Lehigh Football Nation

I've been doing this long enough to know that every Lehigh football team is different.  The dynamics running through every team is different; what motivates one team has no impact on the team of the following year. But every big win this 2016 team gets, many of the fans who have been here a while keep whispering: 2011 . Like an Adele Spotify channel, you can't help but be reminded of 2011 when you go to Murray Goodman Stadium or Fitton Field or wherever they're playing.  The popular online game between fans on the Lehigh football message board is: Who was better, 2011, or 2016? The answer is still, beyond a shadow of a doubt, 2011 - for now - but the only reason for that is that 2016 is still in the midst of writing their story.  Yet it can hardly be helped that fans look at the potential of this 2016 team and think, with apologies to Adele, that they are rolling in the same sort of wins that they were in 2011.

(Photo Credit: Matt Smith /The Express-Times ) When I look back at Lehigh's football program over the last four years, I can't think of a single game that wasn't meaningful. And when you think about this fact, that's a powerful thing to say about this group of seniors that will graduate this season. So many programs have off years, years in between quality starting quarterbacks, years when players who find themselves in NFL training camps graduate, and the number of holes to fill are too great to compete for championships, let alone playoff spots. But that didn't happen for this group of Lehigh athletes in 2013. Despite needing to replace two players who found themselves in NFL training camps, WR Ryan Spadola and LB Billy Boyko , a starting quarterback, QB Michael Colvin , and an all-Patriot League secondary consisting of CB Bryan Andrews and S Billy O'Brien , the expectations on this year's team was great: Win the Patriot League.  Build off a ...

On the third play of scrimmage, Lafayette freshman QB Drew Reed fumbled the ball off a bad snap. The ball squirted loose from the line - where a Lehigh player might have fallen on it - and instead nudged in the direction of junior RB Ross Scheuerman , who found himself with the ball in his hands, and, on the broken goal line play, wide open space to get into the end zone. It was that type of day for the Mountain Hawks - a day when five years of Rivalry frustrations, five years of balls bouncing the wrong way, and five years of Lehigh victories came crashing to an end. It was a game where Lehigh never led.  It was a game when the Mountain Hawks came close to coming back - and clearly believing that it could, and would, happen.  But it wasn't meant to be, as Lafayette took home all the marbles on Saturday - the Patriot League Trophy, the Patriot League championship and autobid, and the win over Lehigh that the players, and the many people that follow the Lafayette footb...

(Photo Credit: Chris Shipley /Special to the Morning Call ) There's no doubt about the fact that it was a terrific day for Lehigh football on Saturday. For the only the second time this year, the Mountain Hawks never trailed, and the many questions that surrounded the team after the loss to Bucknell were, in large part, answered. But I also heard something interesting, too, in several conversations with fans. It's the idea that Lehigh's "losing" to Bucknell was the perfect thing to happen to this team at this time.

If you went into Murray Goodman Stadium and said you knew exactly what to expect from this Lehigh Mountain Hawks team, you were lying. Everyone involved with the Mountain Hawks football program had seen, or heard about, the loss to Bucknell. If they had sharp eyes, too, they saw the former starting quarterback, Brandon Bialkowski , on the sidelines in a jacket, his arm immobilized so his collarbone can heal. You had to go back a long way to find a Lehigh team with this much uncertainty, with this much at stake, with three games left. And in this environment, this Mountain Hawk team responded. The Mountain Hawks would never trail in this game, though the Crusaders would tie the game twice, at 7-7 and 13-13.  But then, after filling in permanently after what seemed to be a rib injury to junior QB Matt McHale , freshman QB Nick "Shaf" Shafnisky came into the game and guided Lehigh on three touchdown drives in a convincing 38-20 victory.

(Photo Credit:  Chris Shipley / The Morning Call ) Below the flip, enjoy this week's "LFN Players of the Week" for the Georgetown game. You'll notice that there's a lot of nicknames below after last weekend's 45-24 win over Georgetown.

