Tennessee Tech - Sept. 11

[AstroDin]

Jasper—I watched and listened to the game - I assume you did too.
My comment is related to an RPO in the red zone - where Hamp made the decision to run it himself and passed on trying to hit Harris in tight coverage in the end zone. Dan and David made the call about Hamp making a conservative decision and not taking a risk. Coaching I'm sure played a role in that - but Hamp's a smart guy (not sure but I'm guessing he's 20), and based on previous comments from CCH Hamp makes that call.

[apaladin]

How about this! TTU second half offense: 1 first down 18 yds. of offense. That is strong, I don’t care who you are playing.

[The Jackal]

How about this! TTU second half offense: 1 first down 18 yds. of offense. That is strong, I don’t care who you are playing.

It really is.

TTU isn't going to win a national title, but they are still a respectable OVC opponent on the road. Furman's defensive effort would have been impressive against a local high school team, but more so against a D1 opponent.

[The Jackal]

You can see that our defense is getting more complicated to diagnose, especially on third downs. Opponents this season are 5-25 converting on 3rd downs against our defense and 0-2 on 4th down. That's outstanding.

You see some of the defensive versatility here. Furman has four linebackers on the field despite the clear passing down. Two of those guys - Jalen Miller and Dae'one Wilkins, are excellent in pass coverage. So, even if you wanted to, it'd be difficult to run against this look.

The stunt is fun to watch (wish we had an end zone camera, though). Furman has a pass rush group in up front - Stokes, Hope, and Clark.

Dimaggio's runs little fake stunt and then breaks back. That small action forces the center to step to him and immediately gives Furman a 1 on 1 situation with both Hope and Stokes. Dimaggio essentially engages the center without actually touching him.

You can have a lot of success as a defense if you can get this sort of pressure while rushing 4 against 6 blockers.

[Affirm]

I'm glad our admissions office doesn't handle football scheduling.

Holy Cross...BFD.

Actually our admissions strategies and our intercollegiate athletics should have mutual alignment to whatever degree feasible.
Prospective students (including athletes), current students, alumni, general public locally, and general public nationally all do pay attention to whom we play.
Winning is important, but so is who we play.
I am not saying we should load up our schedule with the most prestigious schools. To do that, we would need to move our campus northward and become D-3.
But I do think that 1 or more of the D-1 schools that are ABOVE us in USN&WR liberal arts rankings, including Holy Cross, Colgate, Bucknell, Lafayette, Richmond, Davidson, Navy, Army, Air Force, would be good to have on our schedules at least a couple of times every decade or so.
I also think it would be good to have 1 or more Ivy League schools such as Yale, Harvard, Penn, Princeton, on our schedules at least a couple of time every 20 years or so.
It is good already that we do get to play both Wofford and VMI (tied at #69 ranking in the USN&WR liberal arts colleges rankings) each and every year in multiple sports. Furman is #52 in those rankings. And I think there are not many other D-1 FCS schools in the liberal arts school rankings than those 9 listed above (the national military academies [not FCS] and the Ivies [not in the liberal arts schools group] are not in that 9.

By the way, Presbyterian College may be the only other FCS liberal arts college in that US N&WR ranking, and they are #127. I think it’s fine when we play PC, which I consider a very good school. Just don’t want PC to be the only OOC liberal arts college (like FU is) that we ever play.

The new USN&WR rankings are now published, and Furman has now moved up from a #52 ranking to a #46 ranking.
Anyone who says these rankings are not important is wrong. It may be true that too much emphasis is placed upon them. However, it is true that every college considers the ranking to be very important, for a number of reasons.
I have not looked at the newest rankings yet, but I noticed an announcement from Furman about our latest ranking being an improvement to #46.
I will be interested to see how the other FCS schools that are National Liberal Arts Colleges along with Furman came out in these latest rankings. Those would be Holy Cross, Colgate, Bucknell, Lafayette, Richmond, Davidson, who are above us in the rankings; and also Wofford, VMI, and PC, who are slightly below us in the rankings.
(If there are other FCS schools that are National Liberal Arts Colleges other than Furman University and the above-named 9 schools [a total of 10] which are listed in the USN&WR rankings, I would like for anyone who knows that to please let me know.)
I am very glad about Furman's moving up in the rankings (thought I think we have previously been #46 or possibly higher in the not-too-distant past). That is the main reason for my present post.
However, I still wish to emphasize that I think Furman should give at least some priority to once-in-a-while having those other FCS National Liberal Arts schools on our OOC schedules in football (and basketball) once in a while - such as at least 5% of the time (in addition to whenever we play PC) over a 20-year period of time. That would be about 3 games (plus whenever we play PC) in a 20 year period against "Holy Cross, Colgate, Bucknell, Lafayette, Richmond, Davidson" and no more than 2 of those 3 games in a 20-year period should be away games for Furman.
Furthermore, I still wish to emphasize that I think Furman should seek to get at least 1 football game in a 20 year period against 1 of the other National Liberal Arts schools that are not FCS but are FBS - namely USMA, USNA, and USAFA.
I realize we have played Colgate in the last 20 years, and somewhat recently; although they skipped out on the return game at Furman a couple of years ago, when we ended up making the game up with Point.
I realize we have played USNA in basketball fairly recently and we will have a Sunday home game against USNA this season.
All good.
I realize also that it can be very difficult to get a team you want to get on your schedule, whether home or away. But I am talking about making it a priority, over a 20 year period; and I am talking about very few games - at least 5% of our OOC games over 20 year, plus only 1 game in 20 years against those 1 of those national military academies (they do schedule FCS opponents, at least Army and Navy do).

