Appalachian State | The Sports Arsenal

New year, new hoops post

Posted on January 5, 2010 by Sandlapper Spike

Conference play goes into high gear starting on Wednesday with the Bulldogs’ trip to Boone to face Appalachian State, followed by a matchup at McAlister with the College of Charleston on Saturday. The next week will feature more road action as the Bulldogs make the western swing through the league, taking on UT-Chattanooga on the 14th and Samford on the 16th.

The Citadel is .500 right now no matter how you look at it, at 7-7 overall, 1-1 in the SoCon. Last year at this time The Citadel was 6-7 overall, 1-1 in the league.

Facts, observations, etc.:

– The Citadel’s starting lineup against Savannah State included no players hailing from east of the Mississippi River, which is decidedly unusual (if not unprecedented).

– Zach Urbanus is averaging 35. 7 minutes per game, which is in the top 25 nationally. I worry a little about him and Cameron Wells (34.1 mpg) wearing down over the course of the season, but they logged major minutes last season too, and it didn’t seem to bother them.

– Bulldog opponents have shot better from 40% from three-point land on four occasions. The Citadel has lost all four of those games.

– The Citadel’s game notes for the Appalachian State game include the statistic that the Bulldogs are 14th nationally in fouls committed per game, at 15.0 per contest. However, the flip side to that is The Citadel’s opponents have only committed two more fouls than the Bulldogs (212-210).

– The fouling statistics are really just a function of The Citadel’s pace of play. At 62.3 possessions per game, the Bulldogs are among the ten slowest-playing teams in Division I.

– So while The Citadel is 22nd nationally in fewest turnovers per game, it is actually 103rd in D-1 in terms of turnover rate (which is still not bad; it’s about where the Bulldogs were last season).

– Let’s talk about offensive rebounding for a moment. The Citadel has struggled at times on the boards this season, and it’s mainly attributable to the Bulldogs not getting their fair share of offensive rebounds.

Joe Wolfinger has 25 offensive boards this season. Now, that leads the team, but on the other hand, Wolfinger has played 339 minutes so far; he’s averaging one offensive board every 13.5 minutes on the floor. Bryan Streeter has 18 offensive rebounds in 255 minutes (one every 14.2 minutes).

Those are the guys you would expect to get the majority of the offensive caroms, and they have — but on a per-minute basis, they haven’t been as effective as Ed Conroy might like. Nobody on the team is actually bringing in an exceptional percentage of offensive rebounds (the best per-minute performer in the category is Mike Groselle, who in limited time has grabbed one every 9.1 minutes).

This is where the Bulldogs really miss John Brown. Last season Brown had an excellent offensive rebounding campaign, averaging one such board every 9.9 minutes (and he played 537 minutes). At least one member of the current edition of the Bulldogs needs to repeat (or at least approach repeating) that effort — either that or The Citadel has to significantly increase its shooting percentage, which is unlikely.

– Wolfinger is shooting 44.2% from the floor, but he’s under 40% against Division I competition. He has only had four games this season in which he has shot better than 50% from the field — against Kenyon, UVA-Wise, Missouri State, and Maryland-Eastern Shore.

Wolfinger has struggled in the two SoCon games. Here is hoping that he gets better as the second half of the season begins, both offensively and defensively. He could still be a key cog in the rotation, but perhaps not as an offensive focal point.

– Although Wolfinger is a 7-footer, the Bulldog who appears most comfortable as an offensive post player is Groselle, who suffered an ankle injury that limited his time on the court the last few weeks. If healthy, I would not be surprised if Groselle’s minutes increase markedly as the season progresses.

– Another freshman, Harrison DuPont, got his first career start against Savannah State (as part of the all-Western starting lineup) and shows potential to be an impact player. He has played 30+ minutes in each of the last two games, scoring 14 points against Houston and 11 against Savannah State. He had six turnovers against Houston, but other than that did well in both games, shooting better than 50% from the field and picking up a few rebounds along the way.

– In nine games as a starter, Austin Dahn shot 15.6% from three-point land. In five games coming off the bench, he is shooting 47.8% from beyond the arc. Advantage, Ed Conroy.

– Bryan Streeter also has some improved statistics after being switched from the starting lineup. His rebounding rates have almost doubled. His free throw shooting has even improved (albeit that’s a very small sample size).

Streeter is shooting 58.8% from the line so far this season (and was 5-6 against Savannah State). That may not seem impressive, but it’s a big change for the better when compared to last season, when Streeter only made 16 free throws in 44 attempts (36.4%).

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The upcoming league games will be tough, considering three are on the road and the one home game is against the College of Charleston, which beat North Carolina on Monday night. Last season The Citadel was a combined 5-2 against the four teams.

The Bulldogs swept Appalachian State in two tight games (one in OT, the other by two points). The Citadel also swept the College of Charleston in two contests, neither of which was particularly close, something the Cougars will surely remember.

The Citadel lost at home to UT-Chattanooga, and had a disappointing split with Samford — disappointing in the sense that while Charleston’s Bulldogs dominated the Birmingham Bulldogs in the regular-season matchup at Samford, in the conference tourney quarterfinals Samford put a quick end to The Citadel’s championship hopes.

The SoCon looks to be very competitive this season, with a lot of evenly-matched teams. The Citadel’s 7-7 overall record is in line with the records of its next four opponents, which have current records of 7-6 (Appy), 8-6 (UTC), 8-6 (CofC), and 6-8 (Samford). Other conference teams with similar records: Davidson (7-8), Furman (7-6), and Wofford (8-7). On the other hand, Western Carolina is 11-2 (with a win at Louisville) while Elon, Georgia Southern, and UNC-Greensboro are a combined 8-33.

I’m hoping for an entertaining conference race. My definition of entertaining is one in which The Citadel is in or near the lead…

Filed under: Basketball, The Citadel | Tagged: Appalachian State, Austin Dahn, Bryan Streeter, Cameron Wells, College of Charleston, Davidson, Ed Conroy, Elon, Furman, Georgia Southern, Harrison Dupont, Houston, Joe Wolfinger, John Brown, Kenyon, Louisville, Maryland-Eastern Shore, McAlister Field House, Mike Groselle, Missouri State, North Carolina, Samford, Southern Conference, The Citadel, UNC-Greensboro, UVA-Wise, Western Carolina, Wofford, Zach Urbanus | Leave a comment »

Football, Game 11: The Citadel vs. Georgia Southern

Posted on November 20, 2009 by Sandlapper Spike

It has been a disappointing season for The Citadel, but it is likely that it has been an even more disappointing campaign for Georgia Southern. The Eagles, like the Bulldogs, are 4-6, and losing seasons are definitely not the norm in Statesboro.

It will be only the third losing season for the Eagles since Erk Russell restarted the football program in 1982. In 1996 Frank Ellwood went 4-7 in his only season in charge; Ellwood was a transitional coach following the firing of Tim Stowers. In 2006, Brian VanGorder blew into town and left after one year, leaving with a 3-8 record. He was replaced by the current coach, Chris Hatcher.

Hatcher had been very successful at Division II Valdosta State (winning a national title in 2004) but has not managed to lift GSU to its accustomed heights, with season records of 7-4, 6-5, and this year’s 4-6 to date. When Ellwood completed his one season as head man in Statesboro, he was replaced by Paul Johnson, who proceeded to win 37 games and a national title over his first three years in command. (Johnson won another I-AA crown in his fourth season, as well.)

Hatcher’s 17 wins pale in comparison, even when given the benefit of the doubt for having to pick up the pieces left by the hurricane that was VanGorder. Stowers won 26 games in his first three seasons as the head coach; Mike Sewak won 27 in his first three years. Even Erk Russell, starting from scratch in 1982, won 21 games over his first three seasons. Small wonder there is some question about Hatcher’s job security.

After all, this is a school that has considered a move to FBS. Struggling in the SoCon is not a good recipe for making a move up the football ladder.

—

The Eagles are 3-4 in the SoCon, having lost last week at home to Furman 30-22. The Paladins jumped out to a 24-0 lead in that game and held on for the victory. It was the third straight loss for GSU; the other two losses were a 52-16 beatdown at Appalachian State and a 31-10 loss at Samford.

GSU fans aren’t used to losing games by 30+ points, but it’s happened three times this season: once to North Carolina (no shame in that), the aforementioned game against ASU and a 44-6 wipeout at South Dakota State earlier this season. The Jackrabbits are ranked #21 in the FCS, but that is no consolation to Eagle fans.

Like The Citadel, Georgia Southern has allowed 28 points or more in 6 games this year. In league play, the Eagles have struggled on pass defense, allowed 7.9 yards per pass attempt, worst in the conference, and 12 touchdowns, tied for worst with…The Citadel.

GSU’s rush defense is statistically better, although part of that is due to teams rushing fewer times against the Eagles than any other squad in the league. The Eagles have done a good job forcing turnovers, which is why GSU is +2 in turnover margin (because the GSU offense has given the ball away quite a bit itself).

Georgia Southern likes to blitz, which can lead to big plays both ways. Samford, nobody’s idea of a big-play team, had touchdown passes of 69 and 57 yards in its victory over the Eagles. The Citadel will have opportunities to get its receivers in one-on-one situations.

The receiver the Bulldogs would most like to see in a one-on-one matchup, of course, is Andre Roberts. It’s his last game for the Bulldogs; maybe he’ll have a chance to cap a memorable career in grand style.

On offense the Eagles are near the bottom in most categories in conference play, ranking seventh (out of nine teams) in scoring offense, total offense, rushing offense, pass efficiency, and third-down conversions. Georgia Southern has, however, been efficient in the red zone. The Eagles are also first in the league in time of possession.

