Two More Verbals

At least according to Andy of Lafayette - who is known for his great scoops! They are David Gongora and Will Griffin, both from Florida I think. I've already blogged on Gongora, a wide receiver, but I haven't found anything substantial on Griffin yet. He is supposedly a defensive back.

As I find more information I will get it up... or if you have any, dear reader, please share!

The Carbondale Connection

Looks like one of Jared Nepa's friends, Zach Lasavage, has given his verbal committment to Colgate. Zach is from Carbondale, PA, home of All-American and Defensive Player of the Year (and all around kick ass linebacker) Nepa. Although Zach is a running back, we can only hope he is cut of the same mold as Jared.

From the sounds of it, he is. This tough cookie had a third degree separated shoulder in the first game of the 2005 season, and instead of taking it easy proceeded to rush for 1,437 yards and 20 touchdowns. He's Carbondale's all-time leading rusher with 4,185 yards.

Some more on Lasavage:

Lasavage the definition of tough in ’05

We already knew Zach Lasavage is to Carbondale football what Emmitt Smith is to the NFL — the all-time leading rusher.

Now, let it be clear, Lasavage is more John Wayne than Emmitt Smith.

How tough is he? How many examples do you need?

Statistics will tell the story. He carried 22 times Friday, took a hit on most every one of them, still gained 231 yards.

There’s more, though.

There were times against the Chiefs, who had beaten the Chargers every time they played since 1978, that Lasavage’s shoulder wasn’t his biggest pain. On a 10-yard carry at the start of the fourth quarter, Lasavage’s right hamstring cramped violently. Three plays later, he limped back onto the field, and with that leg drilled a 30-yard field goal that gave Carbondale a 15-14 lead it would never relinquish.

Comeback of the Year

It was a comeback that really wasn’t. Injured with a third-degree separation of his right shoulder in the first game of the season, Lasavage was expected to be out for the season. He played sparingly in three losses, but returned to full duty in Week 5 and led the Chargers to a 6-4 season and finished with more than 4,000 yards rushing in his career.

Lasavage carries Chargers past Wildcats

As Zach Lasavage goes, so goes the Carbondale offense.

With the junior tailback churning out yardage in chunks, the Chargers defeated Western Wayne, 19-0, on Friday night at the Andrew J. Cerra Sports Complex. Lasavage finished with 212 yards and a touchdown on 25 carries.

"Zach is an amazing back," Western Wayne coach Bob Matoushek said. "Nobody stops him. He runs through almost anybody. We really hustled on defense today, he's just that good."

Welcome to Colgate, Zach! Get healthy and get ready for some Colgate football this fall!

Colgate (and Fordham) Recruits

Ran across this story out of the Miami Herald. It's not much, but it is a recruiting tidbit. From the bottom of the story:

From Ely, Devan James is visiting Eastern Michigan, Doug Westbrook is visiting Eastern Illinois, Jahmal Blanchard is visiting Hampton, Eddie Cameron is visiting Fordham...

From Chaminade, Joe Dawson is visiting FAU, David Gongora is visiting Colgate, Cleo Edwards is visiting Emporia State and Willie Floyd is visiting Eastern Kentucky.

What I could find out about David Gongora is this: He's a 6'2" 185 lbs. receiver from an 11-2 team. I'm not certain, but something does seem odd that he only has stats from 3 games on that same site. It could be a mistake or there could be more to it because here he's listed as one of the area leaders. In this story, he's listed as the quarterback's favorite target.

Ah well, no matter what the story is, anytime you mention Florida, receiver and Colgate in the same sentence, I'll get excited!

As for the Fordham recruit, I'll leave that up to them to research!

It's been a while

If there are any readers left, I hope you all understand that sometimes a guy needs to take care of some business before he can spend time on a fun pursuit such as this. Blogging will be sporadic for the next two or three months or so, so bear with me! That said, I will try and keep some items up to date, even if I can't really get into analysis or commentary.

