Archive For September 24, 2013

My vote for the FCS Top 25 for the week ending 9/23/2013 follows below the flip.
But first, by all means, enjoy this awesome shot of the Gardner-Webb/Wofford game this past week, played in a driving rainstorm.
The Runnin’ Bulldogs did some of their best wet runnin’ this past weekend, a drenched 3-0 win at Gibbs Stadium in Spartanburg, South Carolina, with RB Juanne Blount of Gardner-Webb helping them control the clock for 37 minutes. They did what it takes to win, in crazy weather conditions.
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(Photo Credit: Justin LaFleur/Lehigh Athletics)
The problem with having a “Sunday Word” for so long is that you keep wanting to reuse an old one to describe a particular game.
“Fun”, which Sautrday’s 29-28 win was? Sorry, already done. How about “Raiders”, which epitomizes the Lehigh ethos at the moment, “Just Win, baby?” Sorry, that’s one’s done, too.
Making things even more challenging was Lehigh’s eventful, to say the least, week leading up to this game. Player suspensions. Critical injuries. Slow starts. Potshots.
In a game where this Lehigh football team could have fallen flat on its face – and appeared to be doing so after a tough first half – the Mountain Hawks took a knee, went back into the locker room, circled the “wagons” (today’s “Sunday Word”), and came out and won the game.
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(Photo Credit: Justin LaFleur/Lehigh Athletics)
Last week, Lehigh beat Monmouth 28-25, partially thanks to a crazy blocked punt that landed behind the line of scrimmage and was caught in mid-air by senior FB Zach Hayden, which he advanced for 37 yards and set up the winning score.
After that game, I asked head coach Andy Coen whether Lehigh fans might be able to expect this type of cardiac win every week.
“Probably,” he said. “I think they’ll all be close. Some of them I hope will be close.”
On a warm Saturday evening in late September, Lehigh pulled the exact same rabbit out the hat that the pulled in the first two games of the year, falling behind 22-3 at halftime before rallying to score 26 points in the second half to beat a tough Princeton team.
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It’s that time of the week where I share with you your weekly Lehigh fan viewing guide for Week 4 of the college football season. Why go to website after website when all the information you need is right here?
Last week I was remiss in forgetting to mention Lehigh’s broadcast information.
Tonight at 6PM, Lehigh at Princeton will be broadcast nationally on NBC Sports Network, and will also be available for live streaming on NBC Sports Live Extra, if your cable company supports it (you’ll probably have to check for yourself).
And I’ll be listenting to the pregame on ESPN 1230 and 1320 of the Lehigh Valley, too, with Tom Fallon, Matt Kerr and Matt Markus. That will also be live streamed here.

(Photo Credit: Keith A. Muccilli/Trenton Times)
We break down the Princeton game – and we give our fearless prediction below the flip.
Though I didn’t get much help from the Ivy League website, doing the Princeton preview is always pleasant because I have a network of people that make it that way.
The Big Green Alert and Roar Lions writers gave me a huge assist in making this week’s preview. They are always huge assets when it comes to anything about the Ivy League, and neither disappointed.
And Princeton’s game notes themselves are also, as expected, top notch. It’s a pleasure to read lead-ins like this:
There is a reason why mid-terms are in October and finals are at the end of the semester. Students do the work class after class, week after week, and then get challenged afterwards.
Imagine getting your syllabus, having a couple weeks to do some reading, and then taking a major test during your first class.
That’s what you, as well as a nationwide audience on the NBC Sports Network, will see Saturday night at 6 pm. The Princeton football team is walking into the classroom for the first time, and it may see the highest-ranked opponent it will see in all of 2013.
But that is the way head coach Bob Surace wants it. After a big step forward last season, he wants to see just how far his team has come in nine months. After all, the next 10 weeks have the potential to be something pretty special.
Princeton has waited long enough. So have you. Let’s go.
Indeed. Let’s go.
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(Photo Credit: Keith A. Muccilli/Trenton Times)
“Once you have some positive things going, you start saying, ‘Wow, I know Lehigh is a great team’. We started playing football, and it was nice to see. After this game, there’s going to be some ‘attaboys’, ‘good efforts’ and everything else, but for us to improve as a team it’s got to go beyond the great effort, the good effort, the hanging in there. It’s not enough. It can’t be the case. It needs to be winning a game that we gave ourselves an opportunity to win.”
That was Princeton head football coach Bob Surace last year after his Tigers came close to beating the Mountain Hawks at Murray Goodman last season, but coming up just a bit short, 17-14.
Princeton’s strong effort that Saturday last season was an indicator that the Tigers, who were 1-9 in 2011, were poised to be a much better team in 2012.
They were.
After a 5-5 season, where the Tigers beat Harvard and Yale – their two biggest rivals – they enter 2013 with goals a lot bigger than a “good effort against Lehigh”. Their goal is re-establishing themselves atop the Ivy League, with their first stop hosting a nationally-ranked Mountain Hawks team on national television.

#Lehigh football coach Andy Coen has acknowledged that “a few of his players” were involved in an off-campus incident & have been suspended
— Keith Groller (@KeithGroller) September 18, 2013

Lehigh’s next opponent, Princeton, plays in their season opener this Saturday at 6PM.
Based on the fact that it’s Princeton’s opener, as well as the opener of the seven other Ivy League schools, you’d think that the conference website would have plenty of articles evaluating the teams of the Ivy League, looking over offenses and defenses, checking out the prospects of all their member teams for the 2013 season.
You’d think so, but you’d be wrong.
I figured I’d share my experience with you, dear Reader, on my attempt to find out something – anything – about the Princeton Tigers from the Ivy League website.
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(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.

My vote for the FCS Top 25 for the week ending 9/16/2013 follows below the flip.
But first, by all means, enjoy this awesome shot of Fordham WR Sam Ajala winning the Rams’ game against a BCS school in Temple.
Want to know the margin between winning and losing? This picture proves it. It’s officially four and a half inches, give or take an inch.
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