FB: Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference

[OzJohnnie]

Hazzben Jr. 1.0 had a "time trial" meet at UST for freshman track on Saturday. His first time competing in the hurdles, 400, and high jump. He admitted it was hard to run the quarter holding his breathe the entire time. I think I've mentioned this before, but I've trained all the kids to hold their breather each Sunday morning as we drive through UST on our way to church. Made me chuckle when he said that 

Hazzben Jr 1.0...  Chuckle.  You're like George Foreman.  Six kids.  All Georges.

[SagatagSam]

[...] I've trained all the kids to hold their breath each Sunday morning as we drive through UST on our way to church. [...]

For their own safety! Noxious fumes coming from that place.

Symptoms if inhaled: inflated sense of self-importance and standing the the universe, speaking in "Tommie Tongues" (ex. shouting the most banal and unoriginal slogans like "Roll Toms!")

[BiggieSmalls]

Looks like Bethel has found their new OC/QB coach along with promoting a DB coach. OC looks interesting coming from Berry College where they finished as 3rd best scoring offense and 5th best total offense in country last year.

https://athletics.bethel.edu/news/2024/3/25/mcelroy-announces-coaching-staff-updates.aspx

[hazzben]

Looks like Bethel has found their new OC/QB coach along with promoting a DB coach. OC looks interesting coming from Berry College where they finished as 3rd best scoring offense and 5th best total offense in country last year.

https://athletics.bethel.edu/news/2024/3/25/mcelroy-announces-coaching-staff-updates.aspx

Yep, I really like both hires. The D staff is really good and deep. Adding Tavian as a full time guy is great.

Duling looks like a perfect fit. He checks both OC and QB coach boxes, and had a an explosive and very balanced offense for Berry. They put up 36 against Trinity (who gave up 9/gm) and averaged like 10/play. The fact he was Berry's recruiting coordinator is another great piece.

[SagatagSam]

Man, I checked in on the situation down in the American Southwest Conference. Not looking good for UMHB (at least not long-term). They will have two games that will be exhibitions from the standpoint of the NCAA.

So, for regional ranking and national tournament purposes, the committee will only have a seven game resume from UMHB to evaluate (Six ASC games plus one non-conference game against Whitewater).

[hazzben]

Man, I checked in on the situation down in the American Southwest Conference. Not looking good for UMHB (at least not long-term). They will have two games that will be exhibitions from the standpoint of the NCAA.

So, for regional ranking and national tournament purposes, the committee will only have a seven game resume from UMHB to evaluate (Six ASC games plus one non-conference game against Whitewater).

Yeah, it's a brutal situation for the ASC schools right now. The only silver lining is a move to a 40 team field should help alleviate getting an at large. Having said that, the best bet is to get that Pool A bid and ensure a spot.

If the committee hadn't done such a poor job of using SOS and at large stuff last year, this would be a perfect scenario to encourage great non-con scheduling. Additional at large teams get in, go boost your SOS and RRO resume, and everyone benefits. But I'm not sure we can have any confidence in the NatCom right now and how they will treat SOS, RRO, etc. The insane notion that NCC couldn't be considered #1 seed since they weren't #1 in Region 5 has shaken confidence that logic is involved. And ignoring the previous playoff results as a 1 seed tiebreaker. Time will tell.

[MadRedFan]

Former Johnnie Michael Orts moving up. Named QB coach and passing game coordinator at non-schollie FCS University of Dayton.

https://daytonflyers.com/news/2024/3/18/michael-orts-named-flyer-football-quarterbacks-coach-passing-game-coordinator.aspx

[GoldandBlueBU]

Looks like Bethel has found their new OC/QB coach along with promoting a DB coach. OC looks interesting coming from Berry College where they finished as 3rd best scoring offense and 5th best total offense in country last year.

https://athletics.bethel.edu/news/2024/3/25/mcelroy-announces-coaching-staff-updates.aspx

Yep, I really like both hires. The D staff is really good and deep. Adding Tavian as a full time guy is great.