The biggest problem GSU has had, statistically, is allowing sacks — 30 in league play, the most allowed by a conference team. The Citadel needs to continue the trend of opponents putting GSU quarterbacks on the ground if the Bulldogs plan on winning this game.

Georgia Southern has committed more penalties than all but one team in league play. However, The Citadel has had fewer penalties called against its opponents than any other school in the conference. Something’s gotta give…

Lee Chapple started the first nine games at quarterback for the Eagles, but last week was replaced as the starter by Kyle Collins. Chapple will probably start against The Citadel. He has thrown 7 touchdowns this season, but has been intercepted 14 times. GSU running back Adam Urbano is only averaging 63.3 yards per game on the ground in league play, but he’s a definite receiving threat, having caught 45 passes this season, which leads the Eagles.

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This game will not be Homecoming at Paulson Stadium — that was last week, against Furman. However, there will probably still be a good crowd urging GSU (including 16 Eagle seniors) on to victory. The Citadel has historically not fared well in Statesboro, with only one victory (in 2003) in ten trips to Paulson.

However, perhaps Saturday will be different. After all, it will be November 21, and strange and wondrous things have been known to happen on that date, most notably on November 21, 1978.

That day, The Citadel trailed Furman 18-0, but scored 35 unanswered points to defeat the Paladins 35-18. The coach of the Bulldogs that day was Art Baker, and it was the first (and only) time Baker ever won a game in The Citadel-Furman series. He had been 0-8 until then, losing games as head coach of both Furman and The Citadel.

He would also lose the next season, in his final game as a head coach in the series, but on November 21 he was golden. Maybe that’s a good sign for the Bulldogs on Saturday against GSU.

Filed under: Football, The Citadel | Tagged: Adam Urbano, Andre Roberts, Appalachian State, Art Baker, Brian VanGorder, Chris Hatcher, Erk Russell, Frank Ellwood, Furman, Georgia Southern, Kyle Collins, Lee Chapple, Mike Sewak, Paul Johnson, Paulson Stadium, Samford, South Dakota State, Southern Conference, The Citadel, Tim Stowers | Leave a comment »

Football, Game 10: The Citadel vs. UT-Chattanooga

Posted on November 13, 2009 by Sandlapper Spike

Note: it can be difficult to figure out what to call the athletic teams of the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. Recently the school began using a ‘C’ mark, for “Chattanooga”. The university’s teams have variously been referred to over the years as “UT-Chattanooga”, “Tennessee-Chattanooga”, “UTC”, and “Chattanooga”.

The nickname/mascot history is even more tangled. A “moccasin” used to be a snake, then a shoe, then a cartoon Cherokee Indian called ‘Chief Moccanooga’, and now a mockingbird train conductor (and “moccasin” has morphed into “moc”, for mockingbird).

There is an explanatory page on the school’s website. The page includes a quotation from Jimmy Fallon. As you may have guessed, the quote is not very funny.

In the post that follows, I will call the school either “UT-Chattanooga”, or “UTC”, because that’s what I’ve always called it, and I see no particular reason to change.

—

Around this time last year The Citadel played UT-Chattanooga in Charleston. It was Homecoming for the Bulldogs, and everyone expected a big win, since the Mocs were 1-9 (and would eventually finish 1-11). At that time I wrote about how UTC had collapsed as a program after consistently challenging for league honors in its first 10-15 years in the Southern Conference.

Well, The Citadel did win that day, but barely, letting a team playing out the string with a lame-duck coach hang around and nearly steal the victory. The Bulldogs survived thanks to Andre Roberts’ last-minute punt return TD, but despite winning the game, it was almost as poor a showing as The Citadel had for this year’s Homecoming.

UT-Chattanooga replaced Rodney Allison with Russ Huesman, who basically has the ideal background for a UTC head coach. Huesman played high school football at famed Moeller High School in Cincinnati for Gerry Faust, who was destined to become a much-maligned coach for Notre Dame (albeit one who never lost to Navy). Huesman then played college football for the Mocs, with his first two years under Joe Morrison and his last two under Bill “Brother” Oliver.

Huesman was a longtime assistant at William & Mary, where he coached the secondary (Huesman was a DB himself at UTC) and was later the defensive coordinator. Players he coached while with the Tribe include longtime NFL interception magnet Darren Sharper, Pittsburgh Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin, and Philadelphia Eagles defensive coordinator Sean McDermott. That’s not a bad list of guys to have as references.

He then moved to Memphis for several seasons, including a stretch as recruiting coordinator for the Tigers, before spending five seasons as the defensive coordinator for Richmond, the defending FCS champions.

That’s a nice resume for any prospective head coach at the FCS level; being an alum is an even bigger bonus. Huesman seems to have given the program some much-needed enthusiasm. Home attendance has increased significantly, with three of the ten biggest crowds in Finley Stadium history so far this season. There was even a bonfire on Wednesday night.

Another thing Huesman did was bring in a transfer from Tennessee to play quarterback. B.J. Coleman has had a solid season for the Mocs, nothing flashy stats-wise but generally getting the job done.

Coleman has thrown fourteen touchdowns against six interceptions, although he did throw three picks last week against Appalachian State. Five of his six interceptions for the season, in fact, have come in the last three games. Coleman is a sophomore who will have two more years of eligibility after this season.

The Vols transfer has spread the ball around, although his favorite target is definitely Blue Cooper, who has 68 receptions and could conceivably make the All-SoCon squad ahead of Andre Roberts (Elon’s Terrell Hudgins is a lock for the other first-team spot at wide receiver).

UTC suffered a blow when running back Bryan Fitzgerald was injured and lost for the season. Freshman Chris Awuah is the leading rusher for the Mocs, but he is averaging just 3.2 yards per carry. UTC is last in the league in rushing offense.

UTC has respectable, if not eye-popping, defensive statistics across the board, generally ranking in the upper half of the SoCon in most categories for conference-only games. The Mocs have struggled, however, in defending 3rd-down conversions; the Mocs D is 7th in the league (The Citadel is 8th in the league, ahead of only Furman). Another sore spot for the defense is red zone conversion rate; UTC is last in the SoCon, and has allowed 17 touchdowns in 25 opponents’ possessions inside the 20.

The Mocs are tied for the lead in interceptions in conference play with eight; free safety Jordan Tippet has five of his own.

One defensive stat that is very impressive for UTC: sacks. The Mocs have 24 sacks on the season; their 16 sacks in league play in second-best in the conference. The primary sack-master is right defensive end Josh Beard, who has 10.5 of them so far this year. His partner in crime on the other side of the line, freshman DE Joshua Williams, has 6.

Despite the mediocre 3rd-down defense numbers and lack of a rushing game, UTC leads the league in time of possession. The Mocs don’t hurt themselves with penalties (second in the SoCon). UTC is next-to-last in net punting, but features an outstanding placekicker in Craig Camay, who is 13-16 converting field goals this year, with a long of 52. Camay is also a weapon for onside kicks; the Mocs have recovered four of five onside kick attempts in league action.

—

A few other odds and ends:

— I was surprised to find out that The Citadel is UT-Chattanooga’s most common opponent. Saturday’s game will be the 43rd meeting between the two schools. The school in second place on the Mocs most-played list? Tennessee, which has faced UTC on 41 occasions. The Vols are 37-2-2 in those games.

— UTC is 5-4, but if it has dreams of a winning season, it probably needs to beat The Citadel. Next week, the Mocs play Alabama. Yikes.

Tangent: what is with the SEC and these late-season matchups against FCS schools? Last week, there were four such games: Tennessee Tech-Georgia, Furman-Auburn, Northern Arizona-Mississippi, and Eastern Kentucky-Kentucky.

Last year, of course, The Citadel closed out its season by playing Florida. Why aren’t these games being played in the first couple of weeks of the season? I hope all of them were Homecoming games.

— UTC’s game notes reference The Citadel’s football stadium (on the same page) as “Haggod Stadium” , “Johnson Hagood Stadium”, and “Sansom Field”.

— The Citadel has never won four straight games against UT-Chattanooga. The Bulldogs currently enjoy a three-game winning streak versus the Mocs.

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It’s hard to say what The Citadel’s chances on Saturday are, since it’s hard to determine which Bulldog team will show up — the one that played Appalachian State and Furman, or the one that played Elon, Western Carolina, and Wofford?

It will be interesting to see who starts at quarterback. If I had to guess (and it’s only a guess), I would say that Miguel Starks, even if just “85%”, will get the nod. Just the thought of a gimpy Bart Blanchard sitting in the pocket as the two sack-happy UTC defensive ends converge on him is cringe-inducing…

I certainly hope that the Bulldogs are more competitive than they were last week. This is a big game for UTC, which has a chance for a winning season. Given that the Mocs won a total of six games in the previous three years, that would be a major accomplishment. UT-Chattanooga will be ready to play on Saturday. The Bulldogs better be ready as well.

Filed under: Football, The Citadel | Tagged: Alabama, Andre Roberts, Appalachian State, Auburn, B.J. Coleman, Bill Oliver, Blue Cooper, Darren Sharper, Eastern Kentucky, Elon, Finley Stadium, Furman, Georgia, Gerry Faust, Joe Morrison, Johnson Hagood Stadium, Kentucky, Mike Tomlin, Mississippi, Moeller, Northern Arizona, Philadelphia Eagles, Pittsburgh Steelers, Richmond, Russ Huesman, Sean McDermott, Tennessee, Tennessee Tech, Terrell Hudgins, The Citadel, UT-Chattanooga, William & Mary | Leave a comment »

Football, Game 9: The Citadel vs. Wofford

Posted on November 6, 2009 by Sandlapper Spike

I wrote about the series between Wofford and The Citadel during the preview for last season’s matchup between the two schools. I’m not going to re-hash the history in this post; if anyone is interested, the link will serve to give some background.