[The Jackal]

Furman has played Colgate at least 3 times recently. Twice in Hamilton, once in Greenville.

[Affirm]

Furman has played Colgate at least 3 times recently. Twice in Hamilton, once in Greenville.

Good.
Approximately what years?
Are all 3 since 2001?

[apaladin]

Furman has played Colgate at least 3 times recently. Twice in Hamilton, once in Greenville.

Good.
Approximately what years?
Are all 3 since 2001?

2008 FU won 42-21 @Colgate
2010 FU won 45-15 home
2017 FU won 45-14 @Colgate

[stonemd]

Army often plays 2 FCS teams a year, including socon. Mike Buddy now works there.

[Davemeister]

Colgate owes us a game in at Paladin Stadium. Then we can talk.

[Affirm]

Furman has played Colgate at least 3 times recently. Twice in Hamilton, once in Greenville.

Good.
Approximately what years?
Are all 3 since 2001?

2008 FU won 42-21 @Colgate
2010 FU won 45-15 home
2017 FU won 45-14 @Colgate

Thanks!
So "my 20-year minimum" (which is at least 5% OOC regular season games in every 20-year period) for 2008-2027 IS met. Good. As soon as we get to 2018, though, we will not be meeting "my 20-year minimum". Per "my minimum", we need to get something lined up for a game with at least 1 of those schools (Holy Cross, Bucknell, Lafayette, Richmond, Davidson, Colgate = the FCS-playing National Liberal Arts Colleges that are overall higher-ranked than us in USN&WR) by 2027 at the latest.
And no, we don't wait until after Colgate plays us again in Paladin Stadium. Not saying go play them again, but there are potentially 5 other schools we can get games with before we even contact Colgate.
Please note: I think we should also play schools that are FCS-playing NATIONAL Universities that rank in the top 50 or 60 in that designation, such as William & Mary, Lehigh, Northeastern, and Villanova. Glad we have W&M to play in near future.
In our conference membership, there are 5 colleges classified as National Universities by USN&WR, and of course we play them regularly. They all are fine schools, but they all rank not particularly highly in USN&WR. I imagine they excel in various other rankings. But USN&WR is the best-known and most-highly publicized, and in a sense it seems to be the “gold -standard” among college rankings.)

[apaladin]

No problem but I don’t really care if a team is a liberal arts college or not, as long as it is a quality opponent, what difference does it make? It’s a 3 and a half hour football game and that’s all.

[Affirm]

Army often plays 2 FCS teams a year, including socon. Mike Buddy now works there.

Navy plays 1 FCS team approximately 2 or 3 times every 4 years.
Air Force apparently plays 1 FCS team every single year, including schools from far away such as Lafayette, Stony Brook, Colgate, Nicholls, etc., as well as less distant FCS schools such as South Dakota, Idaho State, Abilene Christian, etc., schools that still are farther from Colorado Springs than we are from Annapolis or West Point.

[Roundball]

No problem but I don’t really care if a team is a liberal arts college or not, as long as it is a quality opponent, what difference does it make? It’s a 3 and a half hour football game and that’s all.

Well, what do you know, we agree on something! Quite frankly, the idea of playing those northeast elite schools does not interest me at all. A game against Holy Cross or Bucknell will not draw any fan excitement. And no, I am not interested in playing Colgate. There are plenty of other good FCS teams within a 4 or 5 hour drive that we can play.

[Affirm]

Colgate owes us a game in at Paladin Stadium. Then we can talk.

You know we should boycott Colgate toothpaste and other Colgate products.
In 1890, Madison University (originally founded as the Baptist Education Society of the State of New York) was renamed Colgate University because of major service and major financial support from members of the Colgate family which founded the Colgate company.