D3football Daily Dose

Phew. This was one of those weeks I spent in front of the computer — I owed the family a little time so I didn’t travel and instead stuck around and watched the scoreboard, live stats and listened to games.

Started my morning with my usual Saturday wake-up call from Western Wisconsin Sports Radio, which has me on for a few minutes in their morning football show every week to talk national scene for Division III.

I figure I listened to or tracked on live stats about a dozen of today’s games. Caught the ending of the Otterbein/Capital game as Capital had a shot from the Otterbein 35 on the final snap. Capital has got to do a better job on its crosstown rival. Joe Loth has that program headed in the right direction.

Baldwin-Wallace had me concerned — I’d been told by more than one person, including insiders, that they weren’t going to be an OAC factor this year yet they led Ohio Northern 17-0 at one point. Not for long, though.

Checked in on Mount Union about midway through the second quarter and quickly realized there wasn’t going to be any need to check back. Yikes.

Spent a lot of time listening to Alma/Wittenberg. Alma was up 17-0, Wittenberg rallied to take the lead, then Alma pulled away.

My alma mater had my blood pumping in mid-afternoon. Catholic rallied to take the lead at No. 23 McDaniel, then saw the Green Terror tie on the last play of regulation. Two overtimes later, someone finally made an extra point and McDaniel won. Catholic isn’t the best 0-3 team in the country by any stretch (hello, Wittenberg) but it will win some games.

Listened to a good amount of the Mary Hardin-Baylor/Texas Lutheran broadcast. Once I figured out which team was “we” to the broadcasters it was a lot easier. Also spent a lot of time with the Redlands/Trinity (Texas) broadcast, which I usually do with any 10 p.m. game. Thanks for the shout-out to our readers, Mitch and folks. Hope you guys get lots of free shoes and tomato sauce!

Crazy e-mail of the day

Marietta College is going to represent the OAC. How can you leave them out of the top 25. One of the top conferences in the nation. Never mind their previous history. They are for Real.

Sent from Stevens Point, Wis., where I’m guessing this person has seen a lot of Marietta football. Marietta had a nice 6-4 season last year but holding off on Top 25 consideration until they play Capital, Ohio Northern or Mount Union.

Come to think of it, didn’t Marietta coach Todd Glaser come from a WIAC school to take this job? Hmm …

Games that concern me
McDaniel/Catholic: McDaniel’s injury problems are obviously having an effect. Going to drop them on my Top 25 ballot until they show they’re healthy.
Wilkes/Delaware Valley: So Wilkes lost to William Paterson and almost beat Del Val? Which is the real Wilkes and which the real Del Val?
Ithaca/Hartwick: Although Jamie Donovan finally put up numbers worthy of the dominant running back I saw at Cortaca last year, worried about the final. Ithaca was up by 31 early in the fourth quarter, though.
UW-Whitewater/Lakeland: Man, that’s a lot of points. Save some for Oct. 1.

Keith McMillan and I will be there for that game, by the way, between UW-Eau Claire and UW-Whitewater. Looking forward to it.

Here’s my take on upcoming Week 3 games:

Game that won’t live up to previous years: No. 3 Mount Union at John Carroll. JCU has given Mount Union fits at home at times in recent years, but not this time.

Game that will live up to previous years: Lycoming at Widener.

Top 25 team most likely to get upset: No. 11 Trinity (Texas). Hopefully they travel better than the last time they visited SCIAC country and lost to Pomona-Pitzer. Redlands is better than that P-P team.

Close but not quite: Texas Lutheran will give Mary Hardin-Baylor a game but won’t be able to push over the top.

Best key game: I think the game between No. 13 Salisbury and No. 20 Christopher Newport will be the best game of the day, at least among games featuring two playoff contenders.

Two and a half games: Keith McMillan mentioned in ATN the chance to see Hardin-Simmons and Mary Hardin-Baylor each at home on Saturday, but start a little earlier in the day and take in the first half of the McMurry/Austin College game, which starts two hours earlier on the other side of Abilene.

