FB: North Coast Athletic Conference

Started by admin, August 16, 2005, 05:05:01 AM

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Li'l Giant

Wabash: I would go with 2011 (though 2005 has a strong argument). My personal feeling is the 2011 team had our best defense ever.

Wittenberg: I would go with 2013. I think that was Witt's best offense ever.

Wooster: 2004, no question. (PS: It's crazy that this was the last time an outright NCAC champion wasn't named Wabash or Wittenberg. That's a LONG time.)

DePauw: Gonna go with 2005 here over the 09/10 SCAC champ teams. A close home loss to a Wesley team that went to the semis that year. A close home loss to a Wabash team that may have been our best in that time period and won a playoff game. There's little doubt in my mind they'd have beaten Trinity had that game been played. Yeah, anything could have happened but that DPU team was good.

Allegheny: Conference champs in 2003. Seems like an easy choice to me but 2009 was a good year for them.

Agree on Denison (2013) and Hiram (2008).

Kenyon: I go with 2012 but a case could be made for 2005.

Oberlin: 2012. A 4-6 team isn't their best record in that period but a win at Wabash was their biggest win in a long time and that team was just gritty.

OWU: Already had said 2012 was it.
"I believe in God and I believe I'm gonna go to Heaven, but if something goes wrong and I end up in Hell, I know it's gonna be me and a bunch of D3 officials."---Erik Raeburn

Quote from: sigma one on October 11, 2015, 10:46:46 AMI don't drink with the enemy, and I don't drink lattes at all, with anyone.

sigma one

The 2003 season was a weird one for Allegheny.  They lost their first 3 games, then beat Wabash 7-6 at the swamp in possibly the worst mud I've ever seen, worse even than the memorable Mud Bowl game at DePauw in 1967, a 7-0 Wabash win.  The mud at Allegheny made the field all but unplayable, and I don't recall seeing a high school field in worse shape.  The week before Gheny lost to Westminster, 7-0, on the same field.  Wabash was told because rain fell all week between Westminister and Wabash, there was no way to work on the field.  Wabash missed an extra point, and that was the end.   But that Allegheny team was very good.  They lost by only one point in their playoff game to finish 7-4.  I chose the 8-2 team based on the quality of their play all year, but I can't argue with the 2003 conference-champion team.
     I thought hard about Oberlin's upset of Wabash in a 4-6 season as being the tipping point to put that team above the 5-5 teams, but decided to go with a season when they reached .500 and were 5-2 in the NCAC.  But I believe that the upset makes for a strong argument for the 2012 squad.  The only thing that kept me from going that direction was that Wabash was also upset at home that year by Allegheny.
     Wittenberg's recently strong run after a somewhat pedestrian (for them) streak of seasons leaves room for disagreement about their "best" season.  My choice favored a team that was strong everywhere, but I agree that the 2013 season was the best offense I've seen come out of Springfield.  I saw the loss at Butler in the first game of the season, and I did not think Witt would recover the way they did, though Butler simply overwhelmed them early and Witt recovered a bit in the second half, partly v. Butler's second team defense.  The Wit win at Wabash is a strong factor in favor of 2013 over their other good seasons, particularly the first quarter and a half when they had their way with a shell-shocked Little Giant team that consistently was in the hole with poor field position--to Witt's credit.  The deciding factor for me was the big playoff loss to Mt Union after which Mount struggled to win and eventually lost by a large margin in the title game.
     My choice and the choice of 2013 are practically a dead heat with a judgment based on Witt's offense a strong point.

wally_wabash

#28232
You guys have already hit on all of the seasons that popped into my head as soon as I read LG's question.  Just to get myself on the record...here goes:

Allegheny - I'll go with 2003 because of the league championship.  I know they mixed in an 8-2 season in 2009, but those two were 37-3 and 52-10 losses so they weren't really competitive as far as a league championship goes.  Bad field and all, they ran the table in 2003 which is their biggest accomplishment of the era. 

Denison - 2013's 7-3 squad is pretty clearly the best we've seen from the Big Red.  And they won a big game on the road at OWU, stayed with Witt for quite a while...and did all of that with a pretty young team.  Lot of positive momentum there for Denison.

DePauw - This is an interesting case.  The best DePauw team I've seen was 2005.  But can their best season happen in a year when they lost to Wabash?  Probably not.  With that qualifier, I'm probably going to pick the 2008 8-2 season that ended with a smackdown of #3 ranked Wabash and springboarded them to consecutive playoff seasons in the next two years. 

Kenyon - Have to choose between the 6-4 campaigns of 2005 and 2012...and I'll pick 2012.  In 2012, Kenyon played in week 11 for a share of the title and a playoff spot, while in 2005, Wabash had wrapped the league up before the final game. 

