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Post by nycrusader2010 on Mar 27, 2022 9:33:51 GMT -5
I believe Bryant was SHU's only loss in NEC play last year.
Yale could easily be just as good as Harvard next season, thank God Chesney is the one Holy Cross coach who seems to be able to beat the Eli. Aside from Lafayette, Bucknell and Georgetown, I wouldn't expect a walkthrough in any of these games. You have Merrimack (beat us last year), Colgate (finished 2nd in the PL) and Lehigh (gave us most competitive game in PL play last year) 6,7 and 8 as far as degree of difficulty, which is probably right on the $.
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Post by nycrusader2010 on Mar 27, 2022 9:36:23 GMT -5
Saturday “night” games would in my opinion bring out more HC students who most are getting ready for their Saturday night parties and not in the library. This was evident at Polar Park where there was great student support. Holy Cross should definitely play a night game in Worcester every year. I'd slightly prefer Fitton under the lights but round 1 at Polar Park was a rousing success. So whichever option is more feasible for us financially, I'm all for it.
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Post by hcpride on Mar 27, 2022 9:45:57 GMT -5
I believe Bryant was SHU's only loss in NEC play last year. Yale could easily be just as good as Harvard next season, thank God Chesney is the one Holy Cross coach who seems to be able to beat the Eli. Aside from Lafayette, Bucknell and Georgetown, I wouldn't expect a walkthrough in any of these games. You have Merrimack (beat us last year), Colgate (finished 2nd in the PL) and Lehigh (gave us most competitive game in PL play last year) 6,7 and 8 as far as degree of difficulty, which is probably right on the $. TBH Merrimack finished outside the top hundred last year so I wouldn’t expect a repeat of last year’s upset (or anything close to it). And Lehigh will be awful. I’d expect wide margins on both of those two games.
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Post by nycrusader2010 on Mar 27, 2022 9:54:17 GMT -5
I thought Lehigh was a young team returning just about everyone. They were a different team in November than they were in September and most of October.
Gilnore's not beating us, don't get me wrong. But I think they're a team that could win 3 or 4 games in PL play.
HC may have had the worst performance against the spread of the entire DI football season, versus Merrimack last year. 27.5 pt faves, lost by 14.
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Post by hcpride on Mar 27, 2022 10:33:10 GMT -5
I thought Lehigh was a young team returning just about everyone. They were a different team in November than they were in September and most of October. Gilnore's not beating us, don't get me wrong. But I think they're a team that could win 3 or 4 games in PL play. HC may have had the worst performance against the spread of the entire DI football season, versus Merrimack last year. 27.5 pt faves, lost by 14. No doubt Lehigh could pick up a few wins in the PL AND be horrendous. Just like they did last year in their 3-8 season (97th in Massey).
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Post by nycrusader2010 on Mar 27, 2022 10:49:03 GMT -5
I thought Lehigh was a young team returning just about everyone. They were a different team in November than they were in September and most of October. Gilnore's not beating us, don't get me wrong. But I think they're a team that could win 3 or 4 games in PL play. HC may have had the worst performance against the spread of the entire DI football season, versus Merrimack last year. 27.5 pt faves, lost by 14. No doubt they could pick up a few wins in the PL AND be horrendous. Just like they did last year in their 3-8 seasons. Lehigh was absolutely blown out in its first 6 games (Nova, Richmond, Princeton, Colgate, Yale, Penn) while showing up week after week with a historically inept offense. This is how they fared they final 5 weeks: @ Fordham L 35-28 => offense suddenly came alive to tune of 500+ total yards. Holy Cross L 31-12 => Much closer than score would indicate. Game was a toss-up heading into 4Q when we led 14-12. @ Bucknell W 38-6 Georgetown W 23-9 Lafayette W 17-10 in 157th edition of "The Game"
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Post by Sons of Vaval on Mar 27, 2022 10:55:14 GMT -5
Lehigh will likely be picked third in the preseason poll.
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Post by kaftan12 on Mar 27, 2022 11:36:56 GMT -5
I see 8 definite wins maybe 10 if we can throw ball down field effectively. After spring game things will be much clearer.