Wake-up call: Franklin and Marshall better have put its bye week to good use after losing at Bethany, because Hobart is not going to be as … err … diplomatic.

Culture shock: Springfield gets to see what a WIAC team is like. UW-Stout might not have faced the triple option before, but they see the wishbone year-in and year-out, so the learning curve won’t be great.

One-man show: There are doubts whether Earlham’s Justin Rummell will be healthy enough to go against Anderson, so we’ll pick Augsburg’s Marcus LeVesseur, put back in at quarterback last week at Wartburg. (That’s his picture above.) Augsburg went 2-8 last year yet still gave North Central a game on the road. What will they do at home?

Although that’s exactly what it was for two receivers last week.

Lorne Chan explains how Texas Lutheran Bulldog Chris Edwards regained interest in football after taking two years off. The San Antonio Express-News even cites the role of certain “Division III football Web sites and message boards” in this rejuvenation.

In Michigan Matthew Mowrey tells the inspirational story of Alma senior Nate Jervey who caught his first touchdown pass last weekend since returning from surgery last year to remove a benign tumor. You can read about Jervey, who also played hoops for the Scots, in the Mt. Pleasant (Mich.) Morning Sun.

The Wildcats were fired up for our first game against Western Oregon over the weekend. You can only practice against your own team for so long before you start to go crazy. Especially going against our defense which seems to run every blitz known to football and a few others that aren’t. So finally getting to step onto the field against a different color jersey was a great relief, made all the sweeter by the margin of victory. WOU answered on their first drive to knot things up at 7, mostly riding their monster tight end. Our defense made their necessary adjusments and from then on, it was all ‘cats. The offense scored on all but 2 of our possessions; punting once and turning the ball over on downs at the end of the game.

The defense came up big with 5 turnovers, two inside the 3 yard line while WOU was threatening. The first was a pic by DE Brandon Tom at the 1 and the second a fumble recovery by DE Jeff Denney at the 3. And the reward for building a large lead is the opportunity to watch younger guys play. Many were able to play almost all of the 4th quarter and moved the ball pretty well.

This week we have Wisconsin Stevens Point which should prove a much more formidable challenge. Last year they played us tough the whole way, leading for 3 quarters. We started working hard from the start of the week, including our typical monday recovery day so we’ll be in top form come saturday.

The team has been presented with an awesome opportunity for next spring. We have been contacted to possibly play in Vienna Austria after the school year as part of their professional league’s preseason. It would be a 9 day trip, 5 spent travelling to different cities in Austria. Around 80 guys expressed serious interest and we’ll begin fund raising soon.

Speaking of fundraising, many different groups around the country have been collecting and donating money for the gulf states and Linfield is no exception. We asked all the guys to donate whatever they felt appropriate which resulted in approximately $550. Not bad for an impromptu effort. Other groups on campus are doing their own events including an on-campus concert Wednesday night.

It is often in times of great hardship and tragedy that people’s true characters are revealed. Many people are great people when everything is going right. It is when life gets hard that you find out who is truly strong. Which is another reason why I believe football and athletics in general to be extremely valuable. You learn how to handle challenges and adversity. Everyone will face hardships in life, but it is how they respond that will determine their success.

Saturday marked a big day for Fitchburg football. For the six of us players that came in four years ago with the new coaching staff, Saturday was the first time that we won our opener. Saturday was also revenge for two losses last year.

In all my years of playing football I have never seen a player dominate a football game the way our senior linebacker Frank Famularo did on Saturday. Frank has been a leader from the first day he arrived at Fitchburg, and has been a captain for three seasons. Since Aug. 19, when we came in to camp Frank has been stressing one thing, to take care of business against Curry.

“Take care of business,” is exactly what Frank did on Saturday — 15 tackles (13 solo) and a pick for a touchdown is a great day for any player, but more importantly Frank was our leader. 85 players and coaches went to battle on Saturday afternoon. Frank by far stood out as the heart and soul of our team.

