Hey man.  Let's just beat UWL first.  It's kind of making me nervous how everyone is saying they're going to handle the Eagles.  I hope that's the case, but that QB is really good.

So what's the deal with UWL?  Are they super dependent on the QB? He's duel threat, but do they have a solid run game?  I see that they tend to give up a lot of points -- NC is probably keeping them up at night -- what's the deal with their D?  Are they giving up long drives or are they susceptible to big plays?  Or are they just giving up points in garbage time?  Looking at the AU game they went down early, but didn't really clamp down.

Quote from: hazzben on November 27, 2023, 02:04:27 pm

But if I have to choose between more money for a national bracket or a larger field, with travel restrictions, give me the former. What good is a 40 team field if 85% of the Top 15 or the entire Top 5 is all on one side? How deep could Trinity, Wheaton, or Aurora have gone if they were on the other side of the bracket this year? This weekend the quarterfinals may already be (probably are??) matching up the best 4 teams in the country. I'd rather see a system where those teams each have an equitable path to the final 4, than one where we have a bunch more at large selections, but still give half the field a vastly more difficult path to the Stagg.

I agree that the first option -- more money for a national bracket -- would make for a better field in terms of quality and competitiveness than the second option could provide, because it would be seeded better (i.e., the midwestern and "island" teams wouldn't all get stuck playing each other in the early rounds, since for generations D3 football's been rather lopsided in terms of most of the good teams being located west of the Pennsylvania-Ohio border). But if I had to place a bet on what the D3 membership would support in an annual meeting vote, it'd be on the second option, because the second option provides access to the D3 football playoff experience to more schools and more student-athletes, and that's what the institutional administrators of D3 schools value.

Quote from: Ralph Turner on November 27, 2023, 10:45:59 am

Interesting post-season comments from NCC Coach Spencer on the D3 Podcast about the best 32 teams in the playoffs.

Linfield not making the playoffs
The bracketing process
The D-3 philosophy of the playoffs
The Geographic Proximity problem

There’s a rumor that this will be discussed in the ATN podcast.

Quote from: Pat Coleman on November 21, 2023, 03:13:53 pm

Perhaps the 2019 total is wrong, because if he only played four, he would have been able to get a medical hardship year.

Sometimes games played totals are incorrect because someone hit the wrong keystroke on the stats program, or put in a starting lineup from the two-deep without checking to see if that person actually took the field.

I think it was the Salisbury playoff game where he's credited with a tackle on his individual stats page but in the actual box score/play by play from that game on the Union website, he doesn't appear.

Quote from: Rhythm21 on November 18, 2023, 04:39:46 pm

Quote from: Captain_Joe08 on November 18, 2023, 03:58:22 pm

Aurora defeats Coe 20-7 in a sloppy game. Up next is UW-La Crosse.

Never apologize for a victory! That being said, our offense owes our defense a few lunches.
*I haven't seen Aurora's O-line get beat like that in maybe 4 years.
*We had WRs dropping TDs, false start on 4th and inches, a terribly timed botched-snap on a 4th quarter punt.
*Chretin tried bouncing everything to the outside, and when he kept to the inside he'd get hit before getting back to the LOS.
*Tyler Adkins is a promising freshman making his first start, and thankfully he played well enough in the first quarter to get the points we needed to survive and advance, but he has to protect the ball much better if Luyando doesn't return next week. Turning the ball over 4x (I think), and the only reason we didn't get blown out was because our stellar defense (and punt team) took the ball away 7x (Yeah, this week's lunches are on the offense.)

We really missed Luyando's dual threat ability, and Coe quickly learned that the Adkins scramble threat isn't nearly as dangerous. But as is said in the movie 300, our defense, "Gave them nothing, and took from them everything!"  And a playoff win is a playoff win, and the fact I can come in here and nit-pic a NACC 2-score playoff W is a privilege we should not take for granted. Happy for the guys that they get a chance to clean everything up and come next Saturday, show UW-LaX what they're capable of.

A playoff win with the backup QB who is a freshman....awesome stuff AU.

Much bigger test this week. Curious if the starter will be back this week.