragalone . But senior WR Troy Pelletier would trade it all for conference wins. On an afternoon where he broke a bunch of school and Patriot League records - some of them unanticipated - his focus, as ever, was about getting the league victories that count towards the main goal of this team - to defend their Patriot League Championship. "I didn't know what the records are," Troy said afterwards about his record-busting, 16 catch, 197 receiving yard, 4 touchdown performance.  "I just knew I was close.  I knew it was going to come if I bought in every day, do what I need to do every day to get better, and I knew it would come." Fortunately for Lehigh fans, his banner day came to allow Lehigh to resoundingly beat Georgetown 54-35 and go to 2-0 in Patriot League play.

It was Colgate 28, Lehigh 14 as the first half was coming to a close.  The Mountain Hawks had the ball, but the pall over Lehigh fans everywhere was very evident - "here we go again," most seemed to be thinking. You couldn't blame fans necessarily for thinking that way, of course.  The Mountain Hawks hadn't found out yet this year how to pull out a game like this, and normally, a two-touchdown deficit to Colgate feels like a four-touchdown deficit, the way they run the ball and gradually crush the spirit of opposing teams. Driving and scrambling - somewhat of a broken play - junior QB Brad Mayes found junior RB Dominick Bragalone downfield with a big 35 yard touchdown pass, cutting the deficit to 28-21. And then, gradually, over the course of a half of football, Lehigh put mistakes behind them just as the uncharacteristic mistakes by Colgate seemed to mount.  One Colgate touchdown would be called back.  Then another.  And Lehigh would battle back ...

Last season, a disappointed LB Colton Caslow talked about the Lehigh defense after a top 26-21 loss to nationally-ranked Villanova. Caslow, LB Pierce Ripanti and LB Evan Harvey had combined for 27 tackles against the Wildcats, but it wasn't enough to spring the upset. "None of those plays I made would have been possible if I didn't have the fantastic teammates I have around me out there," he said after the game .  "Everyone's just been flying around, we're getting all eleven players to the ball, everyone has a lot higher energy out there, and we're in a lot better shape than we were last year." Caslow's disappointment would be the last time he'd experience that emotion after a regular-season football game, as Lehigh then proceeded to win their next nine games and the Patriot League championship.  Caslow, and the defense, never averted their focus and improvement from that point forward. This weekend at the Brown/Whit...

(Photo Credit: Keith Groller/Morning Call) It felt a lot closer than 14 to 3 at halftime. Sure, Lehigh had outgained Georgetown 220-64 on offense up until that point.  Definitely, the Lehigh defense, which has been playing with a chip on its shoulder for most of the entire season, was playing, as they say, lights-out, and they had just come up with a big defensive stop in the red zone to keep Georgetown from cutting it from 14-7 rather than 14-3. But a batted ball at the line of scrimmage, alertly grabbed by DE Hoya DE Hunter Kiselick , made it feel like the Mountain Hawks might rue the opportunities they had in the first hald to put away Georgetown. After coming in for injured senior QB Nick Shafnisky , sophomore QB Brad Mayes  jumped right into the fray and finished the scoring drive with a perfect pass over the middle to junior WR Troy Pelletier to make the score 14-3 Lehigh. But after a drive that went backwards and that interception, it was Georgetown that h...