Archive For The “Lee Kurfis” Category

LFN Players of the Week, Lehigh vs. Princeton, 9/21/2013

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LFN Players of the Week, Lehigh vs. Princeton, 9/21/2013

(Photo Credit: Andrew Miller/Trenton Times)

Below the flip, enjoy this week’s “LFN Players of the Week” for the Princeton game.

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Lehigh Circles the Wagons And Wins Yet Another Football Game

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Lehigh Circles the Wagons And Wins Yet Another Football Game

(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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Lehigh Pulls Another Rabbit Out of the Hat, Beats Princeton 29-28

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Lehigh Pulls Another Rabbit Out of the Hat, Beats Princeton 29-28

(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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Two-Minute Drill and LFN Players of the Week: Lehigh/Monmouth 9/14/2013

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Two-Minute Drill and LFN Players of the Week: Lehigh/Monmouth 9/14/2013

(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.

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Lehigh Keeps Calm And Beats Monmouth, 28-25

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Lehigh Keeps Calm And Beats Monmouth, 28-25

(Photo Credit: Justin Lafleur/Lehigh Athletics)

“I’d never seen it,” head coach Andy Coen said, adding a “whew” for good measure.

He was referring to a very strange play this Saturday, a play that happened in Lehigh’s favor that felt like the decisive play of the game.

Down 25-21, and senior P Tim Divers readying to punt, speedy Monmouth CB Tevrin Brandon blocked his punt – the ball deflecting almost straight up, then falling back down to earth behind the line of scrimmage, where alert senior FB Zach Hayden kept calm, grabbed the ball out of the air, and started to go for the first down marker.

He did more than get enough yards for the first down.  He rumbled 37 yards, thus turning the momentum of the game completely on its head.

Two plays later, senior QB Brandon Bialkowski hit senior WR Lee Kurfis with a 40 yard dagger to make the score 28-25.

It would be a death blow from which Monmouth wouldn’t recover.

“I’ve been coaching and playing a long time,” Coen said, “and I’ve never seen a blocked punt picked up by one of our own guys and run for a first down, which ends up being the biggest play of the game.”

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LFN Players of the Week for CCSU/Lehigh, And The Two-Minute Drill

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LFN Players of the Week for CCSU/Lehigh, And The Two-Minute Drill

(Photo Credit: David DiFrancesco/Brown and White via the Express-Times)

Here at LFN, I’m always looking for something to keep things fresh, and this year the plan is to keep things fresh by combining the “LFN Players of the Week” with something new: the two-minute drill.

In the past, I used to have a “press roundup” with links to all the recaps and interesting articles that would emerge concerning Lehigh football.  In a world without Twitter and Facebook, this type of content curation was great not only for people who liked my blog, but for me, too, when wanting to refer back to a particularly memorable game or moment.

But we live in a world of Twitter and Facebook now.  I can post links to the recaps on my Facebook page, my Twitter feed, and they can even be pulled into a type of newspaper delivered to your email called Paper.li.  All are great tools, all feature content that I myself read, and, frankly, are the way people consume news now.

But that doesn’t mean the “Press Roundup” is now worthless.  It will be the place where I empty out my notebook from the prior week, take a look ahead at next week’s opponent, and maybe even something completely different.  We’ll see how it all goes.

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Win Against CCSU Evokes Many Goodman Memories

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Win Against CCSU Evokes Many Goodman Memories

(Photo Credit: Chris Shipley/The Morning Call)

When you’ve gone to a lot of Lehigh games as I have, it’s easy to fall back on “memories” (today’s “Sunday Word”) to try to describe the action.

In a game which pretty much defied description overall, perhaps it was a requirement.

Sure, there hasn’t been a game in recent memory – certainly not in the Andy Coen Era – that featured a starting quarterback for Lehigh with less game experience than senior QB Brandon Bialkowski last Saturday.

Can you remember the last time Lehigh had eight departing seniors on defense to replace?  I can’t, either.

Yet even with all the new faces lining up for the Mountain Hawks, it was easy to see this performance alongside some of the greats in Murray Goodman history.  I mean it.  It is game one, a fact I haven’t forgotten, but I’m willing to bet that through time, this one is going to rank up there in terms of “memories” for many.
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Lehigh Outlasts CCSU In Opening Day Marathon, 51-44

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Lehigh Outlasts CCSU In Opening Day Marathon, 51-44

It looked pretty grim – so grim, in fact, that many of the announced attendance of 6,386 had already left the stadium by th beginning of the 4th quarter.

Central Connecticut State, behind a monster offensive performance by RB Rob Holloman, was methodically beating up the Lehigh defense.

There the Blue Devils were, driving to start the 4th quarter, a Lehigh facemask penalty keeping their drive alive, and finally reaching 1st and goal at the Lehigh 9.

It was the end of that drive, unbeknownst to all, that would be the difference between winning and losing their home opener.
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Bialkowski and Kurfis Ready To Step Into Big Shoes

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Bialkowski and Kurfis Ready To Step Into Big Shoes

(Photo Credit: Brent Hugo/Lehigh Sports via the Morning Call)

Being a new Lehigh quarterback or wide receiver is no easy task.

Your athletic director, Joe Sterrett, is a former star quarterback for Lehigh.   Think he’s invested in the program?

Your receivers coach, Dave Cecchini, was a star member of head coach Hank Small‘s “Air Lehigh” teams of the early 1990s.  Now he works every day with members of the offense.

Your recently graduated receiver, WR Ryan Spadola, will be lining up for the NFL’s New York Jets on Sunday.

Every day each Lehigh quarterback and receiver sees Lehigh Hall of Famers all over the place – something that might be intimidating to some.

But not senior QB Brandon Bialkowski and senior WR Lee Kurfis.  They clearly embrace challenge of stepping into those shoes.

When I asked Brandon what we should expect this Saturday in his first ever start, he responded simply.  “Expect Air Lehigh to be back,” he said.
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2013 Mountain Hawk Season Preview: The Offense

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2013 Mountain Hawk Season Preview: The Offense

“At least we have him returning.”

That’s what Lehigh fans have been able to say to themselves each offseason for the last five years.

Some first-team all-Patriot League offensive weapon.  Some top Patriot League defensive leader.  Something… measurable.  “We lose a lot, but at least we have him.”

When Lehigh saw record-breaking QB Chris Lum lost to graduation, the Nation turned to QB Michael Colvin and WR Ryan Spadola to keep the offensive machine humming.

During the past three season, Mountain Hawk fans have grown accustomed to head coach Andy Coen and offensive coordinator Dave Cecchini’s abilities to mold new players and plug them in, not missing a beat.

But they’ve never had to replace this much.  Last season’s top rushers are gone.  The receiver who’s noe made the 53 man roster of the Jets.  The linchpin of the offense – the quarterback – gone.

As we finally enter the 2013 Mountain Hawk football season, the biggest question to answer is: can Lehigh reload on offense?
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