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Post by hc87 on Mar 27, 2022 12:39:44 GMT -5
Toughest games IMO (considering both teams play relatively close to their potential) 1) Buffalo 2) Harvard 3) Bryant - will be very comparable talent to Sacred Heart 4/5) Fordham & Yale tie 6) Merrimack 7) Colgate 8)Lehigh 9)Lafayette 10/11) Bucknell and Georgetown tie You may well be right....I haven't really looked at who's coming back where etc....but I have a hard time thinking that Bryant is bettah on paper right now than the Eli.
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Post by nycrusader2010 on Mar 27, 2022 13:10:01 GMT -5
Bryant went 7-4 last year, 6-2 in NEC play, including a W over conference champ Sacred Heart. They closed the season winning 4 out of 5. Last 2 games of season were blowout wins 52-7 v. LIU and 58-14 @ Merrimack. If not for a disappointing November 6th loss to Central Connecticut, Bryant would've won the NEC auto-bid last year.
Bryant also played Akron last year, their first ever FBS opponent I think. Lost 35-14 but game was tied 14-14 through 3 quarters. So they were competitive.
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Post by hcpride on Mar 27, 2022 14:59:56 GMT -5
Actually, I just re-checked and Lehigh finished at 97 (!) on Massey last year. Awful. Just awful (yes, they did beat three other awful PL teams late in the season). I’m thinking that between our returnees and recruits we further opened the gap on the rest of the PL.
Lots of patsies on our schedule. Style points may matter.
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Post by nycrusader2010 on Mar 27, 2022 16:07:18 GMT -5
Actually, I just re-checked and Lehigh finished at 97 (!) on Massey last year. Awful. Just awful (yes, they did beat three other awful PL teams late in the season). I’m thinking that between our returnees and recruits we further opened the gap on the rest of the PL. Lots of patsies on our schedule. Style points may matter. I think we should pump the brakes a little on the style points and widening the gap talk just a little bit. We outscored PL opponents by an average of about 30 points last year. It's going to be tough to top that. Even more so now, the Holy Cross game will be the Super Bowl for all of our league opponents. We get Fordham and Lehigh at home (not that I'm worried there -- Chesney will beat the Rams and Gilmore anywhere) but do have a tough road trip to Hamilton. Let's not forget Colgate finished a "quiet" 5-1 in the league last year for 2nd place. I do think we should set our sights on a potential at-large playoff bid, just in case we get upset by one of our PL rivals. Even with a loss to Buffalo, who's been a strong MAC team of late, I think if we're able to beat Harvard, Yale, Bryant and Merrimack, we would earn an at-large at 9-2. Obviously, we're heavy favorites to win the conference again and that should of course be the goal. Another opportunity for Chesney -- beating Harvard in Cambridge for first time since 2000. With regards to Lehigh, their Massey rating was indeed awful but they basically had a "tale of two seasons" in 2021. Through Week 6, they were bottom 5 in FCS if I'm not mistaken. They were quite respectable the rest of the way and expect them to be at least a decent team in 2022. They're not beating Villanova, Richmond or Princeton but have OOC games against Monmouth and Cornell where I could see Gilmore having them competitive and possibly winning. They also get Georgetown early so should have the cushion of starting 1-0 in league play in September.
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Post by kaftan12 on Mar 27, 2022 16:24:29 GMT -5
Call me crazy but the odds are almost zero to get an at large bid playing in the PL. Schedule is what it is and just need to take care of business in the PL.
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Post by Sons of Vaval on Mar 27, 2022 16:30:23 GMT -5
Call me crazy but the odds are almost zero to get an at large bid playing in the PL. Schedule is what it is and just need to take care of business in the PL. Definitely not true. The PL was a multi-bid league when Moorhead was at Fordham.
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Post by longsuffering on Mar 27, 2022 16:45:51 GMT -5
With good teams moving up to FBS and being replaced by teams moving up from D-2, two bids from the PL becomes more plausible.