The term being bandied about the season in regards to the 2013 Mountain Hawks was the "Cardiac Kids". Every week, the Mountain Hawks would fall behind.  Every week, there would be hiccups, issues, and heart-stopping moments, but most often would end up in Lehigh victories. Most fans wondered: Could it be possible, would it be possible, for Lehigh to put the pedal to the metal against an opponent, to surge to a huge lead, go for he jugular early, and never look back? This Saturday, the Mountain Hawks answered. Lehigh scored the most points they'd scored in the first half since 2002, scoring on seven of their eight drives of the first half and narrowly missing the eighth.  They'd cruise to a 38-3 halftime lead before the second stringers would make the final score look a lot closer. In short, it was exactly what most of the 9,866 fans in attendance were looking for in the first Patriot League conference game of the season.  Never trailing.  Making the game...

As sports comebacks go, this one was pretty epic. Down 5-1 in the bottom of the eighth inning, Boston OF David Ortiz jumped on the first pitch from Tigers P Joaquin Benoit , a pitch he put over the short right-field bullpen fence in Fenway Park. OF Torii Hunter leaped, and the baseball appeared to bounce off his glove, but he went head-over-heels into the dugout without the ball in hand, and Big Papi had tied the game at "five". Like so many Lehigh football games this season, Boston came from behind, thanks to heady baserunning by OF Johnny Gomes , and ultimately won Game 2 of the ALCS 6-5. It seemed apropos that this game would have that score, and be won in this way, because it seems like that game could also be a microcosm of this Lehigh football regular season, too. Everywhere you look at this season thus far, things are coming up "fives" for Lehigh.

(Photo Credit: Howard Smith /USA Today Sports ) So on the morning of October 5th, I got out of bed. The Lehigh football team was undefeated, of course. WR Ryan Spadola was a receiver on the NFL's New York Jets, and by many indications was in line for more playing time on the biggest of stages, Monday Night football. And G C.J. McCollum , after ripping up the NBA summer league for the Portland Trailblazers, seemed poised to enter the NBA season with a flourish, maybe even competing for Rookie of the Year. By the end of my trip to the Big Apple, all three dreams were shattered. Athletically, most Lehigh people of all stripes had three things in which they take an immense amount of "pride" - the football team, successful on the field for so long, the battle of Ryan Spadola against the odds to make the 53 man roster of the New York Jets, and the first Lehigh player ever taken in the NBA draft, C.J. McCollum.  By the end of Saturday, Lehigh's "pride...

(Photo Credit: Justin Lafleur /Lehigh Athletics) It was a real Yankee crowd in the Bronx this afternoon - a sellout, overflow Bronx crowd of over 7,800. Without a Yankee postseason to worry about, the nationally-ranked Fordham Rams had something they hadn't had on an October afternoon in a very long time: the undivided sports attention of the local area, playing against another Top 25 team on national television. When the calls didn't go the Rams' way, the fans stood up the same way they might in New Yankee Stadium, arguing the call.  And when a play didn't have yellow laundry on the field, indeed, the "Bronx Cheer" the Borough made famous did indeed ripple through the crowd. Not that Fordham needed help from the refs. The Rams may have had some doubters going into this weekend with their 5-0 record, but there sure aren't any more after a resounding, offensive clinic that made Lehigh pay desperately for two turnovers and ultimately had Fordham ...

(Photo Credit:  Matt Smith / The Express-Times ) Below the flip, enjoy this week's "LFN Players of the Week" for the New Hampshire game.

(Photo Credit:  Andrew Miller / Trenton Times ) Below the flip, enjoy this week's "LFN Players of the Week" for the Princeton game.

(Photo Credit: Justin LaFleur /Lehigh Athletics) Below the flip, enjoy this week's "LFN Players of the Week" and a Two Minute drill on the quotes from this Saturday's game. I've decided to break out the sneak peek at Princeton into a different blog post - for reasons that will be come clear.

As much as I sometimes regret to admit, I remember the group Styx, and I also remember the album Paradise Theater . One of the songs on that album, "Borrowed Time" (today's "Sunday Word"), reminded me a lot of how Lehigh is winning football games right now. The song, buried deep in my memory banks, perhaps not gracing my ears for more than two decades, struck me after the Mountain Hawks won their second improbable, impossible, game in a row. "Don't look now, but here come the '80s!" lead singer Dennis DeYoung croons. "Don't look now, but here comes the 2013 season!", the entire Lehigh football team seems to be telling me in the same way, flirting with danger, converting improbable plays into huge momentum swings, twenty-point deficits into touchdowns, losses into wins.

