Atlantic Central Football Conference/Independents

[PA_wesleyfan]

SUBacker

 The injury bug seems to hit teams all at once. The disciplinary stuff seems to be happening more and more at every level. The Gulls should be able to score this week against SJF but they need some stops on D too

[XSUGull]

It sounds like Salisbury is falling apart. Maybe they will move Curley to the defensive side of the ball too. He is already playing QB and WR, why not add him to the wrong side of the ball?

[Bigtoe75]

It pains me to post this story, but here it is

http://www.wboc.com/global/story.asp?s=9131140

Another black eye for SU sports given what happened with the lax team last spring.  This is tough to take after all the good Coach Wood has done with the team in the community, especially the schools.

[wesleydad]

bigtoe, thanks for the link.  shame that young people cant make the right decision when so much more is at stake than macho pride.  unfortunately, that is the way of so much of today's society.

xsu, shame for him and the others as just a couple of weeks ago they were ranked in the top 10.  curley is an excellent player, may be able to help on the d side.

subacker, the loses on defense are hard to deal with, but i saw the game at delval and the d was not playing very well that day with all the players, less the nose guard.  there is a reason they were the starters and teamski is right. others will have to step up.  salisbury will have to attempt to outscore their opponents and you have plenty of weapons to use.  good luck the rest of the season and i will look you guys up when we travel down for the early november game.

[SU Backer]

   XSU......wrong side of the ball? LOL.....right side if you ask me! But Curley won't be lining up on defense, SU has some young kids that will need to get it done. Sometimes things like this can bring the guys left standing a "us against the world" mentality that makes them dig down and compete harder than they thought they could. I hope this is the case. Our pass defense was a bit lacking so maybe there are some guys that will surprise when they get in there.  I feel bad for Coach Wood and all the good guys past, present and future involved in the program that will have to hear about this crap these 5 (ex)players got themselves into. This is not what this program under Coach Wood is about- this program does a bunch of volunteer work in Salisbury's community and I am sure they will continue to do so in the future. Come on Go Gulls!

[dlippiel]

  Bad news out of Salisbury Maryland for my SU Seagulls.....starting linebacker Leonardis reportdedly broke his leg against Newport and is out for the season. Add to that one of the noseguards tore a knee ligament and is out for at least several weeks. Chandler was already out for the year. And I also just heard that 5 defensive starters were removed from the team for disciplinary reasons unrelated to football today! I checked the roster and all the names I was looking for were indeed gone. I fear my beloved birds may be cooked.....I really feel bad for the seniors, as this was a good team that still had a shot at the playoffs even up until today. But you can't lose 8 total starters on defense and stay at the same level, they are just not deep enough to recover from this IMO.  I still love the team and support them now more than ever, but we shall see how they respond this week at SJF. I hope for the best...Go Gulls!

Well that sucks!  Sorry to hear that.  It sure looks like some benchers are going to have to kick in and step their game up.  Good luck at SJF.  It will be a tough one to be sure.   

-Ski

Well with SJF's poor loss to Hartwick last week I wouldn't count your Gulls out yet. Two things are possible with SJF :-they come out flat and disheartened on SAT and Salisbury can take advantage or SJF comes out very refocused and composed and take out last week on a depleted Gulls lineup. Either way this is a big game for both teams. A win for either will most likely give that team some momentum and rejuvination towards the rest of the season.

[superman57]

SJF notoriously has one bad loss a year, my feeling is that this loss came at a bad time for SU... Fisher in the past has had great success against option teams... in my memory only one team in the past has truly run wild on fisher and that was 07 Springfield who in the next game got rocked...  as for the arrests... it is a shame by the sounds of the article every single one of those players should be kicked off the team... but I'm only reading the article

[XSUGull]

SUBacker: All defensive players play on the wrong side of the ball. I know that Curley won't play on defense, which is good because then another would be converted to the dark side. 

[XSUGull]

My unprofessional expert picks for Week 6:
XSUGULL season record: 9-5-2*

I have to make my picks a little early this week because I'm going to be out of town until Sunday.