Oberlin - In 2003 Oberlin knocked off a ranked Wooster team which was a giant deal (remember, they weren't that far removed from an 0-40ish streak at that time).  I think I'll agree with the 2007 5-5, 5-2 team as their best season overall, but obviously their best moment happened in 2012 at Wabash...and that would have been their best season by a long way were it not for some injury issues that derailed the middle of their season. 

OWU - This is 2012 and it's probably not close, although I do want to give a quick nod to the plucky 2004 team that won Ye Olde Skull and played a week 11 game against Wooster for the league title.  They lost 24-6, but that was a lot better than most did agaisnt that Wooster team. 

Wabash - For me, the answer is 2005.  2011 was tremendous and the North Central win was phenomenal, but it's hard to beat seeing Wabash being named the top seed in the region.  And in 2005 Wabash beat the best DePauw team I've seen, ups the ante a little for me. 

Witt - I'm going to take 2009 here.  That team was nasty.  Allegheny was the only regular season team to score 10 points on them (in a 52-10 loss), and then we'll always have to wonder what if Huffman hadn't have been knocked out of their game with Whitewater.  The 2013 team was tremendous as well, but 2009 gets my vote. 

Wooster - This is pretty clearly 2004.  Tony Sutton gets the credit, but that team also had a lot of great players on defense.  A league championship and a playoff win stands head and shoulders above any other season Wooster has had during this time. 
"Nothing in the world is more expensive than free."- The Deacon of HBO's The Wire

The_Bishop

#28233
Great discussion fellas.  Have to agree on 2012 for the Battling Bishops and great call out on the '04 team Wally.  The '01 squad back in the Capone era that went 9-1 could give you something to think about (and revising the criteria from 2000 to date), but Witt put the clamps on that team, they didn't play Wabash, and were about 3-4 yards away from a last second hail mary against a 5-5 or 4-6 Wooster team that year that could have been a loss.

R.I.P., Wing-T.
"If we chase perfection - we can catch excellence."  --Vince Lombardi

DPU3619

Quote from: sigma one on July 26, 2014, 06:09:07 PM
DEPAUW:  I'm looking at the SCAC and NCAC seasons.  My choice is 2010, 9-2, with a playoff loss to Trine, 45-35, after a rocky first half.  There are three seasons of 8-2 and one of 7-2 (the game v. Trinity cancelled).  Of these as runner-up, I like 2008, with a 36-14 win v. Wabash, and losses to Millsaps and Trinity. 

I'd also add 2004. That was an 8-2 team that lost to Wisc-Stout in Lynch's 1st game as HC. Led good Trinity 28-16 with 5 to go. I know the Bell game wasn't aesthetically pleasing, but still a very good team. Also, the 2005 team was pretty good. Battled the heck out of Wesley in the first game under Tim Rogers. Lost the Bell game tight and late. I always believed they would have beaten Trinity that year in San Antonio, but the game was canceled because of Hurricane Rita.

I'd pick 2010, too. But then I'd probably go 2004, 2008, then 2005 as the next best.

Li'l Giant

Quote from: wally_wabash on July 26, 2014, 09:43:30 PM
DePauw - This is an interesting case.  The best DePauw team I've seen was 2005.  But can their best season happen in a year when they lost to Wabash?  Probably not.  With that qualifier, I'm probably going to pick the 2008 8-2 season that ended with a smackdown of #3 ranked Wabash and springboarded them to consecutive playoff seasons in the next two years. 

2008 is a great choice. I didn't mention it because despite the impressive beatdown of Wabash I think DePauw's best team that didn't win a conference championship was that 2005 team.

But Wally makes a great point. It presents a hard choice for both Wabash and DePauw to rank teams that have Bell losses. I think the 2007 Wabash team was pretty darn good, but none of us has mentioned them at all most likely because of Jordan Havercamp's clutch kicking. Same for the aforementioned 2008 Wabash team that got pasted at home in the Bell Game.

Quote from: Old Pal Wes on July 27, 2014, 03:46:08 AM

I'd also add 2004. That was an 8-2 team that lost to Wisc-Stout in Lynch's 1st game as HC. Led good Trinity 28-16 with 5 to go. I know the Bell game wasn't aesthetically pleasing, but still a very good team.