(Photo Credit: Justin Lafleur /Lehigh Athletics) "I'd never seen it," head coach Andy Coen said, adding a "whew" for good measure. He was referring to a very strange play this Saturday, a play that happened in Lehigh's favor that felt like the decisive play of the game. Down 25-21, and senior P Tim Divers readying to punt, speedy Monmouth CB Tevrin Brandon blocked his punt - the ball deflecting almost straight up, then falling back down to earth behind the line of scrimmage, where alert senior FB Zach Hayden kept calm, grabbed the ball out of the air, and started to go for the first down marker. He did more than get enough yards for the first down.  He rumbled 37 yards, thus turning the momentum of the game completely on its head. Two plays later, senior QB Brandon Bialkowski hit senior WR Lee Kurfis with a 40 yard dagger to make the score 28-25. It would be a death blow from which Monmouth wouldn't recover. “I’ve been coaching and ...

Last season, Lehigh's defense was expected to help carry an offense a little as a new offense learns the ropes. This time around, though, it's a completely different situation. Eight starters depart last year's starting squad, including key members of both the defensive line and defensive backfield rotation.  Oh yeah, and LB Billy Boyko , an undrafted free agent signee by the Raiders in the offseason, graduates as well. It's not like the cupboard is bare by any means.  But, man, eight starters? While the expectation is that Lehigh's offense will proceed just fine, the defense just has so many departing seniors that it's worth asking the question: what's the expectation for 2013?

(Photo Credit: Matt Smith /Lehigh Valley Live) We are getting so close now we can all taste it. Thankfully for all of us, our next honoree, senior FS Tyler Ward , has a great impact picture from Lehigh's last game of 2012 - versus Lafayette, of course - to carry us through to the Big Day 23 days away.

(Photo Credit: Lehigh Athletics) Despite the meetings with the other coaches beforehand, despite the bustling schedule of Media Day, where coaches are shunted around for two straight hours, fielding video spots, and reporter after reporter with digital recorders in hand, by the time I got to Lehigh head coach Andy Coen , any stress from the commotion was not evident anywhere when I talked to him. Perhaps part of that came due to his incredible success over the past three seasons. With a 31-6 record in the past three years, two Patriot League Championships, playoff wins against the CAA and Missouri Valley champs, and last year's 10-1 record, his three last years at Lehigh can be stacked up against anyone's in the country. North Dakota State's Craig Bohl , who downed Lehigh on their way to their first FCS National Championship in 2010, went 37-7 over that time period.  The coach of the team they beat twice for the national championship, Sam Houston State's Willi...

(Photo Credit: Kevin Mingora/The Morning Call/April 20th, 2013) By any measure the defense probably had more of its share of concern - and attention from coaches and fans alike - in this Spring season. They had heard the issues all Spring long - the fact that only three starters returned on defense, including four new starters in the secondary and three new starters on the defensive line. “The defense needs to get better,” Coen said in the release before the Brown/White game. “They didn’t perform very well in our last scrimmage and our coaches have challenged them." The defensive Brown team, led by new team captains senior LB Nigel Muhammad and senior FS Tyler Ward , responded to the challenge. Using a modified scoring system, the Brown defense scored 14 points off of sacks and 12 points off of turnovers as the defense put up a solid performance in a 46-37 victory.

Last season, there was little drama on the defensive side of the ball going into the spring season. With all-Patriot League names like DT Sajjad Chagani, DE Tom Bianchi, LB Billy Boyko and CB Bryan Andrews on the roster, you knew that the squad was more in a mode to "tweak" rather than to "retool". This season sees not only these three position leaders graduate, but plenty more, making the defense much less experiences, and a much larger area of competition, than last season. “The defense needs to get better,” head coach Andy Coen said in this week's release . “They didn’t perform very well in our last scrimmage and our coaches have challenged them. We haven’t had a lot of live tackling because we’re in a tailback situation. Last week we got more into it, we scrimmaged, and we didn’t tackle very well. We have to improve upon that."