This will be the third consecutive meeting between the Terriers and Bulldogs to be featured on SportSouth, which may be the first time The Citadel has played on TV against the same opponent three years in a row. Tom Werme and Sam Wyche will again call the action from the booth.

—

When sporting events began to be regularly broadcast (first over radio, then television), some of the individuals running sports clubs feared that broadcasting games would lead to attendance declines, because people could just stay at home and listen to the radio, or watch on TV. This notion was largely debunked by Hall of Fame baseball executive Larry MacPhail (in the 1930s and early 1940s).

Tangent: this type of thinking had gone on for decades, beginning with clubs trying to deny telegraph operators the right to give scoring updates for baseball games. In 1876, the first year of the National League’s existence, Hartford owner Morgan Bulkeley (one of the three most undeserving members of the Hall of Fame) attempted to bar representatives of the local telegraph company from buying tickets.

However, the question has to be asked: if a game is on TV, why would someone choose to see it in person, rather than watch it on the tube? Going to a game can be very inconvenient and expensive. Instead, you could choose to not leave your house and watch the game (preferably in HD) while lying on your couch, with all the comforts of home, including a refrigerator, bathroom, and an HVAC system.

A lot of people go to the games anyway, as evidenced by the large crowds that see many different kinds of sporting events. Even when it is noted that there are empty seats at an arena or stadium (like Doak Campbell Stadium for the North Carolina State-Florida State game last Saturday, the bottom line is that there were still a lot of people who went to the game (in that case, over 50,000).

Why do they go? Well, tradition, I suppose, along with camaraderie — tailgating, seeing old friends in the same seats every year, that type of thing. They go for the atmosphere. Sometimes, that atmosphere isn’t so great. However, occasionally there is a day to remember, a day when the electricity in the stadium isn’t just being provided by the power company.

It’s the kind of thing that gets people off their couches and in their cars and headed to the game, just for the chance to be a part of a high-voltage event, to be swept along in a moment of nirvana. Maybe it won’t happen too often, but when it does, it makes up for all the times it didn’t.

Such an occurrence happened at Johnson Hagood Stadium in 1988. Since this Saturday is Homecoming, I’m going to write briefly about the most memorable Homecoming game in the history of the stadium, which had the most electric atmosphere of any game I’ve ever seen at JHS.

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***November 5, 1988 — Marshall (#1) vs. The Citadel (#19)***

It was a bright, sunny day when the Thundering Herd and the Bulldogs met on the gridiron. Marshall had played in the I-AA title game the year before, losing 43-42 to Northeast Louisiana. After that setback, the Thundering Herd hit the ground running in 1988. By the time Marshall ventured to Charleston, it was 8-0 and ranked #1 in I-AA football.

The Thundering Herd featured a high-octane offense averaging 32.6 points per game. Starting quarterback John Gregory threw for 3,127 yards and 21 touchdowns in 1988. Many of Gregory’s throws went to Mike Barber, Marshall’s All-American wide receiver, who would be named I-AA player of the year in 1988 by the American Football Coaches Association. Barber had caught 106 passes in 1987 and followed that up with “only” 79 catches in 1988.

When Gregory wasn’t throwing passes to Barber, he was tossing them to Sean Doctor, the Herd tight end, who in just two years in Huntington would accumulate 2,100 receiving yards. Marshall could run the ball, too, as halfback Ron Darby gained 1,282 yards in 1988 and scored 16 touchdowns.

That was the juggernaut facing The Citadel, although the Bulldogs did not lack for confidence. The Citadel came into the game 6-2, having won five straight games, including a 42-35 victory over Navy. That triumph had been led by quarterback Gene Brown. However, Brown was injured two weeks later against UT-Chattanooga.

Tommy Burriss had ably filled in at quarterback (no surprise, as he was the former starter) to lead the Bulldogs to victories over Boston University (yes, BU still played football back then) and East Tennessee State. Brown’s return to the field was highly anticipated, though, as he was a truly gifted director of Charlie Taaffe’s wishbone attack.

A crowd of 20,011 showed up to see the matchup, the second time that season more than 20,000 people had attended a football game at Johnson Hagood Stadium.

After a scoreless first quarter, The Citadel would strike first, with Adrian Johnson scoring on a one-yard touchdown run. Marshall would respond with a short field goal, but the score was only 6-3 at halftime (the Bulldogs having missed the PAT).

However, The Citadel’s offense began to control the game, dominating the time of possession. Brown entered the game in the second quarter and the rushing yardage started to pile up. Johnson rushed for 106 yards and Raymond Mazyck added 79 (on just 10 carries). The Bulldogs as a team rushed for 359 yards, and perhaps more importantly ran 83 plays and kept Marshall’s high-powered offense off the field.

Even when Marshall had the ball, the Herd struggled. In one sequence, the Herd would run eight consecutive plays inside the Bulldog 5-yard line without scoring a TD. For the game, Marshall only managed 247 yards of total offense.

The crowd went into a frenzy when Phillip Florence took an end-around 33 yards for a touchdown in the third quarter, and when Johnson scored his second touchdown of the day in the fourth period, it was all over. 20-3, The Citadel.

Well, almost over. As the game ended, the field was invaded by the corps of cadets, a number of whom headed straight for the goalpost in the south endzone. The uprights were then torn down…okay, maybe not quite torn down. The cadets were unable to rip the uprights away from the crossbar, and the crossbar remained attached to the stanchion. It was the Cardinal Richelieu of goalposts.

It didn’t matter, though, as it was the thought that counted. The administration didn’t seem to mind having to shell out some cash for a new goalpost, either, which may be the best indication of how amazing the atmosphere at the game really was.

Tangent: the next week, Marshall’s Darby rushed for 262 yards against Western Carolina, which would have been a Southern Conference record — but on the same day, Brown rushed for 286 yards against VMI (on only 13 carries!) to shatter the mark. Talk about bad timing for Darby.

Now that was a game worth attending. What about Saturday’s game? Will it be worth attending for Bulldog fans?

—

Wofford had enjoyed seven consecutive winning seasons before this year’s campaign. The Terriers are 2-6, although it should be noted that Wofford played not one but two FBS schools this year, losing to both South Florida and Wisconsin.

However, eyebrows were raised around the conference when the Terriers (picked in the preseason to finish in the league’s top 3) lost 38-9 at UT-Chattanooga. The Mocs have proven to be the most improved team in the league, but that loss clearly showed that Wofford had some unexpected issues. The two main themes for the Terriers this year have been injuries and turnovers.

Wofford entered the season with a fairly inexperienced squad (only nine returning starters), and that inexperience has been compounded by a rash of serious injuries, many of them season-ending. Only ten players have started every game for the Terriers; in all, 34 different players have made at least one start.

Many of the losses have been on defense (including pre-season All-SoCon pick Mitch Clark, who has only played one game this year). The Terriers also suffered the loss of starting fullback Eric Breitenstein (who rushed for 121 yards against South Florida). Wofford was already missing halfback Jeremy Marshall, who tore an ACL last season against Appalachian State; in this season’s matchup with the Mountaineers, another Terrier halfback, Derek Boyce, tore his ACL.

The Terriers run an option attack known as the “wingbone”, with the emphasis on run. Wofford, with all its problems, still leads FCS in rushing, averaging 258 yards per game. However, the Terriers are last in the division in passing, averaging only 70.5 yards per contest.

Quarterback Mitch Allen is completing just 45.2% of his passes. That’s not a huge problem – after all, he doesn’t attempt that many – but while Allen has thrown five touchdown passes, he’s also thrown five interceptions (in just 62 attempts).

Wofford as a team has thrown six picks, and has also fumbled 19 times, losing 13. Losing two-thirds of their fumbles is a bit of bad luck, to be sure, but the Terriers are at heart a possession-oriented team. Committing nineteen turnovers over eight games is not typical of a Wofford outfit. The Terriers have committed 3+ turnovers in four games this season, losing all four.

The Terriers are still a dangerous offensive team, even with the turnover bugaboo, but have been inconsistent. Wofford rolled up 537 yards of total offense against Appalachian State and another 426 against Western Carolina. Unlike The Citadel’s last opponent, Samford, the Terriers are more than capable of creating big plays (Wofford has had five plays from the line of scrimmage of over 60 yards).

On the other hand, Wofford only had 170 yards of total offense against Elon (The Citadel can relate) and just 151 against UT-Chattanooga. Part of the inconsistency can be traced to the Terriers’ third down conversion rate, which is just 38.3%.

For the style of offense Wofford employs, that isn’t good enough. The problems converting third down have led to Wofford averaging less than 29 minutes per game in time of possession, definitely not what an all-out running team like the Terriers wants.

When Wofford scores first, it is 2-0; when it doesn’t, 0-6. Wofford is 0-5 when trailing after three quarters and 0-4 when scoring less than 20 points.

Terrier opponents are averaging 387 yards per game in total offense. Wofford has forced twelve turnovers in eight games, including five interceptions. Much like its offense, the Terrier D has not had a lot of luck in the fumble department, forcing twenty but recovering only seven. That’s the kind of statistic that will eventually turn in Wofford’s favor; let’s hope it doesn’t happen this week.

Wofford’s opponents have been in the “red zone” 36 times this season, and have scored touchdowns on 26 of those occasions.

The Terriers have a solid kick return game, led by running back Mike Rucker. Wofford has a net punting average of 35.9, which is quite good. The Terriers have only attempted four field goals all season, making two (both against Elon).

In last year’s game, The Citadel did a good job offensively but couldn’t stop the Terriers, as Wofford had 409 yards of total offense, including 279 yards rushing. Andre Roberts had a huge game (14 receptions, 190 yards, 3 TDs) but it wasn’t enough, as Wofford stayed one step ahead of the Bulldogs the whole way, committing no turnovers and converting all three of its fourth-down attempts.