Duling looks like a perfect fit. He checks both OC and QB coach boxes, and had a an explosive and very balanced offense for Berry. They put up 36 against Trinity (who gave up 9/gm) and averaged like 10/play. The fact he was Berry's recruiting coordinator is another great piece.

Curious to see what the offense will look like with Duling!  Sad to see AJ go - like you, he was one of the old guys who made little freshman me feel welcome on the team.  Pure conjecture, but I would assume he probably applied for the head coach position, and then moved on in order to keep climbing the coaching ladder?

[hazzben]

He definitely applied, and yeah I'd assume the move to Winona is to keep pursuing moves up the ladder. And agree, bummer to see him head off, but probably ideal for Mac given they both applied for the same role and that could have gotten tricky.

[DuffMan]

Curious what % of BU's staff are BU alums.  I could look it up, but I don't want any visits to their site in my search history. 
Heckendorf (OC) and Kulick (QBs) are the only SJU coaches who aren't Johnnies (Kulick technically graduated from SJU but never played a down there).

[OzJohnnie]

A potential major situation brewing in the Australian Football League over the last few hours.  It's come out, and the AFL has admitted, that they are faking injuries in order to keep players who fail secret AFL-arranged drug tests away from World Doping Authority testers and, thereby, avoiding a doping ban.

Apparently, players call the league CEO or Commissioner or other executives (sometimes at 2am we've learned) and let them know they have been blowing coke or smoking meth or whatever.  The AFL then fires up their private testing lab to see if the players will fail and arrange fake injuries if needed.  All the while keeping clubs in the dark and avoiding club doctors.

The AFL is claiming (and the AFL-access-authorised media is spinning) that this is for player health (so they don't risk injury playing while stoned) and World Doping integrity (so players aren't trying to avoid tests on their own, instead using the League office to do it).  And... betting markets.  Ah, the real news is there.  The AFL is evading independent doping tests in order to keep players eligible.


Anyways, we'll see where this goes.  It's a hell of a scandal.  It wraps up business, politicians, media... a whole slough of people were needed to keep this quiet.  They will work hard to make it stay that way.

[BiggieSmalls]

Curious what % of BU's staff are BU alums.  I could look it up, but I don't want any visits to their site in my search history. 
Heckendorf (OC) and Kulick (QBs) are the only SJU coaches who aren't Johnnies (Kulick technically graduated from SJU but never played a down there).

Their HC, OC/QB coach, WR coach, OLB coach, and CB coach did not play at Bethel. Although the new DB coach is a recent alum they still have a CB coach and he is not. Not sure if they'll have both a DB coach and CB coach. Seems redundant, but maybe DB coach would focus on safeties only?

[art76]

Duling looks like a perfect fit. He checks both OC and QB coach boxes, and had a an explosive and very balanced offense for Berry. They put up 36 against Trinity (who gave up 9/gm) and averaged like 10/play. The fact he was Berry's recruiting coordinator is another great piece.

I'm cautiously optimistic towards this coming season to see how BU does in it's first season post-Coach Johnson. Truly hoping the wheels don't fall off throughout the transition.

[hazzben]

A potential major situation brewing in the Australian Football League over the last few hours.  It's come out, and the AFL has admitted, that they are faking injuries in order to keep players who fail secret AFL-arranged drug tests away from World Doping Authority testers and, thereby, avoiding a doping ban.

Apparently, players call the league CEO or Commissioner or other executives (sometimes at 2am we've learned) and let them know they have been blowing coke or smoking meth or whatever.  The AFL then fires up their private testing lab to see if the players will fail and arrange fake injuries if needed.  All the while keeping clubs in the dark and avoiding club doctors.

Genuine question. They've been covering up the testing. Do we really think it's "only" for blow and meth. My gut reaction was, there have to be guys also taking PED's, and this is a method of covering that up. Which is what WADA really cares about to begin with.

[hazzben]

Follow up question. What's the Australia version of Sioux City or St. Cloud in terms of meth production? A guy on my team has a brother on the St Cloud SWAT team, man are there some interesting stories coming out of the Granite City.