FB: Ohio Athletic Conference

[MountRaider]

I can't possibly be the only guy who saw Lee Corso and Kirk Herbstreit pick Mt. Union over ONU, can I? 

Way to go, ONU and MUC getting the D-III love on Game Day.

At about 2 a.m. est, i was watching sportscenter and during the OSU and BG highlights I heard from one of the anchors  "That wasnt the only action in Ohio football today.  BW beat heidleberg today"   Might not have been those exact words, but it was some thing like that.  Just a little more love for D-III, always nice to see that, even though it had to include those two teams

[Mr. Ypsi]

Must have been someone who had ties to either BW or the 'berg.  Afterall, that ain't news - EVERYONE beats Heidelberg!

Now, MUC DESTROYING ONU, or Wilma DESTROYING Ott, or Cap BARELY beating JCU, or OWU being 0-6, or Kenyon scoring 69 points (or Hiram getting 34) - THOSE are news!  BW beating Heidelberg (by less than hscoach's spread, incidentally) - that AIN'T news.

[Kira & Jaxon's Dad]

Pat,

Could you clear the poll again please?

Thankyou,
KDad

[seventiesraider]

Except MAYBE St. John's, who's gonna pass 'em?!

Wisconsin LaCrosse comes to mind.

[section13raiderfan]

Hey Pat, talk about Mount Union having an unfair advantage, even if the NCAA could make the Raiders fire Kehres... they still have another Kehres in the system..Vince. And where do you suppose he learned his football? Depth is where its at, and Mount Union has it in spades. Now if they could just take those pesky zebras out of the equation everything would be perfect.

[HScoach]

49-7 Revenge how SWEET IT IS!!!!!!!

Just when I thought your only posts said "TEST"..................

[skunks_sidekick]

What a great football day it was yesterday!  I listened to Ric while at my son's PeeWee game, and it was a fun game to hear.  Good job Ric!

If CAP thinks they can put that kind of performance on the field against Mount and win, they are sadly mistaken.  And, if Mount played that poorly against JCU (or does), I will say they have major issues.  Props to JCU, but really CAP, you gotta be kidding me!

Oh, and Mount is in trouble next week.  The juggernaut that is Wilmington is ROLLING!  OTT's "great emergence" in the OAC is officially over.  How embarassing for them.

Stats my youngest had from today's PeeWee game:  12 carries, 102 yards, one touchdown, and one fumble when he held the ball over his head at the one because he was going to score, and FUMBLED!  His punishment (other than total embarassment and shame), is he has to carry the football all next week during sprints.   

[b4uknewit]

SKUNKS-- Enjoy these times with your son! Soon enough it will be high school football politics, recruitment aggrivations and quite possibly-- your retirement for college tuition

[HScoach]

Random thoughts/impressions from MUC/ONU:

1.  MUC's intensity was playoff caliber and then some.  No doubt they were VERY focused.

2.  ONU played very well defensively in the first half, but wore down in the 3rd quarter.  Would like to know whether ONU's 2nd half defensive collapse was physical fatigue or just emotional due to score.  I'm guessing the latter. 

3.  Would have liked to see Gunter play the entire game versus Garcon as he was stride-for-stride with him on the only deep ball thrown before he got hurt.  From what I saw in the pre-game and early on, Gunter looks like a great athlete.  Anybody know for sure what year he is athletically?  I'm hoping no worse than a junior right now

4.  This game looked like the exact opposite of the 2005 game with ONU making the stupid mistakes and MUC making all the plays.  No way you beat Mount and lose the turnover battle 4-0.  Play of the game might have been the blocked punt that opened up a 14 point lead early.  Still, ONU's defense held very tough from the 1 yard line as MUC had to throw it in after getting 2 runs stuffed.    Even Mother Nature was with the "opposite day" theme.  What a perfect day for a football game.

5.  Most surprised by the MUC O-line dominance with 2 starters out.  That was my biggest fear going into Saturday and they played very well.  I can't remember seeing J Trusnik make a single tackle.  He strung out a couple sweeps/stretch plays nicely, but no "plays" made by the odds on favorite for Defensive Player of the Year?  Huge win for the Raider O-line.

6.  Glad to see Kmic and running game return to playoff from after a lackluster start to the 2006 season.   This last TD run was a thing of beauty.  Should have been stopped for a loss, twice, but broke loose.  Nice.  Very nice ineed.

7.  Jorris didn't have a very good game, but didn't make any mistakes that cost him.  Which says volumes about how balanced and deep MUC is when they can still hang 49 on a good defense.

8.  Interesting to see LK go with Micheli at QB more and more in crunch time.  Nice to see the youngster play well in those spots too.  Looks like we're going to be set at QB in '07 and '08 .