You can bet that Roberts will be priority #1 for the Wofford defense, but you can say that about any defense that faces The Citadel. Who winds up throwing the ball in Roberts’ direction is anybody’s guess.

What I hope happens is that if both Bart Blanchard and Miguel Starks are healthy, the coaches rotate them by series instead of by play. If one of them is moving the team down the field, then that’s the guy that needs to stay in the game. I’m not forgetting about Tommy Edwards, either. He got the job done against Samford, and he’ll get the call if need be against the Terriers.

I would like to see more of the type of playcalling used in the game against Furman, which seemed to suit the offensive line. Speaking of the o-line, that unit will need to contain Wofford defensive end Ameet Pall, a Montreal native who is having a fine season for the Terriers. Kevin Higgins was quick to note Pall’s abilities during his press conference on Monday.

It’s been too long since The Citadel won in this series. Hopes are high that the Bulldogs will end that streak on Saturday, in front of an appreciative Homecoming crowd. I am not so sure, to be honest, but I’ll be there cheering them on regardless.

Filed under: Football, The Citadel | Tagged: Adrian Johnson, Ameet Pall, Andre Roberts, Appalachian State, Bart Blanchard, Charlie Taaffe, Derek Boyce, Doak Campbell Stadium, Elon, Eric Breitenstein, FCS, Gene Brown, Jeremy Marshall, John Gregory, Johnson Hagood Stadium, Kevin Higgins, Larry MacPhail, Marshall, Miguel Starks, Mike Barber, Mike Rucker, Mitch Allen, Morgan Bulkeley, Raymond Mazyck, Ron Darby, Sam Wyche, Samford, Sean Doctor, South Florida, Southern Conference, SportSouth, The Citadel, Tom Werme, Tommy Burriss, Tommy Edwards, UT-Chattanooga, Western Carolina, Wisconsin, Wofford | Leave a comment »

Football, Game 6: The Citadel vs. Western Carolina

Posted on October 16, 2009 by Sandlapper Spike

Like a lot of other college football fans, I’ve been following the current situation with Bobby Bowden and Florida State with some interest, wondering how it will end. At this point, it does not look like it will end well, because it’s obvious that A) Bowden clearly does not want to retire, and B) FSU higher-ups desperately want him to do so.

Bowden is Florida State football, at least as we know it today. How do you cast off a legend? It’s not easy. It’s something Western Carolina had to do 20 years ago, though, under circumstances much more tragic.

Bob Waters was a star quarterback at Presbyterian in the late 1950s who wound up playing for five years for the San Francisco 49ers. He started several games at quarterback in 1961 in Red Hickey’s then-novel “shotgun” offense.

After three years as a college assistant coach (at PC and Stanford), Waters would become the head coach at Western Carolina in 1969. In 20 seasons in Cullowhee, he would not only become the Catamounts’ winningest coach, he would win more games than all his predecessors did combined. Waters is the only coach in the history of the program to finish his career at the school with a winning record.

Western Carolina would make the Division II playoffs in 1974, a prelude to joining the Southern Conference (and Division I) in 1976. Waters was a key part of the move up the NCAA ladder, as he by this time was also director of athletics at WCU. In 1983 Waters and the Catamounts would win 11 games and go all the way to the I-AA championship game (played at Johnson Hagood Stadium!), losing in the final to Southern Illinois.

Then in 1985, Waters was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). He would lead the Catamounts to a 4-6-1 record that year; the following season WCU would go 6-5.

In April of 1987 he would be profiled in Sports Illustrated. The piece noted that Waters was one of three players from the 1965 49ers squad to suffer from ALS, a coincidence (or perhaps not a coincidence) that drew considerable scrutiny.

In 1987, the Catamounts would slip to 4-7, and then in 1988 WCU would lose its last five games and finish 2-9, the worst season of Waters’ career. It would also be the last season of his career.

During spring practice in 1989, Waters was “reassigned” by Western Carolina administrators, a decision made more difficult because Waters had wanted one more year. He didn’t get it. Waters died in late May of that year.

That had to have been a very trying time for the WCU administration, which was faced with trying to decide how best to ease the best coach it ever had out of the position he had held for so long. Waters had made WCU football a success, but it appeared that success was drifting away as Waters’ body continued to fail him. He wouldn’t quit, so he was removed.

Then the folks at WCU made a mistake, bringing in an “outsider”, Dale Strahm, to coach the team. Strahm was in Cullowhee for one year, and then decided to get out of town following a 3-7-1 season. Four coaches have followed, none establishing any pattern of success.

Steve Hodgin, who had been an assistant at the school for seven years prior to becoming head coach, did have a respectable run, with three straight winning seasons in the mid-1990s, but after a 1-7 SoCon record in 1996, he was done. Bill Bleil was actually 7-4 in his fifth season in Cullowhee, but was then fired after a series of off-the-field problems. Kent Briggs spent six seasons at WCU; he would finish his career at the school with 15 consecutive conference losses.

The current coach of the Catamounts is Dennis Wagner. WCU was 3-9 in his first season; this year, the Catamounts are 0-5 entering Saturday afternoon’s contest.

Western Carolina is 79-135 since the reassignment of Bob Waters. Replacing a legend is not easy.

—

It’s also not easy to win while dealing with budget restraints, a historic problem at Western Carolina. WCU’s budget for athletics is the league’s smallest (just under $8.5 million in FY2008). Western Carolina has fewer athletic donors than any school in the league save UT-Chattanooga (The Citadel has more than seven times as many boosters as does WCU).

The school is situated in a population area that is one of the league’s smallest (Elon, by comparison, has a population base surrounding it three times as large), which perhaps partly explains the less-than-stellar home attendance (less than 7,000 per game last season). Western Carolina also does not have a large local corporate presence from which to solicit donations, and the general population is not particularly affluent (average household income: just over $34,000).

It’s a tough sell.

Tangent: Appalachian State and Western Carolina are rivals, or at least are supposed to be rivals. The two schools have met on the gridiron 73 times, which means they’ve met almost every year WCU has had a football program. App State leads the series, 54-18-1. It has to be tough when your biggest game of the year is against a team that has beaten you 75% of the time. The Mountaineers have won 22 of the last 24 meetings.

—

Western Carolina’s cumulative statistics in the current campaign are not pretty, which is not surprising for an 0-5 team. Opponents are outscoring the Catamounts 30 to 8; have more than twice as many first downs; have intercepted WCU passers seven times (with the Catamounts yet to pick off a pass on defense); and are averaging almost twice as many yards of total offense.

In five games, Western has a total of 3 first-half points. WCU has scored 4 touchdowns in those five games.

—

In short, this is a game The Citadel should win. Of course, that was the feeling before the 43-7 embarassment at Elon. Now, will doubt creep in? Kevin Higgins has to convince his team it isn’t as bad as last week’s game and prepare them to fight a desperate team which needs a victory just as badly (if not more so) as do the Bulldogs. Other potential x-factors: Whitmire Stadium’s playing surface is artificial turf, and the game is WCU’s Homecoming.

The Citadel has defeated Western Carolina five times in a row, and historically has had more success against the Catamounts than any other Southern Conference school (19-13-1). I am hopeful that both of those trends will continue on Saturday. However, if they don’t, The Citadel may be in for a very long season.

Filed under: Football, The Citadel | Tagged: Appalachian State, Bill Bleil, Bob Waters, Bobby Bowden, college football, Dale Strahm, Dennis Wagner, Elon, Florida State, Johnson Hagood Stadium, Kent Briggs, Kevin Higgins, Presbyterian, Red Hickey, San Francisco 49ers, Southern Conference, Southern Illinois, Steve Hodgin, The Citadel, UT-Chattanooga, Western Carolina, Whitmire Stadium | Leave a comment »

Football, Game 5: The Citadel vs. Elon

Posted on October 9, 2009 by Sandlapper Spike

In the 1880s a train depot was built at what would eventually become the town of Elon College (yes, the town was called “Elon College”). By 1888 there was a post office, and once you’ve got a post office, well obviously the next thing you need is a college, so some local assemblymen from the United Church of Christ founded Elon College (the actual school, not the town) in 1889. The first year there were 76 students enrolled.

By 1931, Elon had dramatically increased its enrollment, and had 87 students.

Okay, that’s a little unfair. Elon’s enrollment was affected by the Great Depression, and there was also a fire in 1923 that devastated the school, but by the mid-1930s, Elon was in trouble, having briefly lost its accreditation and barely keeping its financial ship afloat. Elon was barely hanging on, but then caught a break when Army Air Corps pilots trained on campus during World War II, which helped the school survive (shades of the relationship between the U.S. Navy and Notre Dame, with one difference being that Elon didn’t have a famous football team). After the war, veterans and the G.I. Bill pushed enrollment past 700.

It was still a sleepy little college, geared towards local students commuting from their homes, until the early 1970s. Its most notable graduate may well have been Doug Moe. Since 1973, however, Elon has made an amazing transformation into a respected regional university under the leadership of two presidents. Fred Young, who led the school for 25 years, made the decision on behalf of the institution to buy a lot of nearby land, which in hindsight was an excellent decision. It increased the campus size threefold, and thus enabled the school to expand dramatically.

Young also appears to have been a pro when it came to fundraising, a tradition carried on by his successor, Leo Lambert, who developed a plan for Elon’s future even more ambitious than Young’s. A list of all the buildings and programs added at the school in just the last 10 years (and it’s a long list) can be found in this article about Lambert: Link

Elon has done a good (if not great job) of setting big goals and meeting those goals by raising a ton of money and having a coherent master plan. The speed in which all of this has been done is truly remarkable. How was it done so quickly? In the linked article, Lambert says:

“Private schools can act quickly and can pursue their own destiny without having to deal with a state bureaucracy. We can build architecturally cheaper, lovelier and more on time than any state university.”