There was something, however that did not go well. We had three kicks blocked — two field goals and an extra point. It was very aggravating and we need to work hard this week to improve on that part of the game. Special teams are very important to our success and we need to take advantage when we can get the points.

Today is September 11, 2005, 4 years after the tragedy of 9/11/01, so I feel that today is a good day to talk a little about the important things outside of football. Fitchburg football doesn’t employ any full-time coaches. We have a collection of hard working guys that know the game and want to teach the game they love. Our staff consists of a nurse, a recreation director, two teachers, two correction officers, a traveling coach, a cop, and a firefighter, all of which make very large contributions to society.

Our head coach is a firefighter and his hard work and dedication along with that of the rest of the coaching staff is something that us players appreciate very much. Coach loves football and he makes sure that we all know by the time and effort he puts into making sure that we are successful, but I don’t think he would change his profession for anything. I have been able to get close to coach Haverty and when he speaks of being a firefighter you can hear the proudness in his voice. I have often heard him tell people how his father and his grandfather were both firefighter and that it is very important to him.

It is days like today September 11, when we need to appreciate what others do on a daily basis. Thank you to everyone out there who either puts there own lives in jeopardy, or helps to make someone else’s life better.

Alright, these aren’t as immediate as they could be, thanks to the server problems we had last night. Thankfully, we found out this morning that the issues were not related to the amount of traffic on the site, but a memory problem on the machine.

Carthage continued to struggle on offense. The Redmen can skate by another two weeks because they face Benedictine in Week 3 and have a bye in Week 4 but Millikin starts off the CCIW portion of the schedule in Week 5, followed immediately by North Central and Augustana.

Speaking of Augustana, the Vikings looked pretty good on Saturday at Catholic. The final score is somewhat misleading — it was 49-7 when Augustana put the second string in and Catholic’s first string scored three times. Catholic looks like it’s on the road to recovery, however. The Cardinals moved the ball somewhat consistently between the 20s but threw two picks in the end zone and missed a field goal.

Principia needs to go back to the drawing board on special teams with three failed conversions in a 20-18 loss to Trinity Bible. (Been a while since anyone’s used those words.)

Lost in the shadow of the numbers put up by Earlham, Manchester and Washington and Jefferson yesterday was the offensive onslaught by St. John Fisher. The Cardinals posted 672 yards of offense and got three touchdowns apiece by Mark Robinson (one was 86 yards) and Noah Fehrenbach (one was 55 yards) in beating Rochester. That’s pretty good from an offense that looked like it had been simplified last week for Nick Suchyna’s first career start.

Along with Carthage, worried about Albright (34-33 win at Ursinus), Hampden-Sydney (allowed 40 points to Gettysburg) and Wheaton (23-16 win against Gustavus, which has lost 12 of its past 14 games).

Don’t overlook: Fitchburg State beating Curry in an NEFC crossover game pitting last year’s two division champs. It’s Curry’s second loss in 23 regular-season games. … North Park starts off 2-0 for the first time in goodness knows how long. In Kickoff, remember, we projected they would actually win a conference game. … Of course, we also thought Puget Sound would play nine games. … John Carroll had eight takeaways against Hope (six picks, two fumble recoveries).

This past week has been filled with excitement and anticipation for the Falcons as we are preparing to play our first game of the season against Curry College. We are going into the game with a good group of veterans along with some new faces.

The team will led by a group of veterans, starting with our four well-deserving captains. LB’s Frank Famularo and Christian Mello will lead the defense, while OL Frank Flanagan and QB Corey Hetherman will lead the offensive attack.

Some other key offensive players will be RB Brian Milleisen, WRs Justin Sleeper, Caleb McKenzie and OT Pat O’Brien.

In addition to our defensive captains, LB John Sweeney, DL Matt Babcock, and CB Dee Whitehead will lead our defense.

One other person that is important to our special teams’ success is veteran Dave Mahoney. He has been a special teams leader for the past two seasons.

