D3football Daily Dose

“This game will be won in the trenches” goes the old cliché extolling the value of a powerful offensive and defensive line.

And while some clichés are more useful than others (See: “He really came to play today”), this one has some heft to it in more ways than one.

Just ask the Mary Hardin-Baylor Crusaders whose offense mashed its way to last year’s Stagg Bowl behind three D3football.com All-American linemen. Or, for that matter, ask the Linfield Wildcats whose front five only allowed 13 sacks last year.

And so this week we turn our eyes to recruits who could specialize in pancake blocks and pass protection next season.

Washington University announced that Danny Luce – a 6-foot-2, 235-pound senior at Stanwood (Wash.) High School – will come to St. Louis next fall. Bears coach Larry Kindbom offered a promising review of Luce to The Daily Herald of Everett, Wash., calling him “an outstanding athlete and a very good football player.”

Of course, size isn’t everything. That’s why the Recruiting Recap smiles happily on Augustana recruit Travis Morgan who did a little bit of everything for Pecatonica (Ill.) High School. According to the Rockford Register Star, Morgan played fullback, defensive end, outside linebacker and center while weighing in at 5-10, 185 pounds.

Morgan probably won’t play all those positions for the Vikings when he arrives in Rock Island this fall.

One recruit expecting such a change is Frankie Herrera who will reportedly play safety for Texas Lutheran after suiting up as a full back and linebacker at Port Isabel (Texas) High School. Herrera told the Brownsville Herald that he’s not worried about the move since “The coach told me I (get to) hit a lot and that’s what I like doing.”

Meanwhile South Fork (Fla.) High School is dishing out recruits across Division III’s landscape. Easton Gunnoe and John LeMaster head to John Carroll in Ohio, Adam Pawlak goes to Concordia (Wis.), and Zack Brumfield is bound for Ferrum in Virginia.

Other recruiting announcements from the previous week include the following:

- Paracelete HS (Lancaster, Calif.) product Zach Anderson to Augustana

- Mike Whitmore of Rockford (Ill.) East HS to Beloit

- Joel Sienicki of Northridge (Ind.) to Bluffton

- Jeremy Winter of Madison (Wis.) East HS to Carroll

- Paul Skidmore of Arundel (Md.) HS to Franklin & Marshall

- Joseph Sinyard of Pace (Texas) HS to Hardin-Simmons

- Joel Hawkins of Fairfield (Ind.) to Manchester

- Belvidere (Ill.) HS graduate Anthony Goranson to Monmouth

- Jager (Ill.) HS graduate Kevin Conway to North Central

- NorthWood (Ind.) HS teammates Jason Hochstetler and Andrew Huber to Tri-State

- Bay Port (Wis.) HS tight end Dan Bassindale to UW-Stevens Point

Before we close, the voices of college professors past remind me to cite my sources, so thanks to Cat11 for the story on Herrera. And thanks to another Recap reader who emailed us about Iroquois (N.Y.) HS running back Steve Mamak who will lace up cleats for Muskingum next year.

If you want to join the fun by posting recruiting news, you can use the comments feature below. But you must include a newspaper URL to verify the story like these two contributors did. Otherwise it’ll disappear faster than free cake in a football press box.

For more passive forms of entertainment, here is the list of all the recruits we’ve heard about so far.

It’s only May, but there’s a dream match-up happening right before our eyes.

It’s a battle between the last three programs to hoist the Walnut and Bronze — Linfield vs. St. John’s vs. Mount Union.

Not on the field, mind you, but on your computer screen where uberauction site eBay offers memorabilia from the Wildcats, Johnnies and Purple Raiders.

Do you want to “leave no doubt” that the Wildcats are the best? Then you might bid on this Linfield football helmet.

Or maybe you’re convinced nothing can top the Johnnies’ memorable run in 2003. Then you can bid on this ring commemorating Gagliardi’s record-breaking victory.

Or maybe you want to celebrate Mount Union’s 2002 championship with this fancy lid. Geez, has it really been that long since they won a title? Only kidding, Raider Nation.

eBay aficionados already know the site is a fun place to find, well, just about anything you can imagine. But who knew that included a miniature version of a Wesley Wolverines’ helmet? Even the NESCAC, which won’t join the playoff party, is in on the fun.

