Archive For The “FcS Playoffs” Category
By now you’ve heard Lehigh was not selected as an at-large team to the FCS playoffs, despite their 10-1 record.
While most years, most Lehigh fans, including myself, would pull ourselves together, accept our fate, and then pull together and root for Colgate to make a run to Frisco, this year it hasn’t been the case.
There is still a lot of bitterness out there. And I know why.
It is not just the function of one playoff snub.
It is the mounting evidence over the last couple of years that Lehigh, and by extension the rest of the Patriot League, is a part of FCS, but not really.
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Lehigh won ten Division I games this year, something that only three other schools managed this season.
Only one, North Dakota State, was the autobid champions of their conference; the other two, Old Dominion and Montana State, not only made the FCS Playoff field of 20 with ease, they were seeded as one of the Top 5 teams in the country.
Lehigh won their final game of the year against their bitter rivals, Lafayette, in impressive fashion, winning 38-21, a three-score victory.
In contrast, FCS playoff participants New Hampshire, Illinois State, and Wofford lost their games by three scores or more, to Towson, North Dakota State, and FBS South Carolina, respectively. ( The Wildcats, in fact, gave up 64 points for the second time this season, falling 64-35 to a team, Towson, that Lehigh beat in the first round of the playoffs last season.)
Lehigh went 10-1 on the season, and even led at halftime over the eventual Patriot League champions, Colgate, before falling in the second half. The 35-24 game, won by the Raiders, was a big-time, championship, hard-fought game, that was eminently visible to anyone who actually watched it.
The FCS playoff committee, though, apparently thought the Mountain Hawks needed to be perfect in order to make it in the field.
And that’s “unfair” – to the fans of the FCS playoffs.
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