First, I'm going to start posting links to verbals we have out there (not only to help out Lennie who can't seem to get the link to work) but also so there is someplace out there that saves the information. As I am currently aware of, we have four verbals:

Brendan Buglione - 6'4" 230 pound defensive end from Vestal, NY. Buglione claims to be choosing Colgate over Villanova, Bucknell, Pennsylvania and Richmond. He's got a 3.92 GPA and he's looking to go to medical school. In his senior year, Buglione had 110 tackles, 26 for losses, two sacks and two forced fumbles for 6-4 Vestal. Of note is that he has an older brother, Dana, who is currently a sophomore defensive lineman for Holy Cross.

Tyler Spencer - 6'1" 220 pound all state fullback or potential rush end from Chenango Forks, NY. He claims to have a 4.5 40 yard time and a 33 inch vertical leap. This kid is a winner as he comes from a program that went 38-1 the three years he played and won 2 state titles. I like kids coming from winning programs. I think it gives them that extra bounce when they get on the field; they expect to win!

Patrick Simonds - 6'5" 200 pound wide receiver from Sydney, NY. This kid is another winner who looks to have chosen us over Lehigh and James Madison. I can't find the article that shows him committing to Colgate, but I know I saw it and I know he has. Looking from his photo, maybe it was the school colors that did it?

Wayne Moten - 5'9" 170 defensive back from Forrestville, MD. The buzz I've heard on this kid is that he is very good - a nice steal for Colgate.

On plain old recruiting scene, this popped into my mailbox about Greg Linder, a wide receiver from Flordia. Looks like Greg is debating football at Colgate versus soccer at Notre Dame.

There you have it. As appear, I will get them up here. For the record though, Andy from Lafayette will most likely scoop everything!

Some Resoultion... and some surprises

Well, I'm sure everyone heard about Lehigh hiring Andy Coen, the Offensive Coordinator from Penn. The Morning Call has weighed in on the hire, so I thought I would as well.

The first thing is, I'm kicking myself for thinking they'd hire Cecchini (the offensive coordinator from Harvard and former Engineer receiver) over Coen. Two things make Coen stand out:

• He's older. Lembo was very young when he was made the head coach at Lehigh, I believe as young as 30. The desire for a more 'seasoned' leader was always there in the background of fan chatter. Cecchini is younger than Coen, and would have been similar to the Lembo hire.
• He's a more direct tie to former head coach Kevin Higgins, a man that in the eyes of Mountain Hawk fans couldn't do any wrong. He was the Offensive Coordinator for the majority of his time there and nothing would make Lehigh fans happier than a return to that offensive of the late 90s.

In reality, Coen is a solid choice all around. There is no head coaching experience (neither does Cecchini) but all of the other ingredients are there on paper. From time to time a coordinator doesn't make the transistion to head coach well, but there is nothing in Coen's background to suggest he can't continue Lehigh's streak of excellence and perhaps even take them to the next level in national play.

So my Lehigh friends should be very happy. You've made a quality hire in a short amount of time. Now it's time to focus on the rest of the staff and recruiting.

Speaking of 'the rest of the staff', another Cohen (spelled differently of course) over at Hofstra made some news we might take interest in. Dave Cohen, formerly of Delaware and now the head coach at Hofstra, announced four staff members today; two of them have Patriot League ties. First, former Fordham head coach Ed Foley is named assistant head coach and will coach the offensive line. Next, John Perry, former associate head coach at Georgetown, is named the offensive coordinator.

It's nice to see both coaches get positions at a new program.

The Week Ahead

I'm sure I'm not the only anxious one in the Patriot League this week. Right now we've got two very big openings to fill, one pretty big opening and a host of smaller ones that will depend on others. I think we will get at least one, if not all, of these lingering questions resolved this week. The big ones are of course, the head coach at Lehigh and Georgetown as well as the Offensive Coordinator here at Colgate.

I for one am chomping at the bit.