FB: North Coast Athletic Conference

[firstdown]

84 - I recall scrimmages with Franklin and Milikin in the early 2000's.  Wabash and Wheaton played an early game in 2001 (on the Saturday after the 9/11 attack) so they didn't scrimmage that year.

[Mugsy]

84 - I recall scrimmages with Franklin and Milikin in the early 2000's.  Wabash and Wheaton played an early game in 2001 (on the Saturday after the 9/11 attack) so they didn't scrimmage that year.

Wheaton played Wabash in regular season games in the early-80's.  We scrimmaged Wabash 2 of the 4 years I played at Wheaton, 85-88'.  Scrimmage between the two teams have been common since the late 80's.

Wheaton leads the all-time series, 8-4.

Past "regular" season games:
2001: Wheaton 58, Wabash 33
2000: Wheaton 17, Wabash 14
1983: Wheaton 22, Wabash 17
1982: Wabash 41, Wheaton 36

[Mugsy]

Um, thinking a bit.  I said I thought Wheaton looked sharp.  I'm guessing that their coaches might not agree.  Despite their ability to move the ball out in the field, they had very little success against the Wabash D down in the red zone, and then missed field goals.

Wheaton graduated a 2nd or 3rd team All-American PK from last year, so that is a big hole to fill.

[owubishops]

OWU vs Otterbein scrimmage is pretty even so far. Bishops down one score. Working on getting the details now.

[owubishops]

Espinosa hit one......one score each.

This guy has some lofty goals. Watch out NCAC.

[wabashcpa]

Espinosa hit one......one score each.

This guy has some lofty goals. Watch out NCAC.

Hope you're right - a strong OWU team has been sorely missing the last several years.

[wooalum05]

Okay so I have been absent from posting but lurking for the past year or so... any update from JCU on the Wooster scrimmage?

[wally_wabash]

Just an FYI to the board...NCAC Pick 'Em has returned and the week 1 games are posted on the pick 'em board linked here.  Play along all season if that's your thing! 

Back to week 1 talk...

Everybody on the schedule is on the road this week except for Wooster who is hosting Allegheny (somebody had to be the home team).  Even though it isn't a league game, I think the Wooster/Allegheny result will be interesting.  Wooster has started off with stronger competition the last couple of years.  Maybe the Scots can set a better tone for their season with a more winnable game here this year.  Also interested to see what they do at QB here.  Any word about who is starting up there? 

Witt/Cap also an interesting contest.  I feel Witt should win, but they'll almost certainly be doing a lot of different things on offense, so who knows if it's all clicking right away. 

Oberlin has a good look at a win on Saturday.  Kenyon and Hiram have a chance to raise some eyebrows if they can steal a road game. 

Side note for 9/8...earlier it was asked if there was a vid stream for Wabash @ Hanover.  Looks like Hanover does in fact stream their games and a link is posted on the D3football.com schedule.  At least Hanover's stream will get a stern test right off the bat.   

[FCGrizzliesGrad]

ANYONE INTERESTED IN BEING PART OF THE 2012 TOP 25 FAN POLL:
Please send me a PM with your ballot. I'd like to get a preseason poll up by Thursday night.

During the season ballots shall be due by Tuesdays so I can get them up Tuesday night.

Remember, this is just fun and we aren't part of the BCS Formula... yet

[owubishops]

For the Bash guys:

Darryl Kennon (6'3", 245 lb) has been signed by the AFC Show in Norway.

He graduated from Wabash College (NCAA Div III). He had an outstanding career in Wabash. He was a consistent all star throughout his four seasons and was named the defensive player of the year in the NCAC (North Coast Athletic Conference in 2008 and first team All American the same season. He earned top accolades from his coaches his entire career.

[Bishopleftiesdad]

Looks like the Bishops roster is up:

http://www.battlingbishops.com/roster.aspx?path=football

Looks like there are 77 players. On a side note I count 3 Baseball players on the team.

9 Seniors
17 Juniors
24 Sophomores
27 Freshman

[bashbrother]

I post for two reasons:

1.  Great to hear DK is still bringing his game... what a great player..thanks for posting owubishops

2.  I wasn't going to let the NCAC board get to the bottom of the North Region Football boards..... what is going on?  College Football starts for real tomorrow ladies and gentlemen!

WAF!

[wally_wabash]

Did we get through an entire offseason with zero football facilities upgrades throughout the conference?  I think we did.  Seems like quite a while since that has happened. 

Something I find interesting, and probably few others, is that Wabash will not play a single down on natural grass this regular season.  Oberlin and DePauw are the lone old school holdouts to be playing on grass in our conference.  How long before they lay down some synth turf? DePauw, I would guess, will be doing this sooner rather than later.  Oberlin has been announcing cool athletics related partnerships left and right so maybe some shiny new green turf is in the offing. 

[ExTartanPlayer]

"Something I find interesting, and probably few others, is that Wabash will not play a single down on natural grass this regular season."

Interesting.  I had a front-row seat to the synthetic-turf "revolution" of the last decade or so (yes, this can be debated to some degree - I know that AstroTurf appeared several decades ago, but the current-standard FieldTurf was starting to appear while I was in high school and has become steadily more prevalent since)...I played almost every down on grass in high school (2000-2003)before starting to play all home games on turf in college, and the number of road "grass games" decreased every year (as a freshman we played at least three games on grass...and by my senior year at CMU, 2007, we played only one).  To be honest, once I got used to turf I absolutely HATED playing on grass - I felt slow & clumsy on grass after practicing on turf all year.

wally, I'd guess this is becoming more and more common.  You're starting to see turf not only at the majority of small colleges, but even at a lot of high schools around the nation (and many of those that DON'T have turf seem to be heading in that direction if they can raise the $$).  In another generation or so, it might be the norm for some kids to go their whole career without playing more than a handful of games on natural grass.

[smedindy]

I like the new field turf - loads better than the old Astroturf.

However, part of me misses watching teams slog around in mud and wet grass. If I wasn't doing stats at a game I enjoyed seeing the mud fly. It was fun to play pickup games in the mud as well.

But field turf definitely has its advantages in upkeep and maintenance- and no grubs!