Well, then.

Of course, there are limits, and Elon may be reaching them. Lambert suggests the goals contained in the next strategic plan will cost at least $500 million, which is a lot of money, especially when you consider that 46% of Elon’s 24,000 living alums have graduated within the past 10 years. The school has tapped a lot of old money already, but the new money won’t be coming in for quite a while, at least from alumni.

On the other hand, Elon can continue to raise money from other sources, as it is situated in the largest population area (50-mile radius) in the Southern Conference, a region that also has the highest average household income in the league. It will be interesting to see how the school continues to progress.

—

Elon had two sustained periods of excellence in small-college (NAIA) football. The first of these occurred in the 1930s, under the direction of head coach D.C. “Peahead” Walker. In 10 seasons Walker would win four North State League championships in football, and several other titles in baseball and basketball, as he coached all three sports at the school (during the summers he played minor league baseball).

Walker was an Alabama native who was a popular speaker on the rubber chicken circuit (occasionally teaming up with his buddy Frank Howard). He would leave Elon to coach at Wake Forest, leading that school to two bowl games (including the first Gator Bowl in 1946; the Demon Deacons defeated South Carolina 26-14). Walker is still the alltime winningest coach at Wake Forest. He also coached the Canadian Football League’s Montreal Alouettes.

Elon’s greatest run of success came during the 1970s and early 1980s under head coaches Shirley “Red” Wilson and Jerry Tolley. Wilson had been a veteran North Carolina high school coach before taking the Elon job. He would coach there for ten seasons, winning five league titles and making the NAIA playoffs in three of those years. Wilson then left to become head coach at Duke and was replaced by Tolley, who had been his top assistant at Elon.

Tolley would only lead Elon for five seasons; he had already decided that he did not want to coach past the age of 40. In his final two years, Elon would win consecutive NAIA national championships. Tolley’s career record as a head coach: 49-11-2.

After winning the second title (3-0 against Pittsburg State; Elon had seven turnovers, but the Gorillas missed five field goals) Tolley walked away from coaching, but not from Elon, where he briefly became a fundraiser before taking a job at LabCorp (whose CEO was on the Elon board of trustees).

Tolley has also written several books on football drills and served two terms as mayor of Elon College (the town). He is now the director of annual giving at the school. One gets the sense that Tolley is one of the influential figures in Elon’s rise as an institution over the past quarter-century.

—

In 2001 Elon College (the school) became Elon University; Elon College (the town) became Elon; and the football program got a new stadium. The year before, Elon had changed the nickname of its athletic teams from the “Fightin’ Christians” to the “Phoenix”. (Kind of a boring nickname, if you ask me.) Elon had completed its transition from the NAIA to NCAA Division I in 1999.

The coach who led the Phoenix into its new era of football was Al Seagraves, who had been a longtime assistant to Charlie Taaffe at The Citadel. Seagraves would coach Elon for eight seasons, with his last year being Elon’s first as a Southern Conference school.

After that season (in which Elon was 2-10) Seagraves was replaced by Paul Hamilton, who would coach the Phoenix for two years. After consecutive 3-8 seasons, Hamilton would be succeeded by current Elon coach Pete Lembo, who is now in his fourth year at the school.

Lembo had been the coach at Lehigh before taking the Elon job. The previous coach at Lehigh? Kevin Higgins. Lembo replaced Higgins when the current head coach of The Citadel took a job as an assistant with the Detroit Lions. Lembo had been an assistant under Higgins at Lehigh.

Elon has improved its record in each of Lembo’s three seasons, going 5-6, 7-4, and 8-4, narrowly missing the playoffs last season after losing its last two games of the year. A 24-16 loss at Appalachian State probably didn’t hurt the Phoenix’s cause, but the season-ended 26-3 drubbing handed out by Liberty certainly did. If Elon had won that game, it likely would have advanced to postseason play. It wouldn’t have deserved to do so, however.

I normally want SoCon teams to succeed in out of conference play, and don’t like ceding potential playoff berths to other leagues (one of these years the selection committee will give every team in the CAA a bid), but I wasn’t too upset to see Elon fold in Lynchburg. That’s because the Phoenix had won a game earlier in the season that it should have lost…to The Citadel.

Last year’s 27-23 Elon “victory” in Charleston was an end-to-end officiating debacle. It featured (among other things) a timing mistake that led to an Elon field goal, a reversed call on a turnover that should not have been reversed (that led to another Phoenix field goal), and an unbelievably poor spot on a fourth down play that gave the ball (and the game) to Elon.

I hope the officials for Saturday’s game are better. They could not be worse.

Note: The referee for last year’s contest worked the game between Appalachian State and The Citadel last week without incident (not counting microphone follies), and has also called an Elon game already this year. I’m assuming he won’t get the assignment for The Citadel-Elon, but this is the Southern Conference we’re talking about, so you never know.

—

Elon is 4-1 entering Saturday’s game, with wins over Davidson, Presbyterian, Georgia Southern, and Furman, and a loss to Wake Forest.

The Phoenix beat the Presbyterian 41-7 at PC, in a game in which the Blue Hose finished with just two yards net rushing. Conversely, PC rushed for 204 yards at The Citadel two weeks ago. Elon has held all four of its FCS opponents to 88 yards net rushing or less.

Elon needed a last-second field goal to get past Furman in Greenville, a game in which the Phoenix struggled to run the ball (49 total yards) but made up for it with passing yardage (374). That was the 15th time in Scott Riddle’s career that he had thrown for 300+ yards in a game, a league record.

The junior had earlier established a Socon mark with 218 consecutive passes without an interception before throwing a pick against Georgia Southern. Interestingly, Riddle is also serving as Elon’s punter this season.

Riddle has thrown for 618 yards and 5 touchdowns against The Citadel in two previous meetings. 321 of those yards and 4 of the TDs were to Terrell Hudgins (who also scored a TD against the Bulldogs the year before Riddle arrived at Elon).

Hudgins set the all-Division I record for career receptions against Furman. He now has 330 catches after pulling in 16 of Riddle’s throws last Saturday. He is two or three games away from breaking Jerry Rice’s FCS record for receiving yardage in a career.

Riddle and Hudgins make for a tough combo. Last season the Phoenix also ran the ball well against The Citadel (187 yards), the kind of balance that Pete Lembo wants in his offense. Brandon Newsome, now the third-string tailback for Elon, had 134 of those yards; he is one of three Phoenix running backs with at least one career 100-yard rushing game.

Elon’s defense has 19 sacks so far in just five games and held Georgia Southern and Furman to 14 and 12 points, respectively. While Elon’s offense is averaging almost 460 yards total offense per game, Phoenix opponents are only averaging 216 yards per contest. The Elon D has forced eight turnovers so far this season, with six of those being interceptions.

Elon’s defense is holding opponents to a 24% rate on third down conversions, one reason why the Phoenix have a five-minute per game time of possession advantage.

Elon placekicker Adam Shreiner is 6-8 on field goals, including the game-winner against Furman with 4 seconds to play last week. He has missed one extra point. The Phoenix do not have particularly impressive kick or punt return statistics so far this season.

—

This game is being billed in some quarters as a matchup of Andre Roberts vs. Terrell Hudgins, but I think the key to the game will be the Bulldogs’ defensive front seven versus the Elon offensive line. The Citadel must get pressure on Riddle, which won’t be easy (in 208 pass attempts, Elon quarterbacks have been sacked 11 times). In last year’s game Riddle was sacked once, for a two-yard loss.

The Bulldogs also must force turnovers. Appalachian State did not turn the ball over against The Citadel. Just one turnover may have made the difference in that game, and the matchup with Elon will be no different. Bulldog defenders are going to have to make plays on the ball.

If The Citadel plays as well overall as it did last Saturday against the Mountaineers, then I believe the Bulldogs will win the game (SoCon officiating caveats aside). The question, then, is whether or not The Citadel is capable of putting together two good games in a row against quality opposition. We’ll find out on Saturday.

Filed under: Football, The Citadel | Tagged: ACC, Al Seagraves, Appalachian State, Charlie Taaffe, College of Charleston, Davidson, Elon, FCS, Frank Howard, Furman, Georgia Southern, Jerry Tolley, Montreal Alouettes, Notre Dame, Paul Hamilton, Peahead Walker, Pete Lembo, Presbyterian, Red Wilson, Scott Riddle, Southern Conference, Terrell Hudgins, The Citadel, UNC-Greensboro, UT-Chattanooga, Wake Forest | Leave a comment »

Too bad the game is football and not horseshoes

Posted on October 5, 2009 by Sandlapper Spike

The Citadel played well on Saturday against Appalachian State. After getting drubbed repeatedly over the past few seasons by the Mountaineers, the Bulldogs held their own for 60 minutes, which was a nice change of pace. Alas, the game lasted longer than 60 minutes, and overtime was not kind.

Let’s make this a ramble:

— I thought that the playcalling on offense by the Bulldog coaching staff was excellent throughout the game. Bart Blanchard and Miguel Starks were mixed-and-matched very well, a task that had to have been made more difficult by Blanchard’s ankle problem.

The TD pass to Alex Sellars was perfectly timed and executed. I really liked the commitment to running the ball, and it paid off (214 yards rushing).

My only criticism would be about the sequence of plays called in overtime. I am not sure about the first and second down calls, and as for third down…

When you have the ball first in overtime, you really don’t want to be in must-attempt-FG mode if you can help it. The Citadel had a third-and-long it needed to convert.

