FB: American Rivers Conference

[doolittledog]

It will be interesting to see just how finished the new stadium at Dubuque will be on Sept. 6th.

Watching the webcam I notice the football players are still using the locker rooms that are under the visitor side seating.  The parking lots still need to be paved.  Should be a nail biting 2 1/2 weeks for that construction crew!!!

[DutchFan2004]

Texas, Florida, and California all produce great numbers of great football players.  I think Iowa does a decent job of turning out football players considering our population base...and weather!!!

That said, I think just being from Texas or Florida or Cali doesn't mean you will come into the IIAC and start dominating as a freshman.  We have seen that at Dubuque.  Get these guys to stick around for 4 years and then you will see some all-conference performers. 

I agree with that.  Not that the kids from those state can not make an impact.  I know that all sorts of kids can get overlooked but the question that I have is that if these kids are so good why did they get away from their instate coaches and schools.  I am sure that there is the possibility that the players could make an impact and there are always diamond in the rough type kids out there.  They take time to develop.  Freshman at any level HS or any level of college take time to adjust.  You don't even see many freshman at the D1 level make the field. 

[Klompen]

Another Knight fan entered the world at 1:56 this morning and God is chuckling away after giving me 2 girls.
Elisa Joy (Ellie) is 7 lb, 2 oz and 19 inches long. Has a nice head of blonde hair like her mom and sister and is quite a cutie if I do say so myself.
Mom and baby are doing excellent.
I am beat.
For the last 4 weeks I've had my phone on me at football practice and even the slightest twitch or sound had me going for it. Go figure my wife calls me for over an hour last night trying to get a hold of me and I never heard a thing. She got a hold of Coach WIlson and he tracked me down.
Its going to take quite a while to make up for that one.

Congratulations WH!  I think you better volunteer for weeks and weeks of diaper duty to make up for missing that phone call!   

[Alfredeneumann]

AEN:

So how many new Knights showed up for the first day of football? 

Any Ryan Winters type difference makers decide to transfer in? 

135 out 136 TOTAL PLAYERS expected showed up yesterday.

I have not had a chance to talk to any coaches about number of freshmen or transfers in. Will try to catch a coach or two today.

[Thunderbolt]

Bolt's 9.69 100 time last night

according to ESPN, supposedly translates into a 3.55 40 time. 

  Considering Deion Sanders ran one of the fastest 40 times ever  (4.19ish I think)  that just doesn't seem humanly possible does it?

Then again, it was insane how easily he won that race with coasting in the last 15 meters

If you heard that right, that was a totally stupid comment by (whoever at) ESPN.

Even if speed were constant across the 100 meters, 40% of 9.69 is 3.876, not 3.55.  And clearly there is acceleration (especially by Usain!) during the race.

The ESPN guy is right. There are 109.6 yards in 100 meters. Devine is right, it doesn't seem hunanly possible.

[dutchfan1]

Another Knight fan entered the world at 1:56 this morning and God is chuckling away after giving me 2 girls.
Elisa Joy (Ellie) is 7 lb, 2 oz and 19 inches long. Has a nice head of blonde hair like her mom and sister and is quite a cutie if I do say so myself.
Mom and baby are doing excellent.
I am beat.
For the last 4 weeks I've had my phone on me at football practice and even the slightest twitch or sound had me going for it. Go figure my wife calls me for over an hour last night trying to get a hold of me and I never heard a thing. She got a hold of Coach WIlson and he tracked me down.
Its going to take quite a while to make up for that one.

Congrats, WH. Do you have pictures to share?

[Thunderbolt]

 To finish cathing up, add me to the long list of well wishers to the Walston Hoover family.

[keith45]

UD PREVIEW UP

http://www.d3football.com/preview.php?id=1152&year=2008

Also just saw that we got Cornell for homecoming this year...is there any reasoning behind homecoming games? Or is it just random?

[wartknight]

Another Knight fan entered the world at 1:56 this morning and God is chuckling away after giving me 2 girls.
Elisa Joy (Ellie) is 7 lb, 2 oz and 19 inches long. Has a nice head of blonde hair like her mom and sister and is quite a cutie if I do say so myself.
Mom and baby are doing excellent.
I am beat.
For the last 4 weeks I've had my phone on me at football practice and even the slightest twitch or sound had me going for it. Go figure my wife calls me for over an hour last night trying to get a hold of me and I never heard a thing. She got a hold of Coach WIlson and he tracked me down.
Its going to take quite a while to make up for that one.

