FB: Liberty League

[Bartman]

Whoa, I knew Alfred was a solid team(Hobart's first opponent) but beating Brockport today was awesome for the Saxon Warriors. This could help Hobart ranking for NCAA seeding a tad.

[IC798891]

Brockport without Gocella is really non-competitive on offense.

Tough loss for IC, but agree with everything BomberJeff said.

Good luck to Hobart

[Ice Bear]

Congrats to Hobart on winning the LL and taking care of business today. I am a big time Pumpkin fan for the rest of this season.

Also, congrats to IC on a very competitive game with Cortland. While I am in agreement with some that Cortland will not repeat, they are special, Boyes is special, and IC played them tough. I'm proud of IC and the season they had.

Congratulations to RPI on winning the Shoes. They are/were the better team and they showed it today. I liked the play of their back up QB DeMatteo and they way they ran the ball. I thought the D really swarmed the ball and took it to Union's offensive line.

Union certainly had their opportunities but just could not capitalize. Patch was Patch, inconsistent through the air, competed though and gave his best.

I am proud of this Union team though. The kids played hard all year and left it out there today. I'm obviously not happy with the record this season. When you consider three coaches in three years, basically an entirely new staff, and some missing pieces from the Oline, it makes sense that this just wasn't a very good team. I think Drach is a pass first type coach who needs a QB who can meet the demands of his play calling.

[NEd3ALUM]

Boyes is good...Lehnen is better. 

No he isn't.

Glad to have cleared that up

Northeast Bias. Lehnen is the better player and has played against better competition throughout his career. It's close though.

[XREDDRAGON77]

Boyes is a freak, Gallo is an animal! In the Jug game, the best team in paper doesn't always win! There were over 9,500 people at the game today! The stadium was wild! Glad i was able to make it!

IC played a solid game! They came out swinging but Cortland settled in. The dragons left 2 scores on the field! A stop and a turnover inside the 10 twice. Butterfly effect though! Who knows how it could have played out if things didn't go as they did!

IC may have finished 6-4 but they may have been a handful of plays away from being 9-1 or 8-2. Can't wait to do it again next year!

[Marcopolo]

Congratulations to RPI today playing with their backup QB and down the LL's leading WR of last year in Hayden Farday. DeMatteo kid has some nuts! Desilva of Union with 17 tackles!
Since the first half of the Hobart Game, RPI outscored its opposition 93 to 14, with 7 of those points coming on a wild fumble six against the Upstart Bengals. The neers and IC were a few bounces away from 7 and 3 or 8 and 2 seasons.

[JacketsPride]

Maybe this has been said before but the Hobart announcer is such a homer.  Everything they do is magical and won't even say who made a tackle or catch for us.  Never seen it this bad in my 17 years as a parent and fan.  Shameful at this level.

Sorry , but we love Ted Baker. He is part of the fabric of the college, calls football, lacrosse, hockey, basketball and women's basketball and soccer. Ted is welcomed here for as long as he wants to announce, even though he is a tad partial

. Congrats Hobart on their great season but Ted Baker can suck it!

[Bartman]

Maybe this has been said before but the Hobart announcer is such a homer.  Everything they do is magical and won't even say who made a tackle or catch for us.  Never seen it this bad in my 17 years as a parent and fan.  Shameful at this level.

Sorry , but we love Ted Baker. He is part of the fabric of the college, calls football, lacrosse, hockey, basketball and women's basketball and soccer. Ted is welcomed here for as long as he wants to announce, even though he is a tad partial

. Congrats Hobart on their great season but Ted Baker can suck it!

Thanks for the support for Hobart's season, and congrats to the Yellowjackets on a winning season. As far as Ted Baker , you are entitled to your opinion, but in the future I suggest you just mute the audio and follow the live stats because he ain't going away

[Bartman]

Hobart moves up to #20 in the tournament ranking. Projections seem pretty worthless, just waiting for 5pm announcement.

[IC798891]

Boyes is good...Lehnen is better. 

No he isn't.

Glad to have cleared that up

Northeast Bias. Lehnen is the better player and has played against better competition throughout his career. It's close though.

Yeah, that's me, the Ithaca guy just so eager to be biased towards....Cortland

[Machiavelli]

Finally something Jackets guy and I agree on.

[unionpalooza]

Boyes is good...Lehnen is better. 

No he isn't.

Glad to have cleared that up

Northeast Bias. Lehnen is the better player and has played against better competition throughout his career. It's close though.

Yeah, that's me, the Ithaca guy just so eager to be biased towards....Cortland

Ha! Put me squarely on Team Boyes.  Lehnen is great but he has spent his entire career surrounded by insane talent and an FCS level o-line.  There is MAYBE one player on the Cortland offense this year (Alfano SJ) that would make the NCC starting 11 on offense. 

[Bartman]

An old LL member, Susquehanna(aka Sasquatch), is our matchup on 11/30.If our defense can keep us in it, I think we can score enough on these guys to get to the next round that likely would be the Jonnies of St Johns. Well, it's time to get the big boy pants on. G0 Bart!

[IC798891]

Ha! Put me squarely on Team Boyes.  Lehnen is great but he has spent his entire career surrounded by insane talent and an FCS level o-line.  There is MAYBE one player on the Cortland offense this year (Alfano SJ) that would make the NCC starting 11 on offense. 

I think Gallo is legit.

But yes, the talent dropoff at Cortland is immense. There's a reason that they trailed their three best opponents in the second half, and trailed two of them in the 4th quarter.

Last year's team went through the regular season in control except for their "Collapsed in all three phases for seven minutes" ending against Susquehanna

This year's team has been in three absolute street fights. Yes, winning all three. But they're not out-talenting the good teams on their schedule.

[Machiavelli]

Well, the 2024 Battle for the Shoes went mostly as expected. Outside of an early jailbreak deep TD pass early on for Union(a pass that almost invoked my old school Nintendo Duck Hunt skills - It got there, but oh boy was it an ugly throw), RPI rattled off 24 unanswered to take the shoes back to Troy, where they belong. RPI did a great job honoring the 1999 team at halftime. There were a ton of alumni in attendance, it was a gorgeous day, and many imbibed from the shoes late night. Good times all around and, while it was a tough season for RPI, it was good to finish strong and hopefully have some momentum heading into 2025.

With that said, onto the playoffs...my immediate thought was that Hobart got screwed a little in the NCAA pairing. I would have liked to see them draw a Springfield or UMass-Dartmouth in their matchup, but I have changed my tune a bit. I think Sasquatch's ranking makes it feel that way, but I do think they are a beatable opponent. Bad news is that whoever wins get St. John's so either way, it's a tough draw.

I was shocked that Endicott didn't get next weekend off, but they got Alfred State, so it's basically a bye week and hopefully they can rest their 1s for most of the game and avoid any major injuries. It's so bad that Alfred State is in, but that is the system I suppose(FYI - Alfred St. lost to Rochester/Buff St/MIT by a cumulative 60-0 - Holy Christ). Endicott will get their shot at redemption with Cortland and I thought they were close to knocking Cortland off last year, so that is gonna be a good game. Springfield/UMD getting the winner of Cortland/Endicott is hilarious though. Basically, we're looking at an Endicott/Cortland vs. North Central matchup in the Final 8.

Good thing is we'll be rooting for a team from the Northeast for a minimum 4 more weeks.