If you’re bored – and we know you are since it’s still only May – surf on over to eBay and see what interesting D3 treasures you can unearth.

Just don’t you dare cast a bid on my favorite item – the
John Gagliardi Bobblehead (pictured above).

To register a new address for eBay and benefit D3football.com at the same time, click here.

It’s hard to avoid noticing the trend. At the beginning of Mount Union’s run, the Purple Raiders were playing Defiance for their non-conference game (the Ohio Athletic Conference has 10 teams, meaning only one opponent must be found each year). Then it was Albion, followed by Allegheny. All regional foes, all within a reasonable distance and with the last two, some reason to expect a competitive result, at least at the time the game was scheduled.

But two years of Allegheny were followed by two years of UW-Whitewater, then Wash U, not an easy trip for either squad. The outcome was hardly in doubt last year and won’t be this year. Next on the list, Averett, a nearly 500-mile trip past Salem to the North Carolina/Virginia border. Mount Union has to go further and further afield to find an opponent. In an era of automatic playoff bids for winning your conference and Pool C bids expanding from three to seven, there’s less and less reason to duck a strong non-conference opponent.

Kudos to Averett for taking the challenge. And shame on anyone closer to Alliance who shared the same open date.

Millsaps couldn’t provide any documentation to verify its claim that Concordia-Selma (or as they list it, Concordia (AL)) had a varsity football program. Well, according to this article from the Selma Times-Journal which a reader sent, they don’t currently, but plan to in 2005. They claim to have ended spring practice with 64 players.

Good thing it’s a home game for Millsaps — with the way Concordia-Selma gets scores out from its other sports, I doubt Millsaps would get accurate stats from this game.

‘Tis the season that we read about Division III football players enjoying athletic success in other sports. Like IWU’s punter-pitcher Drew Himes and place kicker-outfielder Mike Berry whose Titans are competing in the NCAA Division III Baseball tournament this weekend.

So this week’s Recruiting Recap goes out to those incoming freshmen who’ve excelled athletically on and off the football field.

Concordia-Moorhead will receive a three-sport star when Moorhead High School senior Cory Johnson enrolls at the school. Along with playing high school football for the MHS Spuds, Johnson was all-state in track and a junior hockey league prospect.

After not being selected in the recent United States Hockey League draft, Johnson decided he’ll trade in his Spuds duds for Cobbers’ maroon and gold.

“I get to play for a great program and get a great education. That made the decision a lot easier,” Johnson told The (Fargo, ND) Forum
.
On a side note, Johnson’s high school mascot was a Spud? His college mascot will be an angry ear of corn? I’m bursting with bad, side order-related puns right now. We need to move on.

Another multi-sport star will suit up for the Washington & Jefferson Presidents this fall. Southwestern (NY) HS senior Matt Mazgaj, who was recently honored for his wrestling prowess, will travel south to join the defending PAC champions. According to the Buffalo News, Mazgaj was a two-time state wrestling champion in the 215-lbs weight class.

Dinwiddie (VA) HS product Khalee Prothro will attend Widener University after completing a three-sport career in high school. Prothro, who also played basketball and ran track at Dinwiddie, saw action on offense and special teams on the football field.

“I like football the most,” Prothro told The (Petersburg, VA) Progress-Index. “It gives me a chance to let out some steam.”

Meanwhile a couple programs who are never short on good recruits were named as high school players’ college of choice.

Dan Georgatos of Foothill (CA) HS will enroll at Mount Union.

Redwood Valley (MN) HS quarterback-wide receiver tandem Luke Radel and Bryan Busack enjoyed playing together so much, they hope to do it again at St. John’s University. The Redwood (MN) Gazette points out that Radel’s brother Jeff also played college ball in Collegeville.

Other recruits who’ve found a home include:

- Shorecrest (FL) HS graduate Bill Wood at Amherst.

- Cave Spring (VA) HS teammates Wade Hammes and Chaffin Scott at Bridgewater (VA).

- Johnsburg (IL) HS senior Nick Biederer at Concordia (Wis).

- Mahnomen (MN) HS graduate Levi DeVries at Concordia-Moorhead.