Congrats WH - a little late here, but didn't touch my computer until this am (A handful of projects to complete the weekend-although, not by choice)

[LCNorse]

Spoke to an incoming freshman at Central this weekend and was pretty upset to here this story. It sounds like Central has around 140 guys in camp, which seems pretty high, but the part that bothers/worries me is the fact that in this particular players recruitment he was told that they wouldn't have more then 115 to 120 guys on the team and that he would have plenty of reps in practice. I would hope that Central just had more people show up then they actually recruited, which is a very realistic possibility. From hearing from a few people some of the coaches on the staff were pretty upset with the numbers and felt they were to high. It seems like when you get up over 130 players, your opportunities in practice are very limited and some very good players can be looked over. Is this a case of over recruiting to keep players from other schools? I sure don't know, Central was always one of the best and classiest programs that I ever played against so I don't think that this was the case. Any word from anyone closer to the program on this?

[doolittledog]

The Dubuque preview noted they had 115 in camp.  Which is down from the last 2 years.  I guess they agree that smaller numbers might be better. 

I am glad to see Colton Hansen will be the starter at QB for Dubuque.  I am curious to see how he does in the IIAC, he had very impressive stats while in high school at Olin. 

[doolittledog]

UD PREVIEW UP

http://www.d3football.com/preview.php?id=1152&year=2008

Also just saw that we got Cornell for homecoming this year...is there any reasoning behind homecoming games? Or is it just random?

I thought I read from some Wartburg posters that theirs is always whatever home game is nearest to a certain date.  Others I would think try to schedule homecoming against an easy opponant.  A school doesn't want homecoming too early or too late in the season...but I think they also try to find an easy opponant.  I remember my freshman year I heard that Upper Iowa was the homecoming opponant of like 4 different teams!!!  Last year Dubuque was Coe and Cornells homecoming opponant...don't know if there were any others.  Always nice to have the alumni see the home team win the game.  Of course, Dubuque beat Coe and Cornell last year, so they didn't play their part in all of that 

[Klompen]

UD PREVIEW UP

http://www.d3football.com/preview.php?id=1152&year=2008

Also just saw that we got Cornell for homecoming this year...is there any reasoning behind homecoming games? Or is it just random?

Central has Wartburg for homecoming.  First conference game of the season, early in the year, lots of new players, not a fluff game...What were the powers that be behind that one thinking?   

[Klompen]

Spoke to an incoming freshman at Central this weekend and was pretty upset to here this story. It sounds like Central has around 140 guys in camp, which seems pretty high, but the part that bothers/worries me is the fact that in this particular players recruitment he was told that they wouldn't have more then 115 to 120 guys on the team and that he would have plenty of reps in practice. I would hope that Central just had more people show up then they actually recruited, which is a very realistic possibility. From hearing from a few people some of the coaches on the staff were pretty upset with the numbers and felt they were to high. It seems like when you get up over 130 players, your opportunities in practice are very limited and some very good players can be looked over. Is this a case of over recruiting to keep players from other schools? I sure don't know, Central was always one of the best and classiest programs that I ever played against so I don't think that this was the case. Any word from anyone closer to the program on this?

I think that this is a residual effect of going undefeated for two years in a row and as deep into the playoffs as we did.  People want to play for a winning team and they also saw that there would be a lot of positions to be contested this year based on the number of graduating seniors from last season.  It all makes for a huge football recruiting class, even if that wasn't the number you were aiming for.  Given that every year is a recruiting battle in Iowa, no school is going to turn kids away if they want to come.

[ShowMe]

Texas, Florida, and California all produce great numbers of great football players.  I think Iowa does a decent job of turning out football players considering our population base...and weather!!!

That said, I think just being from Texas or Florida or Cali doesn't mean you will come into the IIAC and start dominating as a freshman.  We have seen that at Dubuque.  Get these guys to stick around for 4 years and then you will see some all-conference performers. 

It still depends on the quality of the player. For all of the states, there are only so many college football prgrams in each state and each team only takes a certain amount of players each year. there are not as many d3 schools in those states. There are quality players that fall through the process.