9.  Very pleased with the pressure Mount's D-line constantly had on Quirk.  Even more pleased with the stuffing of Meadows.  The only running game ONU had was Quirk running for his life.

10.  Not sure why ONU kept running option at the MUC defense (unless they were just grapsing for straws).  That's the last thing I want to do against a fast but undersized defense.  Especially when the defense is in a 4-2-5 alignment.  Which brings me to how much more I like the defensive scheme post-Montgomery.  Much more physical and more versatile.  Still amazed by the MUC run defense in '05 and '06 with only 6 in the box.

11.  Without a consistent running game, ONU needed Quirk to make plays and he isn't capable of carrying the O.  Too bad for ONU they don't have a QB like Franzer to go alone with that defense.

12.  Left the stadium thinking that ONU is going to get drilled by Capital next week as Cap's defense is every bit as good as Mount's.  Then I see how Cap struggled at JCU and began wondering what to think.  Still thinking Cap is 3+ TD's better than ONU unless Capital turnovers even the playing field. 

13.  Like OSU looking forward to Michigan, MUC has a one game regular season (Capital) to see if they enter the post-season at #1. 

14.  LK can't be real happy with the amount of penalties, but that's correctable.  Good job by the ONU players for baiting the MUC guys into the unsportsmanlike penalties, again and again.  Some day the players will understand that the first guy never gets the flag.  If you need to get someone back, you wait a play or two.

15.  Hope Antonucci is OK after the legal cheap shot on an incomplete pass.  I know what the rules say, but that was a cheap shot nonetheless.   Fortunately it doesn't look like anything more than a concussion.  And with Wilma and BW up next, he'll have plenty of time to rest.

16.  Nice large and vocal crowd.  Just like the team, sometimes the fans need a wake up call too.

[HScoach]

FYi, the Pick-Em's results and next week's game are posted.

[Wizardman]

MUC-ONU: Wow, just seeign the score was somewhat scary, as I was expecting something like 35-17.
Capital-JCU: Listened to most of this one. JC played great, and it looks like Capital's not as good as we may have thought.
BW-Heidelberg: I was expeting a 49-7 blowout, instead it's only 36-10, which to me is a bit disappointing.
Wilmington-Otterbein and Marietta-Muskingum: From the looks of these games, the Marietta-Wilmington game could actually be a fun one to watch.

[reality check]

HSCoach

I'm glad you mentioned Gunter.  A couple pages back it was stated that there might not be a DB in Div. III that can cover him and from what I heard, Steve Gunter was right with him on those first few plays, even batting balls away until the injury.  We will never know unfortunately because of the ankle injury (unless we meet again in the playoffs).  I think Gunter would have done as good a job as anyone.  Robertson did a decent job but Garcon's size played a major role and I think Gunter can be more physical which is what we needed but didn't get. 

Regarding Gunter's eligibility, I know onusports.com lists him as a junior and they're usually pretty good about these things.  He played for Toledo in the 2004 season as a true freshman recording 6 tackles on ST as a walk-on.  There is no record of him playing in 2005.  Technically it appears he has two years of eligibility after this one so I guess it comes down to his education and so forth.  He should definitely be around in 2007 though.

[reality check]

I can't possibly be the only guy who saw Lee Corso and Kirk Herbstreit pick Mt. Union over ONU, can I? 

Way to go, ONU and MUC getting the D-III love on Game Day.

At about 2 a.m. est, i was watching sportscenter and during the OSU and BG highlights I heard from one of the anchors  "That wasnt the only action in Ohio football today.  BW beat heidleberg today"   Might not have been those exact words, but it was some thing like that.  Just a little more love for D-III, always nice to see that, even though it had to include those two teams

I now remember why you hear a Heidelberg score about 3 times a year on Sportscenter.  Anchor John Buccigross is a Heidelberg alum and if and when the Berg is mentioned on Sportscenter it's either John himself making the call or his counterpart doing it to poke fun at him.  There's a decent amount of D-III representation on ESPN programming with Fred Hickman from Coe, Brian Kim from Westminster (MO), Dan Patrick from Dayton (DIII at the time), and Karl Ravech from Ithaca.

[stoonk]

The "collector"Larry Kehres Collects win # 236 .Way to go Pierre "Speedo"Garcon.Way to go Nate"The Skate" Kmic.Way to go Jorris "The Florist".It would be a nice gesture for  Jorris to send flowers promptly  to the ONU football office thanking the Polar Bears for playing the  "machine".Los Purple Raiders of Alliance Ohio continue to be "simply the best" just Like Smuckers jelly and peanut butter, and the new Smuckers  Goobers,all made in Orriville Ohio.

[Wizardman]

ESPN has many DIII reps? Very interesting, didn't know that.
But yeah, it was either a shot at John or a shot at Heidelberg.