- Jimmy King of Hidden Valley (VA) HS at Ferrum.

- Rosewood (NC) HS quarterback Danny Langston at Guilford.

- Milton Strother of Daphne (Al) HS at Huntingdon.

- Anthony Catucci of Spalding (MD) HS at McDaniel.

- Dustin Stephens of Prairie Central (IL) HS at Millikin.

- Mount Vernon (OH) HS seniors Bobby Peck and Ty Callkins at Ohio Northern.

- Severna Park (MD) teammates Chris Anthony and Tim Hackmann at Salisbury.

Impress your friends and neighbors with your knowledge of recruits’ destinations by checking out a longer list here.

And please remember that any comments posted below with recruiting news must be accompanied by the related newspaper story’s URL. No ifs, ands or Spuds about it.

A handful of schools have yet to release a 2005 schedule, but we’ve gotten final schedules from Newport News, Ursinus and Gustavus Adolphus over the past week. About half of the schedules still missing are from the NESCAC, which only affects the teams on that little island anyway.

The Gustavus folks say they still might have an announcement soon about adding a tenth game. If so, it might have to be a long trip, or someone from outside Division III, or Crown, or a second game against St. Thomas. Either that or Northwestern is looking to play three games in one day. (For those who missed it, the first-year provisional members are already taking on mighty Trinity Bible and Macalester on the same day, Oct. 8.)

There are some games which we know must exist, but just don’t know for sure when. We assume Rochester and Worcester Polytech will play each other this year, since both are in the Liberty League. Rowan would be expected to play Kean, right?

Millsaps only has eight games at this point. Well, they have nine games listed on their own Web site, but one of the schools on the list, “Concordia (AL)”, doesn’t appear to have varsity football.

One school sent us a schedule that claimed it was playing SUNY-Maritime in its opener this year. Interesting, considering Maritime doesn’t play varsity football until 2006.

Montclair State and Huntingdon are still an opponent short after the Thomas More/PAC fallout. You know, considering that the PAC appears intent on adding more teams — “Long-term, we envision a PAC with 8-10 members … we expect to reach our desired membership level in the near future,” said the leader of the conference’s presidents council — if I were a coach, I’d be very leery about scheduling ANY teams in that conference right now. Who would want to be caught in the next PAC land grab?

And in closing, even though we haven’t asked for them yet, we have received two 2005 season previews. So dig in!

There are three open head coaching jobs that we’re aware of, and here’s what we know about them:

Kings Point (3-7, 3-4 Liberty League in 2004)
Tim McNulty resigned at the end of March and the school intends to introduce his replacement tomorrow afternoon. All indications from the rumor mill point to Mike Toop, head coach at Division I-AA non-scholarship Davidson. Toop is an alumnus of the institution, also known as the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy. He’s 17-22 at Davidson, which has moved recently to playing almost exclusively I-AA schools instead of mostly I-AA and a handful of D-IIIs.

Pomona-Pitzer (4-5, 3-3 SCIAC)
Roger Caron left the school in early April to coach at Cheshire Academy in Cheshire, Conn. The school still has his name on the Web site and his voice and name are still on the voice mail. That’s because Pomona-Pitzer believes Caron is taking a one-year leave of absence, according to athletic director Charles Katsiaficas, who expects Caron to return next spring. Scott Rynne will coach the team in 2005.

Waynesburg (7-4, 3-2 PAC)
Jeff Hand left for conference rival Westminster (Pa.). The school says it intends to go through a search and hire a “permanent” replacement but time is awful short for that.

Also, Brent Becker was named interim head coach at Lake Forest in February, but will be coaching there in 2005. A search will begin at the end of the season.

Tell me you don’t feel the same way.

I’m definitely ready for football to start. I’ve ridden the high from Division III basketball as much as I can. I love major league baseball, but that’s not the same. But it’s been almost five months since the Stagg Bowl, and football needs to start.

It’s the worst time of the year. The NFL Draft is done. Schedules are basically finished. Graduations litter the May schedule … and it’s still more than three months until kickoff!