Along with head coach Pat Haverty we have a great coaching staff with a lot of knowledge of the game. We also welcome former teammate Carmy Cesaire as the receivers’ coach.

Back for another year on staff is LB coach Matt Gardner, who is coming off a World Championship season with the Colorado Crush of the Arena Football League.

Today we are going to get out on the field for a little while to make sure everyone is all set on what we are doing tomorrow. Then it is rest tonight, and get we’ll get after it tomorrow.

Outside of football I am preparing for my internship which begins Monday morning. I was hoping to start last week, but some scheduling problems prevented that.

Most importantly, I got engaged on Thursday to my girlfriend of almost seven years, Lindsey.

I thought when Macalester decided to drop out of the MIAC to an independent football schedule in 2002 it would be a wake up call for other struggling teams across the nation.

I guess it wasn’t.

As I read the announcement from Lewis & Clark president Tom Hochstettler, I felt like I was sitting in the Macalester auditorium in 2001 as a current player, listening to former Macalester president Michael McPherson give a similar announcement.

The announcements were eerily similar, as if there is a Micrsoft Word template for how to give up on your institution’s football team by making it sound like you have their best interests in mind.

McPherson’s letter said,

“Our concerns included not only the difficulty of competing effectively against teams with so many players, but also about the risks to health and safety that might be imposed by this imbalance.”

Hochstettler’s letter said,

“…come to the difficult conclusion that having too few players on the Pioneer football team puts our players at undue risk for injury, to the point of constituting an actual endangerment to their well-being.”

So, the two main concerns appear to be roster size and fear of injury.

Macalester’s roster has hovered around 40 players for as long as I have been associated with the program. With injuries, there were times when we dipped down around 30 players throughout a season. When we went 5-5 in 2002 we had 35 guys on the team. Don’t let any administrator tell you that you can’t compete or win with 35 players. They just have to be the right players.

Currently, the 2005 Macalester roster has 40 players on it. This independent experience, which was supposed to help improve the team and increase the roster, has not helped to increase our roster size at all. Yet, rosters of the teams we are playing are in the 70-80 range. Carleton, our MIAC academic foe, has nearly 90 players on their team — the most since WWII.

The concern for injury is the second reason for the actions these school presidents have taken. Injuries are a part of football that every player who straps on a helmet accepts. Injuries tend to occur in blowouts when players on opposite sides of the ball are likely moving at different speeds.

In 2004, Macalester lost by more points per game (36 ppg) than they did in their last season in the MIAC in 2001 (29 ppg). Yet, the concern for injury has not been mentioned.

So, what am I trying to say here? These schools who are struggling need more than a temporary fix. They need people who care and a concrete plan for improvement.

Macalester now has a new president and new athletic director who both seem to have the passion and energy to turn around the Macalester program. If the Scots’ 21-10 defeat in Week 1 is any indication, the team is already starting to improve.

It’s a shame that Lewis & Clark chose the forfeiture route but what will be an even bigger shame is if they don’t put the time and effort into making a plan to turn the program around.

Larry Beckish of the Hilton Head (S.C.) Island Packet is apparently ready to make the move.

That is, the move from Division I to Division III football fandom or at least begin more closely following a level where student athletes are the rule, not the exception.

Good to have you aboard, Larry.

Just so you know, Amherst and Tufts can’t meet in the Stagg Bowl for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is the NESCAC doesn’t participate in the playoffs. But you’ll get the hang of this soon.

Dear readers:

Maybe you’ve noticed, maybe you haven’t, but we’re no longer running pop-up ads on our sites.

For a few years, pop-up ads were what kept this site alive. We know that they are not popular with visitors, but for a long time, allowing one pop-up ad per visitor was all we needed to stay out of the red. Now, with the success of the Kickoff, we no longer need to bother you this way.

Who knows, perhaps someday our operating costs will go back up again and we’ll need to return to some more intrusive advertising method. But as long as you guys let the banner ads continue to be shown, we should be fine.

Thanks for your tolerance. Enjoy 2005 football.