Given the overall situation, I think it would have been best to run the play using the starting QB who had displayed a lot of composure during the game, and who has now thrown 6 TD passes in his last two games. His first option would have been the player who is almost certainly the best wide receiver in school history.

In other words, I think the ball needed to be in the hands of Blanchard and/or Andre Roberts on that play. I’m not a coach, though.

— There were only seven accepted penalties by the two teams combined in the game. However, five of them came in the fourth quarter. It was like watching a bizarro NHL game.

— Sam Keeler can’t think about the kick he missed in OT. He needs to think about the 50-yarder and the 45-yarder he made in the first half. His kicking was a plus for the Bulldogs on the day overall, without question.

— Defensively the Bulldogs did a fair job of bending but not breaking in the first half. It got tougher to keep Appalachian State out of the end zone as the game went on. The overall strategy seemed sound; the Bulldogs were hampered by a blown coverage that led to the tying TD in the fourth quarter, and by some shoddy tackling. Poor tackling was the proximate cause of the Mountaineers’ second touchdown. That is something which must improve.

The Bulldogs did not create a turnover on defense. If The Citadel could have forced just one turnover, it likely would have won the game. The Bulldogs’ D came into the game with six interceptions and three recovered fumbles, but just two of those turnovers have come while the outcome of a game was still in doubt (both against Presbyterian, with Cortez Allen accounting for each of them).

— Van Dyke Jones’ 69-yard TD run was one of the better runs I’ve seen by a Bulldog. Maybe it wasn’t the best ever at Johnson Hagood Stadium (Stump Mitchell’s effort against VMI in 1980 comes to mind), but it was truly special.

— Attendance was announced as 14,238. That seemed about right to me as I surveyed the stands. However, that’s just how many people were inside Johnson Hagood Stadium. What was truly striking was the attendance outside the stadium. The parking lots were packed.

There are now lots of fans who tailgate but don’t go to the game itself, and I don’t mean the groups where a couple of people remain to watch over the tailgating equipment while everyone else goes to the game. I’m talking about gatherings where almost no one goes to the game, where everyone just remains in the parking lot the entire time.

I mentioned that the tailgating scene could be perceived as “too good” when I wrote about attendance a couple of months ago. It seems to me, though, that the tailgating-only crowd has increased exponentially as of late, thanks to the ability to incorporate the joys of satellite television (along with flat-screen TVs) into a tailgate setup.

There was an article about “TV Tailgating” in Columbia, S.C.’s The State newspaper on Sunday about this very subject. That story focused on people watching South Carolina play on TV while stationed in one of the parking lots outside Williams-Brice Stadium.

Of course, at The Citadel the game inside the stadium is rarely on television. Folks tailgating during the game watch other contests on TV while listening to Darren Goldwater call the Bulldogs’ games on the radio. At least, I hope they’re listening to the Bulldogs on the radio…

Twenty years ago, if the parking lots had been as full as they were on Saturday, I believe there would have been at least 17,000 people watching the game inside JHS, perhaps more. However, twenty years ago there weren’t portable satellite dishes, and when people talked about “plasma” they were referring to blood and not TVs.

I don’t know what The Citadel’s administration can do about that. I don’t know if it wants or needs to do anything about it, either.

— It was Military Appreciation Day, and thus the fans who did venture inside Johnson Hagood were treated to a good show, including a flyover by a World War II-era B25 bomber, a parachutist bringing the game ball (landed on the 45 yard line — nice job!), and the Parris Island Marine Band performing at halftime.

There was a pull-up bar station in the concessions area under the stadium, so that future Marines could showcase their upper body strength in what could have been construed as an attempt to impress women, but was undoubtably meant just for recruiting purposes.

— Also underneath the stadium was a table for The Citadel’s club hockey team, which was doing a little fundraising by raffling off a motorcycle. A cadet wearing a complete goalie outfit was part of the show. I couldn’t decide if his uniform was terribly awesome, or awesomely terrible. Click on the link to judge for yourself.

— Fourth game played, fourth game wearing navy pants, fourth game with a terrible-looking uniform. Maybe The Citadel should wear orange jerseys and yellow helmets with them.

— The sound system is still a bit too loud, in my opinion. A few other stadium music/sound observations…

1) In the third quarter, someone thought it would be a good idea to play the “Everybody Clap Your Hands” snippet while The Citadel was punting. I guess the fans were supposed to get excited about the home team not converting on third down. “One hop this time; right foot let’s punt.”
2) “Cotton Eye Joe”? Really? Probably made the App State fans feel right at home. It’s also a staple at Yankee Stadium. Why not bring in Ronan Tynan while you’re at it?
3) I liked the NFL Films-style music, but it sounded a bit tinny over the speakers. Maybe a better recording is needed.
4) The referee’s microphone cutting in and out surely did wonders for sales of Advil and Tylenol.

— I spotted Jeff Hartsell of The Post and Courier hustling down to the field at the five-minute mark of the fourth quarter. As he got about halfway down the stadium steps, Appalachian State scored the tying touchdown. Hartsell hesitated briefly, then started to head back to the press box (as if he had forgotten something), and then turned back and went to the sideline area. Perhaps he was saying to himself, “I really need to update Bulldog Bites!”

— App State fans in the East side stands tried to start an “ASU” chant in the third quarter, only to be drowned out by a lusty rendition of “Hey Baby” by the corps of cadets. The Mountaineer supporters seemed confused by the choice of song (hard to blame them) and quieted down almost immediately. I still could survive without it, but for that moment, “Hey Baby” worked. Well played, cadets.

—

All in all, it was a good game, but it was still a loss. Next for the Bulldogs is a trip to Elon. Getting a win there will not be easy, but if The Citadel plans to contend in the conference, it will be necessary.

Filed under: Football, The Citadel | Tagged: Alex Sellars, Appalachian State, Bart Blanchard, Cortez Allen, Darren Goldwater, Elon, Jeff Hartsell, Johnson Hagood Stadium, Miguel Starks, Parris Island Marine Band, Presbyterian, Sam Keeler, South Carolina, tailgating, The Citadel, The Post and Courier, The State, Van Dyke Jones | Leave a comment »

Football, Game 4: The Citadel vs. Appalachian State

Posted on October 1, 2009 by Sandlapper Spike

It’s time for the games that matter to begin. League play, SoCon style. First up for the Bulldogs: Appalachian State, winner of three of the last four FCS championships and four-time defending conference champs. Basically, the league opener is as big a challenge as The Citadel will have for the rest of the season.

This will be the 38th clash on the gridiron between the two schools. Appy leads the all-time series 26-11; the Mountaineers are 10-8 in 18 previous trips to Johnson Hagood Stadium. Appalachian has won 14 of the last 15 games in the series, with the one Bulldog victory coming in 2003, shortly before the Mountaineers began their run of conference and national titles.

That 2003 victory (24-21) is one of only two times in that 15-game stretch in which The Citadel held Appalachian State to fewer than 25 points; the other exception came in 2001, when the Mountaineers slipped past the Bulldogs 8-6. In the thirteen other games played since 1994, Appalachian State has averaged 41.5 points per game. The last four meetings have resulted in Appy point totals of 45, 42, 45, and 47.

—

Perhaps the most curious thing about the history of the series between the two schools is that prior to 1972, there was no history. The Citadel and Appalachian State had never played each other in football until Appy joined the Southern Conference in 1971. The two schools then began the series in 1972, and have met every year since.

The never-and-then-always aspect of the series is not particularly surprising when juxtaposed against the backdrop of the Southern Conference, a way station of a league since its founding in 1921. Schools have come and gone, and sometimes come back (hello again, Davidson). The conference has routinely featured schools that in many cases don’t have much in common. The Citadel and Appalachian State, fellow members of the SoCon for four decades, make for a good example of this phenomenon.

Appalachian State University has origins dating back to 1899, and would eventually become a four-year college in 1929. It was at that time a teachers’ college, designed to educate future instructors in northwest North Carolina. By the late 1920s the school was also fielding a football team and playing similar two- and four-year institutions like High Point and Lenoir-Rhyne.

In the 1950s the school began to become more of a regional institution, with multiple degree programs. By the 1970s the undergraduate enrollment had increased to over 9,000 (today it has 14,500 undergrad students). As the school increased in size, the department of athletics left the Division II Carolinas Conference and moved up to Division I, joining the Southern Conference (essentially replacing George Washington, which had left the SoCon in 1970).

Appalachian State’s institutional history is not unlike that of fellow conference member Georgia Southern. The two schools were both originally founded to educate teachers. Appalachian State’s undergraduate enrollment began to increase before Georgia Southern’s did, and as a result Appy has about 20,000 more living alumni (95,000 to 75,000). The two schools have the largest alumni bases in the SoCon (by a considerable margin) and also enroll the most students (ditto).

Georgia Southern’s fan base includes a sizable (and vocal) contingent of supporters who want the school to move to FBS status in football. I wrote about this a few weeks ago; it doesn’t seem like a particularly good idea to me, and the GSU administration appears to oppose making the move.

Appalachian State, on the other hand, does not seem to have a significant (or at least loud) base of fans wanting to test the FBS waters. This is probably wise. While Appy does have the largest alumni base in the SoCon, it would not compare well to most FBS schools, at least in the southeast. Only one of the ACC/SEC schools (Wake Forest) has a smaller alumni base, and eight of the twelve C-USA schools have more living alums.

The population base around the school isn’t that large, and the area’s average household income is less than that of the markets for every school in the Southern Conference except Georgia Southern.

My sense is that most Appy fans are very happy with their football program’s position in the NCAA universe right now. Given the past two decades, who can blame them?

