FB: Empire 8

[middlerelief]

E8 2-0 against the Liberty League and the OAC

I'm glad about the OAC wins - can't tell you how many times I have to hear something like "if Mt. Union weren't in our conference we'd win the Nat'l Championship . . "  Getting steam rolled every season by one team doesn't make a great conference.  SJF beat John Carroll and Otterbein in prior seasons, and this year Buff State and Cortland hand a loss to Heidelberg and Otterbein again

The E8 (and probably MIAC) is a great conference there's a challenge every season for who is going to win the league and rarely is the same team more than two seasons in a row.

[Jonny Utah]

Lots of good things to like for Ithaca today:

Wolfgang Shafer was amazing: 25-for-33 for 265 yards, two TDs and 0 picks. Made all the throws he was asked to

Josh Oliver was the player of the game: 8 catches for 80 yards, 3 punt returns for 82 yards, and a 32 yard touchdown pass

Schnayder Termidor had a great game: Lived in the backfield

Malik Morris: The best corner in the E8 kept Kyle Reynolds in check, and sealed it with a pick 6

Things not to like:

The Bombers were undisciplined, taking 10 penalties for 96 yards, including a personal foul. Inexplicably, there were at least two times where a quick Union snap caught an Ithaca corner not in position, leading to a catch

Playcalling and clock management were questionable. Ithaca ran out of time in the first half despite never taking a timeout. You have a kicker who can hit from 50, why are you not taking a timeout with 20 seconds to go at midfield when you have three of them? For some reason, Ithaca decided to have Max Rottenecker angle kickoffs to the sidelines, leading to several penalties. After the last one, he kicked it down the middle and got a touchback every single time. Why mess around with perfect placement and even a return, when your kicker can put it in the end zone?

And the playcalling on the second to last drive was terrible. Ithaca gets the ball back with less than 10 minutes to go, and they try three different times to pass the ball. The first time, the ball is nearly intercepted, then Shafer is chased from the pocket, and then, when you survive those two disasters and get it down to a first-and-20 with 7:15 to go, you pass again, and take a safety. Why? What's the upside? You don't need more points, your defense hasn't allowed a thing in the second half, Union has one timeout left. Seriously, all you need to do is run in three times and take another two minutes off the clock. Union's offense was not going to score three times in five minutes.

Still, a win is a win, and all in all, Ithaca's mistakes are fixable

Bombers, what did the offense look like in terms of formations/scheme compared to the last 10 years?  Anything different?  Or the same run it into a stuffed line inside the tackles 15-20 times a game?

Not saying that isn't all bad, if your strategy is to simply catch teams off guard with the pass/play action, and it worked against Mount Union 10 years ago (and they pretty much did the same thing every year after that in terms of the lack of a running game).

This is the Offensive coordinators first year right?  Or second.?

[BomberJeff]

This is the Offensive coordinators first year right?  Or second.?

This is actually Ryan Heasley's 4th year as Offensive Coordinator at Ithaca.

[Jonny Utah]

This is the Offensive coordinators first year right?  Or second.?

This is actually Ryan Heasley's 4th year as Offensive Coordinator at Ithaca.

Wow.  I don't know what the hell I was thinking, could have sworn it was his 2nd year at the most.

Any idea how many plays were from under center with a fullback?

[SaintsFAN]

E8 2-0 against the Liberty League and the OAC

I'm glad about the OAC wins - can't tell you how many times I have to hear something like "if Mt. Union weren't in our conference we'd win the Nat'l Championship . . "  Getting steam rolled every season by one team doesn't make a great conference.  SJF beat John Carroll and Otterbein in prior seasons, and this year Buff State and Cortland hand a loss to Heidelberg and Otterbein again

The E8 (and probably MIAC) is a great conference there's a challenge every season for who is going to win the league and rarely is the same team more than two seasons in a row.

Heidelberg lost their entire offense - it's a good win but they wouldn't be claiming they could win the National Title if Mount Union wasn't in the OAC this year.

[SaintsFAN]

It's an interesting feeling to know after week 1 the only chance you have to make the playoffs is by winning the conference bid.  Zero chance of a pool C bid since that would mean two losses, with at least one by an unspeakable monkey stomp. 

Definitely feel your pain after losses to SJF and Wesley in the season openers the past few years.  I'm glad Thomas More scheduled these games, though. Both of those seasons we thought the team had a shot to beat W&J and couldn't get the job done. 

Good luck the rest of the season.

[boobyhasgameyo]

Good luck to your team as well.  Wish Fisher would have shown up, but maybe this will be a really down year for them.  Either way Thomas More was impressive.

[sjfcards]

I'm finally coming out of hiding after that performance by Fisher yesterday. I just believe Fisher is that bad, but there was nothing to get excited about after watching that. They have talent but the O line looked really soft, and the defense was terrible.