Don’t get me wrong — I enjoy the opportunity to spend extra time with my kids, especially with the newborn taking up a lot of our time. The lawn needs to be cut. The kids like to play outside. I need to get the brakes checked and some tires replaced after putting another umpteen hundred miles on the cars during the football and basketball season. But it’s a long time until kickoff and I’m sitting here ready to go.

Let’s skip June and July and get it on.

Folks in Indiana have been well aware; people in neighboring states, not always. But with most of Indiana refusing to observe Daylight Savings Time, it’s been a curse on football schedule-makers.

For those who don’t know, most of Indiana, the part in the Eastern Time Zone, has not observed Daylight Savings Time, the time between the beginning of April and the end of October in which most of the USA turns its clocks forward one hour. Therefore, games scheduled in Indiana from Weeks 1-9 actually start one hour later to those based in Michigan, Ohio, etc.

Most of the Indiana schools get their schedules right year-in and year-out. They know that if a game starts at 1:30 in Ohio, then they need to list it as 12:30 on their schedule if listing it in Indiana time. But it often confuses opposing schedule-makers, who will list a 1:30 Indiana Time game as 1:30, rather than 2:30, and say “All Times Eastern.”

It even causes headaches on our schedule, since the change in time comes during the football season. We have to manually change the clocks between Week 9 and Week 10, when Indiana comes back into line. It also affects people calling the NCAA’s national office, in Indianapolis.

Thankfully, starting in 2006, this will no longer be an issue. The state’s legislature passed a law restoring Daylight Savings Time in Indiana for the first time since the early 1970s.

We can hardly wait.

Some of Division III’s newest programs – including one that won’t play a varsity game until 2006 and another that isn’t playoff eligible until 2008 – lead the list of destinations announced by recent recruits.

Tavares (FL) High School seniors Ryan Leary and Danny McManus will enroll at SUNY-Maritime (Coach Clayton Kendrick-Holmes standing to right in photo). The Throggs Neck, Long Island-based school announced it will compete as a club team in 2005 and play a varsity schedule in 2006. Tavares teammate Matt Habermehl will attend Millikin University.

North Carolina Wesleyan, which enjoyed a 4-4 inaugural season in 2004, will get a pair of New Bern (NC) High School teammates as Joey Belviy and A.J. Glenn announced plans to suit up for the Battling Bishops this season.

Belviy led New Bern in sacks and tackles for loss last season despite standing just 5’6. “It means a lot to me because I really didn’t think I’d get the chance at first because of my height and size,” he recently told the New Bern Sun Journal.

Bradford (FL) High School’s Milton Sumpter will attend Tri-State University, which is entering the second season of a four-year transitional period in its move from NAIA to NCAA.

“I want to thank God for giving me the ability, I want to thank my parents for letting me play and I want to thank my coaches because they taught me a lot, even off the field,” Sumpter told the Bradford County Telegraph.

While Sumpter will pick up some frequent flyer miles traveling from Florida to Indiana, they won’t compare to those racked up by Joe Quinn when he leaves home in Anchorage, Alaska to attend Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland.

Quinn is a two-sport athlete at West Anchorage High School where he plays goalie on the soccer team. “Goalie is kind of the closest soccer position you can get to football,” Quinn quoted to the Anchorage Daily News in this interesting feature. “It’s kind of a seamless transition.”

Of course, we’re only assuming Quinn will fly to JHU. He might choose to make the 76 hour, 4,316-mile trip by car instead.

Elsewhere:

- Paraclete (CA) HS senior Domenic Donato will enroll at Chapman.

- Stevenson (CA) HS seniors Ashton Clarke and Philip Trapp will play for Claremont-Mudd-Scripps while attending Claremont McKenna College.

- Montour (PA) HS senior Ernie Ricci goes to Dickinson.

- Highlands (OH) HS senior Chris Owens will go to Earlham while teammates Bert Bathiany and Shaun Matisak head to Ohio Northern and Weston Lawrence enrolls at Wittenberg.

- Pinkerton (NH) Academy senior Nate Gooden will attend Plymouth State.

For a list of other recruits and their college destinations, click here.

If you want to share recruiting news, feel free to do so using the comments feature below. But don’t forget that you need to post the link to the newspaper story so we can verify the information.

Otherwise we’ll make you chauffer Joe Quinn from Baltimore to Anchorage over Christmas break.