—

Jerry Moore has been the coach of the Mountaineers for the past 21 seasons (counting this one), but the run of success Appy has been on really began with the previous coach, Sparky Woods. Woods would preside over the Mountaineers’ first two SoCon titles (in 1986 and 1987). He was also the coach when Appalachian State started beating The Citadel on a regular basis; after losing his first game against the Bulldogs, Woods won four straight games in the series to close out his career in Boone.

Of course, as all fans of The Citadel know, Woods faced the Bulldogs on one other occasion as a head coach, in 1990. Woods had taken the South Carolina job following the death of Joe Morrison. In his second year in Columbia, the Gamecocks would lose to The Citadel 38-35. I will never forget watching his coach’s show the next day; he looked like he had been embalmed. Woods is now the head coach of VMI; he will get another crack at the Bulldogs next season.

Moore had once been the head coach of North Texas (where his record was mediocre) and Texas Tech (where his record was abysmal). After two years out of coaching, he got a break when Ken Hatfield invited him to join the coaching staff at Arkansas, first on a volunteer basis and then as a salaried assistant. Moore spent five years in Fayetteville before being offered the job in Boone after Woods left. He decided to take another shot at being a head coach. It would prove to be a good move for him and for Appalachian State’s football program.

Moore would win a SoCon title of his own at Appy in 1991, but then hit a brief rough patch that included his only losing season with the Mountaineers in 1993. During that stretch Appalachian State would lose three straight games to The Citadel (which was fielding some of its best teams at the time, including the 1992 SoCon championship squad).

That is the only period in the series to date in which The Citadel has won three consecutive games. In the 1992 season, the Bulldogs beat the Mountaineers in Boone 25-0, one of only three victories by The Citadel in Boone and the only time Appalachian State has ever been shut out by The Citadel.

October 3rd, Note Number 1: That 1992 game is also the only time the two schools have met on October 3rd — that is, until this Saturday. Hmm…
October 3rd, Note Number 2: On October 3rd, 1970, Appalachian State hosted Elon in the first football game in the Carolinas to be contested on artificial turf.

Moore’s Mountaineers would finish 4th in the league in 1993. That season and the 1996 campaign are the only two seasons during Moore’s tenure in which Appy has finished lower than third place in the conference (and in between the Mountaineers would win another league title in 1995). Since 1997, Appalachian State has five first-place finishes (two of those were shared titles), six second place finishes, and one third-place finish (in 2004).

After that third-place finish in 2004, the Mountaineers would win three straight FCS titles. Breaking through in the postseason had proven to be very difficult for Appy, which would finally win the national championship in its 13th appearance in the I-AA playoffs.

The Mountaineers had never managed to get past the semifinals prior to 2005, but after getting by Furman in the semis, Appalachian State defeated Northern Iowa for the first of its three national crowns. The change in postseason fortunes was attributed in part to a change in offensive philosophy, from a power-I formation to a spread look.

—

Last season Appalachian State averaged 37.3 points per game and 463.6 yards of total offense per game. Its defense was decent but not spectacular (allowing 21.6 PPG and 334 yards per contest). Appalachian committed 28 turnovers on offense, with 18 of those being lost fumbles (Appy recovered 12 of its own fumbles, so it put the ball on the ground 30 times in all in 13 games).

The Mountaineer defense intercepted 19 passes and recovered 8 fumbles, so Appalachian State had a turnover margin for the season of -1. The fact that the Mountaineers could win the SoCon despite a negative turnover margin is a testament to just how explosive on offense Appy really was (averaging almost seven yards per play).

—

Appalachian State is 1-2 so far this season, losing to East Carolina 29-24 (after trailing 29-7, with its backup quarterback) and McNeese State 40-35 (with McNeese scoring five points in the final four seconds). In its SoCon opener, Appy beat Samford 20-7, scoring the first 20 points of the game and keeping the Birmingham Bulldogs off the scoreboard until midway through the fourth quarter. The games against McNeese State and Samford were played in Boone, with Appalachian State traveling to Greenville, NC, for the game against ECU.

(Incidentally, despite losing to the Pirates, the Mountaineers still lead the all-time series between the two schools, 19-11, a factoid that I found a little surprising. Most of those wins over ECU came during the 1930s and mid-to-late 1950s.)

Appalachian State played East Carolina without its starting quarterback, Armanti Edwards, who was still recovering from a much-chronicled attack by a lawnmower. His backup, Travaris Cadet, acquitted himself fairly well against the Pirates in the loss. Edwards was back against McNeese State and so was the Appy offense (493 total yards), but the Mountaineer defense couldn’t contain the Cowboys’ offense (522 total yards), and Appy eventually lost a last-team-with-the-ball-wins type of shootout.

The game against Samford was played in a steady downpour, which apparently favored the defenses. The Mountaineer D rose to the occasion and limited Samford to 188 yards of total offense (Appy’s O had 366 total yards).

—

For The Citadel to pull the upset on Saturday, it needs to control Armanti Edwards. Not stop him, but control him. In his three previous games against the Bulldogs, he has been completely uncontrollable, rolling up 317.7 yards per game of total offense; Edwards has been responsible for 12 TDs in the three contests. That can’t happen again if The Citadel has any hope of winning the game.

Whether the Bulldogs are capable defensively of slowing down Edwards and company is debatable. The results from the game against Presbyterian were not encouraging in this respect. Previously run-challenged PC piled up 200+ yards rushing against The Citadel. Appalachian State could have a field day.

On the bright side, I think The Citadel’s offense is capable of moving the ball against a good but not great Mountaineer defense. The keys will be to A) control the ball, keeping Edwards and his friends off the field as much as possible, and B) put points on the board when in scoring position. It will be important to score touchdowns in the “red zone” on Saturday. Of course, you could say that about any Saturday.

The Citadel’s offensive line must protect Bart Blanchard. Appalachian State had three sacks against Samford (after not having any in its first two games). This is also a game that, for the Bulldogs to prevail, will likely require a special performance by Andre Roberts. He’s certainly up to the challenge.

The Bulldogs cannot afford major special teams snafus. Missing PATs and other misadventures in the kicking game will be fatal against a team like Appalachian State, which can and almost certainly will take advantage of any mistake.

I think this will be a fairly high-scoring game. For The Citadel to win, I think the offense/special teams must score at least 30 points, because unless the defense creates a multitude of Appy turnovers, I believe the Mountaineers are going to score at a clip similar to what they have done in recent meetings. It may well be that 30 points will not be enough for the Bulldogs. Would 40 be enough?

I’m not overly optimistic about The Citadel’s chances on Saturday afternoon. However, I’ll be there, part of what (if the weather holds up) promises to be a good crowd, cheering on the Bulldogs and hoping for the best. They’ve got a chance against the Mountaineers. I’m not sure you could have said that in the last few meetings.

Filed under: Football, The Citadel | Tagged: Andre Roberts, Appalachian State, Arkansas, Bart Blanchard, Carolinas Conference, college football, Davidson, East Carolina, Elon, FCS, Georgia Southern, High Point, Jerry Moore, Joe Morrison, Johnson Hagood Stadium, Ken Hatfield, Lenoir-Rhyne, McNeese State, North Texas, Northern Iowa, Samford, South Carolina, Southern Conference, Sparky Woods, Texas Tech, The Citadel, VMI | Leave a comment »

When an easy win causes unease

Posted on September 29, 2009 by Sandlapper Spike

The Citadel 46, Presbyterian 21. Concerns? Yes.

Presbyterian rushed for 204 yards against The Citadel, averaging 4.7 yards per rush. In its first three games this season, PC had rushed for a total of 203 yards.

Blue Hose running back Trandon Dendy came into the game averaging 3.0 yards per rush, with a season long of 16. Against the Bulldogs, Dendy rushed for 147 yards, averaging 6.4 yards per carry, with a 40-yard TD run included.

Presbyterian’s previous seven games against Southern Conference opponents (all played over the last two years) included five games in which PC had 61 yards rushing or less, and none of more than 140 yards. The 4.7 yards per rush garnered by the Blue Hose on Saturday is the best PC has done against any SoCon opponent over that period.

The Citadel’s defense occasionally got pushed around by an offensive line that included a 258-lb. left tackle and a 240-lb. center. This is not good.

Against Princeton I thought the defense did an excellent job against the run, particularly considering the Tigers have a fine running back in Jordan Culbreath. Against PC there were problems, unless there was some major sandbagging taking place. I don’t see that, though, not when it’s rush defense that’s the issue.

At one point late in the second quarter Presbyterian held a 14-13 lead and was moving the ball, combining its rushing attack with a fairly sharp mid-range passing game. Then, the Blue Hose got a little greedy, and tried a long pass that was intercepted by Bulldog defensive back Cortez Allen. On the ensuing drive The Citadel scored a touchdown to take a 20-14 lead into halftime, and the Bulldogs pulled away in the second half. Allen’s pick was probably the key play in the game; it was certainly important in terms of momentum.

Offensively the Bulldogs did not have much in the way of a ground game, but I am not as worried about that as I am the defensive letdown. That’s because there isn’t a big need to run the ball when the passing game is working like it was Saturday night.

PC’s strategy for defending Andre Roberts was a bit curious. Actually, I am not completely sure the Blue Hose had a strategy for defending him. Twelve catches for 184 yards and four TDs is a good night (and that’s despite dropping a sure 70-yard TD on the first play of the game).

Then there were the special teams…

Two missed extra points. Yuck. (Actually, there were three missed opportunities for PATs, as Kevin Higgins went for two at 26-14 early in the third quarter, which I think was too soon to start chasing the lost point.) I wasn’t crazy about the kickoffs, either, although I think the coaches were trying some different personnel, so that may not be as big a problem. The punts seemed a touch slow (in terms of getting them off), as well.