Chances of running the table to get in to the tournament, I would out at 0%. I know TMC is a good team, and they were very impressive yesterday, but that was a kick in the gut for sure. Fisher has a lot of work to do before Cortland comes to town in a couple weeks.

[UfanBill]

Some observations from the Union/Ithaca game.  Ithaca used a mix of short underneath crossing patterns to control the ball and pick up first downs.  Wolfgang Shafer  was right on target all day 25/33 and the Bombers were 10/15 on 3rd down.  As I have observed for awhile now the Union linebackers seemed to be lost in pass coverage.  They play a 3-4 and quickly drop 10 yds deep at the first sign of a pass.  Ithaca continually used motion to get receivers open underneath the coverage.  Am I missing something isn't the purpose of playing the 3-4 is to help in pass coverage, but don't you have to locate the receivers first?  The Union lbs drop too deep and too soon and usually end up covering no one. Shafer has a field day dropping passes off to #2 Josh Oliver.  Oliver was the difference maker of the game. He caught 8 for 80 yds., returned punts 17, 26 and 39 yds. and caught Union flat footed with a flanker reverse TD pass.

[Bombers798891]

Bombers, what did the offense look like in terms of formations/scheme compared to the last 10 years?  Anything different?  Or the same run it into a stuffed line inside the tackles 15-20 times a game?

Not saying that isn't all bad, if your strategy is to simply catch teams off guard with the pass/play action, and it worked against Mount Union 10 years ago (and they pretty much did the same thing every year after that in terms of the lack of a running game).

This is the Offensive coordinators first year right?  Or second.?

Shafer seemed to be in the shotgun a lot more than I remember other QBs being, The running game was mostly in the tackles, but it was really strange. They used three different backs, including Dan Porter, for 13 carries, who apparently was not on the two-deep. I really thought Brown would be the guy, and honestly, i thought he looked the best yesterday (Although Skea made several nice plays, especially on his touchdown run, when he made a one-handed catch on a pitch.

Still, they deserve some credit. They were breaking in a whole new offense, and they put up 31 points. They also got the ball in Oliver's hands a lot. They went back to their trick play again, and managed to make it work

[D3MAFAN]

Looking forward to the Framingham State vs. Cortland State game. I think Framingham State takes this rematch from the 2012 1st round playoff match. I think this game is going to show if Cortland State is on its way back to being a dominant team or if Framingham State can continue to make the climb to being a well respected east regional team.

[XREDDRAGON77]

Looking forward to this game as well. Cortland made several special teams mistakes with the punt team which gave away some short field points. Fix the mistakes and the Dragon's may be a solid squad this season.

[D3viewer]

Since I don't see the Players of the week on the E8 site..I will attempt my own.

Offense....Co players of the week....The Garcia brothers of Hartwick. Sr QB John Garcia (6-2 210..warwick Valley NY) 24/48 422 yards passing 5 TDs/1 INT
                                                                                                    Soph WR Brad Garcia (6-1 199..warwick valley NY) 12 catches for 255 yards, 4 TDs

Defense   SR DE Julian Serrano..Morrisville...(6-3 248 Bronx NY)  7 tackles..2.5 sacks and 2.5 TFLs

Special Teams  Utica SR K Thomas Woodburn (5-11 174 West Islip NY) 2/2 FGs (20 and 33 yards)

[bman]

Looking forward to this game as well. Cortland made several special teams mistakes with the punt team which gave away some short field points. Fix the mistakes and the Dragon's may be a solid squad this season.

The coaches need to take a long hard look at that game film as well.  They almost gave the game away.   The decision to throw in the final minutes was baffling and in reality, should have cost them the game...  They were fortunate that the O was able to work its way down the field and complete the hail mary...

[AUPepBand]

Since I don't see the Players of the week on the E8 site..I will attempt my own.

Offense....Co players of the week....The Garcia brothers of Hartwick. Sr QB John Garcia (6-2 210..warwick Valley NY) 24/48 422 yards passing 5 TDs/1 INT
                                                                                                    Soph WR Brad Garcia (6-1 199..warwick valley NY) 12 catches for 255 yards, 4 TDs

Defense   SR DE Julian Serrano..Morrisville...(6-3 248 Bronx NY)  7 tackles..2.5 sacks and 2.5 TFLs

Special Teams  Utica SR K Thomas Woodburn (5-11 174 West Islip NY) 2/2 FGs (20 and 33 yards)

How about a school record 90 yard KO return by Woodburn's teammate, Jerred Beniquez, who had a second return of 20 yards, and a run for a two-point conversion? Woodburn was also 4-for-4 on PATs, accounting for 10 points, while Beniquez finished with 8 points. Beniquez as a WR also had four catches for 31 yards plus two carries for 34 yards.