I had honestly forgotten about that 2004 game against Trinity. That was part of the reason we all thought they'd beat TU in 2005. They had shown they were ready. That's a good DePauw team to bring up.
"I believe in God and I believe I'm gonna go to Heaven, but if something goes wrong and I end up in Hell, I know it's gonna be me and a bunch of D3 officials."---Erik Raeburn

Quote from: sigma one on October 11, 2015, 10:46:46 AMI don't drink with the enemy, and I don't drink lattes at all, with anyone.

firstdown

What about the Wabash team of 2002?  At 12-1, this team really started Wabash's return to top flight football.

wally_wabash

Quote from: firstdown on July 28, 2014, 08:54:31 AM
What about the Wabash team of 2002?  At 12-1, this team really started Wabash's return to top flight football.

We certainly haven't forgotten...we were looking at the D3football.com Top 25 era which started in 2003.   :)
"Nothing in the world is more expensive than free."- The Deacon of HBO's The Wire

ExTartanPlayer

Little late to the conversation, but that was a really cool topic.  Thanks.
I was small but made up for it by being slow...

http://athletics.cmu.edu/sports/fball/2011-12/releases/20120629a4jaxa

DPU3619

Quote from: wally_wabash on July 28, 2014, 09:27:41 AM
Quote from: firstdown on July 28, 2014, 08:54:31 AM
What about the Wabash team of 2002?  At 12-1, this team really started Wabash's return to top flight football.

We certainly haven't forgotten...we were looking at the D3football.com Top 25 era which started in 2003.   :)

I tried to forget.

Li'l Giant

That didn't kill as much time as I hoped. Best individual game for each NCAC team in that period? Best player on each side of the ball for the teams during that period? We have a lot of days to kill before the season kicks off. Or until Kickoff gets released.  ;D
"I believe in God and I believe I'm gonna go to Heaven, but if something goes wrong and I end up in Hell, I know it's gonna be me and a bunch of D3 officials."---Erik Raeburn

Quote from: sigma one on October 11, 2015, 10:46:46 AMI don't drink with the enemy, and I don't drink lattes at all, with anyone.

wally_wabash

#28241
Oh that really turns up the heat.  I'm going to need to think about this one, espeically for teams other than Wabash.  I'll have stats to go along with these games in a few minutes, but here are the first few that popped in my head for Wabash players:

Russ Harbaugh's 19-20 game vs. Denison, 2005: 19-20, 317 yards, 3 TDs.  Eric Summers tripped and couldn't get to that one pass...which would have been for 39 more yards and another score. 

Dustin Huff vs. Franklin, 2007: 27-44, 477 yards, 1 INT, 4 TDs, 22 more rush yards for a grand total of 499 yards of offense which I believe is still the single game record for Wabash.     

Tyler Burke vs. North Central, 2011: 24-49, 311, 4 TDs, 2 INT, 34 yards rushing; not listed in the box score: a single game record for guts. 

Aaron Lafitte vs. Witt, 2003 - 27 carries, 157 yards, 3 TDs, 4 rec, 38 yards...and the Little Giants rode this freshman to a 41-14 beatdown of Wittenberg, thus obliterating the Witt mystique forever.

Tyler Holmes vs. OWU, 2012 - 23 carries, 210 yards, 1 TD

Addrian Frederick vs. Witt, 2009  - 7 tackles, 4 INT...anchored a defense that kept a serverely limited Wabash offense in a game against what we decided was Witt's best team of the era. 

Chase Belton vs. CMU, 2012 - 13-23, 183 yards, 4 TD, 20 rushes, 193 yards, 3 TD.  Seriously.  Seven TDs.  What. 

Russ Harbaugh vs. Wooster, 2005 - 28-42, 452, 4 TDs...this was the biggest passing day against a Wooster defense EVER. 

And while I'm here...Russ Harbaugh vs. Albion, 2005 - 34-39, 360, 3 TDs...plus 27 yards rushing (maybe a career high there).  If you've not caught on, Harbaugh's 2005 season was pretty much bonkers. 

More nominations?  I know there are some Matt Hudson gems that I'm forgetting.  And there are more defensive games that I need to dig up as well. 
"Nothing in the world is more expensive than free."- The Deacon of HBO's The Wire

sigma one

I'm thinking, too.  Adi Pynenberg has to be in there somewhere.

wally_wabash

Quote from: sigma one on July 28, 2014, 10:34:46 PM
I'm thinking, too.  Adi Pynenberg has to be in there somewhere.

Pynenberg was awesome, well always, but the one that stands out for me was the 2007 Bell game.  DePauw won the game, but Adi did everything he could to keep Wabash in it...specifically I remember him going one on one with some bowling ball fullback DePauw had on the goal line.  And Adi won.  That was a man's stop right there. 
"Nothing in the world is more expensive than free."- The Deacon of HBO's The Wire

sigma one

If memory serves, that fullback's name--Brett Claxton--whose older brother was a good basketball player at Wabash several years previously.  Wham, bang goal line stop off a short pass from Spud Dick.