Salisbury at St. John Fisher
This is a difficult game for me to predict. My heart says one thing but my head says another. It will be tough for Salisbury to deal with the loss of five defensive starters but the Gulls do get a boost. It sounds like Jarrell Chandler will be able to play this weekend. With an inexperienced secondary it will be very vital for the Gulls to have a good pass rush to put a little pressure on the opposing quarterback. Offensively the Gulls need to get the ball into Ronnie Curley's hands. It might not happen this week but I think it will happen by the end of the season; Curley will get the hat-trick of running, passing and receiving a touchdown all in one game. Right now I feel like Kirk Herbstreit when he picks against Ohio State. I think the depleted defense will hurt Salisbury too much and I am picking against the birds this week. St. John Fisher 28, Salisbury 24.

Frostburg State University at Southern Virginia
I think Frostburg is better team than their 1-3 record shows. They put up a fight against Washington Jefferson in the first week of the season and almost came back to beat Widener in Week 3. I think the Bobcats will spoil Southern Va. Homecoming. Frostburg State 31, Southern Virginia 14.

Wesley at Iona
If you look at past games you might say that Iona should beat Wesley. After all, Iona beat Delaware Valley who beat the Wolverines. However, this is a different Wesley team than the one that lost two fumbles and struggled offensively in the second half against the Aggies. I think the Wolverines stay on track and make it three wins in-a-row. Wesley 35, Iona 21.

Apprentice School at Lake Erie
This is the first of three games against ACFC teams for Lake Erie. I think the Shipbuilders will get the ACFC off to a good start against the Storm. Apprentice School 28, Lake Erie 10.

[fisheralum91]

hey guys- im a regular on the e8 board and i wanted to read about the suspensions...
bad deal for both schools-
the what if factor is always going to be there.
safe travels to all heading to rochester,  and of course GO FISHER!

[njlincolnlion]

It pains me to post this story, but here it is

http://www.wboc.com/global/story.asp?s=9131140

Another black eye for SU sports given what happened with the lax team last spring.  This is tough to take after all the good Coach Wood has done with the team in the community, especially the schools.

Bigtoe:

Thanks for the link.  I passed it on to my daughter is is a Salisbury alum class of 2006).  The arrests are a black eye on the players involved, and to a lesser extent on Salisbury football.   Hopefully these young men learned a valuable lesson about responsibility for their actions.  I hope they are able to continue their education at Salisbury or some other institution of higher learning, and receive their degree's and become valuable contributors to society

[njlincolnlion]

Will the bad news regarded the expelled football players at Salisbury, it was good to hear that Jarrell Chandler is back!  

[Teamski]

Wesley at Iona
If you look at past games you might say that Iona should beat Wesley. After all, Iona beat Delaware Valley who beat the Wolverines. However, this is a different Wesley team than the one that lost two fumbles and struggled offensively in the second half against the Aggies. I think the Wolverines stay on track and make it three wins in-a-row. Wesley 35, Iona 21.

This game is a real tough one to call.  Wesley is definately improving it's game in reducing turnovers and penalties.  So, I think that if they maintain their discipline, they can win the game.  Coach Drass has a lot of respect for Iona, and he mentioned on his show that he is taking the game extremely seriously.  Now that the are only two Pool-B bids this year, they have to take every game seriously, that's for sure.  I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

-Ski

[wesleydad]

wesley at iona, i checked out the box scores for iona and i am not sure how they have won any games.  i know that the stats dont tell the whole story, but they give up yardage both running and passing.  it seems that they take advantage of the other teams mistakes.  if wesley holds onto the ball they should win this game.

i forget to give a shout out to the president of wesley college for making the drive out to frostburg last week to take in the game.  it was nice to see that he has that kind of interest in the sports programs.  he mentioned that they had the field hockey team over for breakfast, met some perspective students, and then headed out to frostburg.  kudos to him.

[Teamski]

Well, at half-time Wesley leads Iona 7-6.  So far so good on avoiding major mistakes by Wesley.  They opened the game up with a 65 yard drive for 7 points.  On the following Iona possesion, Chet Turner interecepted a pass at the 16 yard line.  Two subsequent drives from deep on it's end of the field, and Wesley couldn't produce any good plays, allowing Iona to drive from a short field to a touchdown with a missed extra point.  Wesley then had a great run of plays from the 40 yard line but was stopped at the 8 with a missed field goal.

I have a feeling that Wesley is going to break some big plays in the second half.  They kept Iona's defense on the field for a fair amount of time in the first.   

Shane McSweeny is doing a stellar job at QB, IMHO.

-Ski