Archive For The “Drew Paulsen” Category
(Photo Credit: Lehigh Athletics)
The ambulance came onto the field for the third time during a Lehigh football game.
On this occasion, it was that senior TE Drew Paulsen was trying to recover an onsides kick for the Mountain Hawks. Down only a field goal, head coach Andy Coen was trying to get the ball back to take advantage of momentum.
But something happened.
On the tackle, he had a head or neck injury, necessitating for the third time this year that an ambulance had to come on to the field for a Lehigh game.
The extremely-loved senior out of Tampa, Florida was carted out on a gurney, and headed to local Presybterian hospital for observation. On the TV broadcast, they showed tears from some of the players on the sidelines.
Lehigh lost to Fordham, 45-35, in an extremely frustrating game where the Mountain Hawks turned over the ball four times, twice in the red zone, and twice setting up Fordham in their red zone. But the injury to Paulsen, and the right leg injury that came up earlier to senior DT Jimmy Mitchell, was the focus after the game. The worries were clearly centered around the two seniors’ well-being.
“It’s unbelievable,” Coen said, Paulsen’s injury clearly very much on his mind. “I’ve been doing this for thirty-something years, and I’ve had three of these in one season.”
(Photo Credit: The Morning Call)
Going to practice this Wednesday, I wondered how things were going with the Mountain Hawks this spring.
You never really know what to expect until you go, and on a surprisingly chilly evening, I arrived up at Lehigh’s practice fields.
A lot of times at practice you hear jeremiads from the coaching staff on “spirited competition” and competing for positions. But you don’t always see it on the practice field.
On Wednesday, though, it was there. I saw it.
Maybe it’s a product of a lot of players knowing where they fit on the team, and that’s certainly what is my impression in regards to the Lehigh offense.
When you have returning all-Patriot League players at running back, wide receiver, and the offensive line, that’s one level of comfort. When you have a returning quarterback that started three games, including an FCS playoff game, and led an 63-35 win over Yale with 524 yards passing, that’s yet another level of comfort.
Perhaps that’s why it was an entertaining scene of players jawing at one another and competing against each other.
The 2016 Mountain Hawks will be leaning on their offense to carry them in the early going on the season.
That’s because they return eight starters from last year’s squad, which was one of the more prolific offenses in all of FCS.
Looking over the stat sheet from 2015, there’s plenty of athletes carrying over that makes Lehigh Nation drool. The return of a sophomore that was a 1,000 yard rusher as a freshman. The return of an experienced quarterback that has started games each of the last three years. The return of a deep threat receivers that invokes fear in opposing defensive coordinators.
There’s not a lot of drama on the offensive side of the 2016 Lehigh football depth chart. But there’s a lot that has Lehigh Nation extremely excited about the potential for this year.
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