Archive For The “Monmouth” Category
It’s the spring, and what that means is that the weather (hopefully) is getting better, the flowers are blooming, and – most importantly – we’re in the middle of spring football season.Soon I am planning on posting an update on what has gone on i…
I’ve been around Lehigh football a long time and I have seen a lot of different Lehigh football seasons.
For some Lehigh football teams, things seem to come easy. Some teams would come into Murray Goodman Stadium, and the Mountain Hawks would seemingly win before the coin toss. The opponent already had beaten themselves, intimidated – and all Lehigh would have to do is not do anything ridiculous, and all the home fans would go home happy.
Those types of games reminded me this weekend of the swagger someone like CB Deion Sanders had as a player. How many NFL receivers beat themselves fifteen minutes before going onto the field because they knew Neon Deion would be on them?
It looks like the for the 2017 Lehigh Mountain Hawks, this will not be the case. It was a season that started out like it would be one where things came easy, but that didn’t happen.
For whatever reason, this team will have to earn it the hard way, and in so doing, have an opportunity in front of them. For inspiration, we don’t need to go with Neon Deion. Instead, we can go with a different choice.
I’ve been around Lehigh football a long time and I have seen a lot of different Lehigh football seasons.
For some Lehigh football teams, things seem to come easy. Some teams would come into Murray Goodman Stadium, and the Mountain Hawks would seemingly win before the coin toss. The opponent already had beaten themselves, intimidated – and all Lehigh would have to do is not do anything ridiculous, and all the home fans would go home happy.
Those types of games reminded me this weekend of the swagger someone like CB Deion Sanders had as a player. How many NFL receivers beat themselves fifteen minutes before going onto the field because they knew Neon Deion would be on them?
It looks like the for the 2017 Lehigh Mountain Hawks, this will not be the case. It was a season that started out like it would be one where things came easy, but that didn’t happen.
For whatever reason, this team will have to earn it the hard way, and in so doing, have an opportunity in front of them. For inspiration, we don’t need to go with Neon Deion. Instead, we can go with a different choice.
(Photo Credit: Monmouth Athletics)
Football is a physical game, and it requires a tremendous amount of strength to line up, play after play, to push people around down after down.
As a result football games sometimes can evolve into contests where the teams push each other around, and such games can end up where one team gets worn down and the other pulls away for a big victory.
That’s what happened this weekend at Monmouth.
The Hawks started out behind the eight-ball early, falling behind by two scores, and then rallying to take a 27-21 lead relatively early in the third quarter. But the physical beating, slowly and surely, took its toll, eventually knocking the offense out of kilter and the pushing the defense out of the way for their powerful running game. In the end, Lehigh only could be punched in the mouth so many times, and fell, 46-27.
It was an especially hard loss to take because this isn’t how the 2017 season was supposed to happen.
“The tougher man wins,” head coach Andy Coen said after the game. “They were a lot tougher and more physical than we were.”
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It pretty much started with RB Pete Guerrerio’s 70 yard kickoff to open the game, and continued throughout a bruising, physical football game.Lehigh would battle back from a 14-0 deficit to take the lead at halftime, but ultimately surrendered the lead…
Not going to West Long Branch to take in Lehigh facing off against Monmouth?
Never fear: LFN is here.
Kickoff time at Kessler Stadium is 1:00PM.
It is possible to catch the game in a variety of different ways: radio call, video stream, and live stats.
Below, here’s how to do it.
(Photo Credit: Asbury Park Press)
Thanks to Monmouth’s game notes and the Asbury Park Press, which is the source of all of this research.
One thing you might want to consider bringing with you to the game on Saturday is clothes to donate.
“At today’s football game against Lehigh and tonight’s men’s soccer game against UMBC members of the Monmouth athletics community will be collecting clothing to be sent to those affected by Hurricane Harvey,” Monmouth’s game preview says.
It can seem like one is powerless with hurricane destruction in Houston and potential hurricane destruction in Florida, but contributions like this can help make a difference.
It was days later, and head coach Andy Coen was still frustrated with last week’s loss.
That was the takeaway from the two pieces that came out in the local media this week, one from Lehigh Sports Central, and the other from Keith Groller of The Morning Call.
“Still a lot of frustration there,” he told Steve Degler. “You know there are going to be some mistakes in that first game, but veteran guys, new guys, we made too many mistakes, and gave Villanova too many opportunities. It was very tough to take.”
In last week’s post game press conference, and this week’s media meeting, the theme was “cleaning up the mistakes”.
“We’re really excited and want to put that first ‘W’ in the win column,” junior LB Matt Butler said. “We left a few plays on the field against Villanova; plays we’d like to have back. We had a few mental errors that cost us. We need to clean that up this week.”
The word “Monmouth” last season became a sort-of shorthand for a humbling experience, a game that should have gone much different than it actually did.
It was usually used in the context of:
“Don’t pull another Monmouth.”
“Lehigh’s been doing pretty great – but they have to be careful not to have another Monmouth.”
The memory of last year’s loss to the Jersey Hawks stung particularly hard, because it had ramifications that slowed the recognition of Lehigh as a legitimate title contender. Wile their loss last season wasn’t stated as a reason why the Mountain Hawks didn’t earn a home game in the FCS Playoffs, it was the one, big blemish on Lehigh’s record that may have prevented them from being in consideration for a possible seed (and, by extension, at least one home game).
And yet, last year’s Monmouth loss also was important in that the loss in that first game of the year seemed to galvanize the Mountain Hawks, sending a potent message that winning every game was going to be hard and nothing was going to come easy. The lessons learned from that game carried through the season, and, in a way, set up everything good that was to come.
Monmouth and Lehigh have a lot more in common than meets the eye.
They don’t share a conference – the Mountain Hawks are in the Patriot League in all sports, while the Jersey Hawks (my name for Monmouth’s mascot) compete in the Big South in football, and the MAAC in all other sports.
But athletically, in terms of everything from enrollment, participation to overall athletic department spending, Monmouth and Lehigh are like peas in a pod. They are both universities; they both have between 4,000 and 5,000 undergrads; and the size of their athletic departments are similar as well.
The Mountain Hawks and the Jersey Hawks have also been frequent opponents of the other in football and men’s basketball as well. Since 2010, Lehigh has played Monmouth twice in men’s basketball and five times on the gridiron. (Recently, it was announced that Monmouth’s hoop squad and their wacky bench antics will be headed to Stabler this fall to play Lehigh hoops as well.)
But in football the last few years, Lehigh’s games against Monmouth have proven a liability to their national stature. That’s because they’ve lost their last two games against the Jersey Hawks, and while their loss last season wasn’t stated as a reason why the Mountain Hawks didn’t earn a home game in the FCS Playoffs, it was the one, big blemish on Lehigh’s record that may have prevented them from being in consideration for a possible seed (and, by extension, at least one home game).
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