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Post by newadvisor on Mar 27, 2022 17:06:29 GMT -5
Even with powerhouses moving into the FBS, the PL isn't deep enough now to get that at large bid. If either Colgate or Fordham make a great run next year only chance we have to see two PL teams in the playoffs. Now if the PL teams clean sweep FCS out of conference games maybe it happens, but its gonna take that to get national recognition. JMO
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Post by nycrusader2010 on Mar 27, 2022 17:43:54 GMT -5
Even with powerhouses moving into the FBS, the PL isn't deep enough now to get that at large bid. If either Colgate or Fordham make a great run next year only chance we have to see two PL teams in the playoffs. Now if the PL teams clean sweep FCS out of conference games maybe it happens, but its gonna take that to get national recognition. JMO Scenario: If Holy Cross goes 10-1 (or 9-2 with an FBS loss to UB) but loses to league champion Colgate, we'd almost definitely get an at-large. The PL was a multi-bid league multiple times earlier this past decade as SoV pointed out. The league even managed to get 2 bids a couple of times in the early 2000's, when the playoff field was only 16 teams. It's now 24. There WAS one 10-1 PL team that did miss the playoffs. This was Lehigh in 2012 -- tripped up against league champ Colgate and was otherwise undefeated. Did not get an at-large. I believe this was during that short time period when the NCAA field had expanded to 20 but not yet to 24. Colgate lost an opening round game to Wagner that year IIRC. Holy Cross lost close games to both Lehigh and Wagner that season as well. We gave up a two-score lead against Lehigh at Fitton late in the season.
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Post by longsuffering on Mar 27, 2022 18:19:20 GMT -5
Sometimes tight games are decided by the way the ball bounces, but discounting luck, HC has had better end game results under our current coach than his predecessor. The finishes against UNH and Sacred Heart at Fitton Field come to mind. Neither due specifically to crafty clock management or play calling, but perhaps influenced by intangibles like player confidence as much as anything.
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Post by bfoley82 on Mar 27, 2022 20:41:40 GMT -5
Sometimes tight games are decided by the way the ball bounces, but discounting luck, HC has had better end game results under our current coach than his predecessor. The finishes against UNH and Sacred Heart at Fitton Field come to mind. Neither due specifically to crafty clock management or play calling, but perhaps influenced by intangibles like player confidence as much as anything. Or just good luck?
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Post by longsuffering on Mar 27, 2022 21:07:35 GMT -5
Sometimes tight games are decided by the way the ball bounces, but discounting luck, HC has had better end game results under our current coach than his predecessor. The finishes against UNH and Sacred Heart at Fitton Field come to mind. Neither due specifically to crafty clock management or play calling, but perhaps influenced by intangibles like player confidence as much as anything. Or just good luck? I used poster's privilege to discount luck. 🙂 Of course you can't discount luck but without being able to define them exactly, the intangibles are more positive under Chesney.
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Post by bigfan on Apr 5, 2022 15:42:39 GMT -5
Notre Dame will play Tennessee State in 2023. First time to play FCS school.
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Post by Sons of Vaval on Apr 5, 2022 15:53:31 GMT -5
Notre Dame will play Tennessee State in 2023. First time to play FCS school. I assume this has something to do with ND seeking to provide a greater spotlight on HBCU schools (the ND men's basketball team played Howard this past season). Plus, Eddie George being Tennessee State's head coach doesn't hurt.
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Post by nycrusader2010 on Apr 6, 2022 12:52:07 GMT -5
Notre Dame will play Tennessee State in 2023. First time to play FCS school. I assume this has something to do with ND seeking to provide a greater spotlight on HBCU schools (the ND men's basketball team played Howard this past season). Plus, Eddie George being Tennessee State's head coach doesn't hurt. 100% that's what it is. Cool, though. UCLA and USC are the other two FBS schools who still have never played an FCS. UCLA has Alabama A&M on the schedule this year or next.
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Post by KY Crusader 75 on Apr 6, 2022 13:36:22 GMT -5
ND vs Tenn State looks like maybe a 45 point spread, although I shouldn't think Notre Dame would run up the score
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Post by football44 on Apr 6, 2022 17:55:23 GMT -5
ND vs Tenn State looks like maybe a 45 point spread, although I shouldn't think Notre Dame would run up the score Tenn State will go home with at least a million dollars in their pocket.
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