Against Appalachian State, The Citadel cannot afford to give away free points like that, or put the defense in a difficult position after a kickoff/punt. The Mountaineers will be a formidable enough challenge as it is.

A few other, even more random thoughts:

The team wore navy pants again, this time with the “home” tops. Light blue over dark blue — almost indescribably ugly. Maybe against Appalachian State we can wear gold jerseys to match the navy pants. Gold isn’t a school color, of course, but at this point that doesn’t appear to be a serious consideration. The Citadel should just go all out and become the Oregon of the east. The Bulldogs could have polka dot tops and horizontally striped pants, or some other Nike-approved combination.
Speaking of Oregon, the Ducks wore “throwback” uniforms on Saturday (in this case, from the 1990s, which isn’t all that far back, but we are talking about Oregon here). The Ducks won big. Navy wore throwback unis too, and also won big. Previously winless Colorado also wore throwbacks, and proceeded to shut out Wyoming 24-0. Maybe The Citadel should consider its own “throwbacks” day. There would be plenty of options.
Attendance wasn’t that bad, particularly considering the weather. It wasn’t great, but it could have been worse. I will say that it shows the difference between scheduling Presbyterian and scheduling Webber International. I expect a very good crowd will be at Johnson Hagood this Saturday for a 1pm start against Appalachian State, which will bring plenty of its own fans.
The halftime interview was unintentionally amusing. Kevin Higgins is a very patient man. Suggestion: just have someone give Higgins a headset, and let Darren Goldwater ask him a question or two. SportSouth actually did this when interviewing Wofford coach Mike Ayers at halftime of its broadcast of The Citadel-Wofford game last season, with Sam Wyche asking the questions. It turned out to be fairly informative (with Ayers spending a lot more time with the announcers than any coach I’ve ever seen interviewed at halftime).
It may have “just” been PC, but Keith Gamble’s interception return for a TD was very impressive. More of that, please.

Now it’s time for the “real” season, as The Citadel begins its eight-game SoCon slate. The Bulldogs are 2-1, exactly what everyone thought they would be at this point. I’m still not sure just what to make of this team, but so far, so good.

Filed under: Football, The Citadel | Tagged: Andre Roberts, Appalachian State, Colorado, Cortez Allen, Darren Goldwater, Johnson Hagood Stadium, Jordan Culbreath, Keith Gamble, Kevin Higgins, Mike Ayers, Navy, Nike, Oregon, Presbyterian, Princeton, Sam Wyche, Southern Conference, SportSouth, The Citadel, Trandon Dendy, Wofford | Leave a comment »

Soccer: Eleven needed for a team, more needed for a program

Posted on September 10, 2009 by Sandlapper Spike

Note: What follows may well be the rantings and ravings of somebody completely clueless about the women’s soccer program at The Citadel, as opposed to mostly clueless. I apologize in advance if I’ve completely missed the boat here, which is possible. I’m just a dude with a computer.

The Citadel’s women’s soccer team opened its 2009 season with a resounding 14-0 defeat of Alabama State at WLI Field. I was startled to see that, even from my vantage point, which is decidedly at a distance from the soccer program.

It was just last season that The Citadel finally won its first Southern Conference match in women’s soccer, a 2-1 triumph over Georgia Southern. Prior to that victory the Bulldogs had been 0-74-2 all-time in league play. Now all of the sudden The Citadel had beaten a Division I opponent 14-0, and no touchdowns were involved. This bore closer examination.

Alas, there was a catch. It turned out that Alabama State had played the match without a full complement of players — in fact, the Lady Hornets didn’t even have eleven players. They had eight.

It’s hard to compete, much less win, when you’re playing eleven against eight, and The Citadel also had three substitutes who played. The Bulldogs set numerous school records, as you might expect. To his credit, coach Bob Winch didn’t emphasize the score; instead, in his post-game interview he said rather bland things like the team had “moved the ball very well.” I’m sure he was less than thrilled to open regular-season play against a team with just eight players.

Actually, Alabama State played two matches while in the Low Country. With the same eight-player squad, the Lady Hornets lost by an identical 14-0 scoreline to Charleston Southern in a game shortened by a thunderstorm. In case you were wondering, a team needs to have at least seven players on the field for a match to be viable, per NCAA rule. Against Troy last week, Alabama State played with exactly seven players, losing 15-0 in a match called after 70 minutes.

I don’t know how you can legitimately compete as a Division I program (or call a program Division I, for that matter) in that situation. According to its pre-season preview, the Lady Hornets were supposed to have a 13-woman squad. Obviously things didn’t quite go according to plan.

However, it seems to me that you would be pushing your luck with even 13 players. What about injuries, illness, etc.? Most women’s soccer programs have a lot more than 13 players. For example, the Southern Conference schools (not counting The Citadel) average 26.7 players per team. Appalachian State lists 33 players on its roster; no school in the league has fewer than 23 players. No school, that is…except The Citadel.

The Citadel has 14 players on its roster.

At first, I didn’t really think that was true. Last season the Bulldogs had 21 listed players, which is a fairly small squad but not extraordinarily so. Also, if there was going to be a school with a soccer roster of a lesser size, it would be The Citadel, what with its low number of female students (going back to the 2007-08 school year, the school had a total of 136 women enrolled as undergraduates).

The 14 players include no freshmen. To be honest, when I initially saw the roster on the school’s website, I assumed that the incoming freshmen just hadn’t been listed on the school’s athletic website yet. I decided to check by e-mailing The Citadel. A hard-working staffer in Athletic Media Relations responded to my query almost immediately, telling me that in fact there are no freshmen on the roster.

That startled me more than the 14-0 score which had piqued my interest in this subject in the first place.

Last year The Citadel had nine freshmen on its roster. All nine returned this year (yay!). Given that, I would not have expected a sizable influx of freshmen for this season, particularly since last year just four seniors departed. However, to have no entering freshmen strikes me as problematic for the program, from an immediate perspective and for the future.

Having only fourteen available players (two of whom are keepers) means that while finding playing time for everyone won’t be a problem, competing against teams able to play almost twice as many players (or more) means that the Bulldogs are probably at a disadvantage in terms of players wearing down during games. For those more familiar with professional soccer at the club or international level than the college version of the sport, substitution is essentially unlimited (although there are certain restrictions that pertain to players re-entering the game). It’s not like competitive professional matches, where only three substitutions are allowed (and where there is no re-entry).

I will say, though, that other teams generally aren’t playing many more players than The Citadel, so perhaps I am overselling this as a significant issue. In The Citadel’s loss to Charleston Southern this week, CSU played 15 members of its 23-woman roster. The Bulldogs only had one substitute during the match. The Citadel also employed just one substitute in last season’s big win over Georgia Southern.

I also wonder a little bit about how having a small roster affects practices. Intra-team scrimmages obviously aren’t going to be 11-on-11. This is probably a minor point, however.

The other issue, in terms of this season, is what happens when a player is injured or becomes ill. Nineteen regular-season matches, plus all the practices in between, is a grind. It’s hard to imagine the Bulldogs going through the entire season unscathed from a health standpoint. What happens when/if half the team contracts the H1N1 virus? (Of course, that could be a problem with a 30-player roster, too.)

Tangent: I think the H1N1 virus (swine flu) is going to be a much bigger factor in the sports world than the general public may realize (although it’s starting to draw more interest from the press). It’s obviously been major news all over the world, but wait until late fall/early winter rolls around. This is not your grandmother’s flu. Last week it affected the schedules of the football team at Stillman College (which had to cancel its home opener because of the flu) and several members of Tulane’s volleyball team (which had to cancel a trip to a tournament). There will be many, many more stories like those to come as the year rolls along (including the flu’s impact on the football teams at Mississippi and Wisconsin).

Down the road, the larger issue with having no freshmen is that there is a “hole” in the program as far as continuity is concerned. Ideally, there would be a roughly equal number of players in each class, so that each year there is a modest amount of turnover as players graduate, to be replaced by freshmen. That also means there would always be several seniors in the program who would be able to provide leadership and experience.

Three years from now that isn’t likely to be the case, since there won’t be any seniors from the incoming class, as there is no incoming class. It is difficult to maintain a program’s momentum in those circumstances.

Caveat: sometimes classes can get skewed because players stay, rather than leave. As I mentioned earlier, all nine of last year’s freshmen returned this season. If most or all of them are on scholarship, either full or partial (a Division I women’s soccer program is allowed up to 14 schollies), it may be that there wasn’t a lot of money available to bring in new talent.

I don’t pretend to have a great understanding of the history of women’s soccer at The Citadel, and don’t know what happened in this particular circumstance, but regardless, having a smaller roster with no freshmen is surely not the preferred method of building a program. Bob Winch knows that, and it’s not like he didn’t try to bring in anybody (see this article on a recruit who apparently didn’t make it to campus).

Everyone associated with The Citadel knows that it is not easy to recruit male athletes who can successfully navigate all the responsibilities of being a cadet-student-athlete. I suspect recruiting female athletes is even more difficult, perhaps exponentially so.

The coaching staff has searched far and wide for players. There are three cadets from Ontario on the roster, which is one more than are from South Carolina. One of those Canadians, Amy Loughran, scored a goal and had an assist when the Bulldogs beat GSU last year, so apparently going north of the border for players isn’t a bad idea at all. The team also features players from Germany, Pennsylvania, and Nevada.

I guess the coaches will just have to cast their recruiting nets even wider. Canada does have several other provinces…

Filed under: Soccer, The Citadel | Tagged: Alabama State, Amy Loughran, Appalachian State, Bob Winch, Charleston Southern, Georgia Southern, Southern Conference, The Citadel, Troy, WLI Field | 1 Comment »

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