At the risk of sounding dramatic - 9 years ago (I cannot believe it was that long ago) the Ephs went up to Middlebury and Bobby Maimaron hit Frank Stola in the back of the end zone on the last play of regulation and it well and truly kicked off a new era of Williams football. Today, albeit a much different game and under much different circumstances, felt similar in that regard.

Wesleyan is the clear 1 to me although it's not by a lot, I think they just have the least question marks. I would go Tufts 2 Trinity 3 and Amherst 4.

I wrote "they would probably both go in and acquit themselves perfectly fine and not embarass themselves". Most of us know how the NCAA tournaments work, plenty of teams that don't make it would throttle some conferences winners. That is not what I'm saying

This will not be a super popular take but I find it silly that there could be 2 or more NESCAC teams in the field in the first year of eligibility. Like, are Trinity and Wesleyan two of the best however many teams in the country? Yeah they probably are. They would probably both go in and acquit themselves perfectly fine and not embarass themselves. But it does seem a little crazy to me that a team from this league could play zero/0/not a single nonconference game, not win the league, and still make the postseason when we have no empirical data to support how the NESCAC would fare against the rest of the country.

Quote from: Nescacman on October 11, 2026, 09:17:39 AMSerious question for the Williams mafia....if Weiler is the next coming of Moffitt/Maimaron, why was he QB3 playing behind two QBs that could be classified as NESCAC journeymen?

Hopefully, he's the answer for a program that has won exactly 1 Little 3 title since 2010 when Whales/Dice left Williamstown for greener pastures (we don't count 2010 since Whales recruited 100% of that team and HCOF Kelton rode that team to a 8-0 record...as Whales has told me many times, NESCACMAN could have coached that team to an 8-0 record)...

With all that being said, we wish the new signal caller the best of luck. Hopefully, they can keep him upright and healthy.

I don't think it would've made a difference against Trinity but it is a tough look for the coaching staff that McHugh was somehow QB2. By all accounts he had barely touched a football over the summer and is focused almost exclusively on baseball right now. Raymond is famously ruthless when it comes to depth chart decisions, there is no emotion or feel good decision making, I have no idea how he was next man up.

I think the positive spin on the situation at Williams is that they have an identity and two things they are very good at. I think that is better than being okay at a lot of things and trying to beat the best teams in the league by out executing them at a really high level and getting lucky. I would expect McHugh to be at least a little bit better passing the ball in the long run than he was on Saturday but I don't really know how much better. His sophomore year he completed 63% of his passes and threw for 177 yards per game, 12 TDs to 8 INTs, but a lot of it was candidly stat padding early in the year and the wheels sort of fell off at the end. But we have at least seen him do it in flashes.

The negative spin is that yeah, it is going to be tough to beat Wesleyan or Trinity without any semblance of passing offense really at all, and for good measure they play both teams on the road. It is going to have to be old fashioned time of possession and move the sticks dominance if they want to have a chance. It would be really great if it kept raining this weekend.

Williams improves to 2-0, going on the road to Waterville and defeating Colby 19-7.

Strangely, despite playing on the road against what was supposed to be a better opponent, and also winning by an almost identical score, it seemed like a flatter and less inspired performance to me. A lot of that was primarily because it was Owen McHugh's return as the starting QB and the air game left a lot to be desired. He was just 6-12 for 53 yards and an interception, which was quite a poor decision and poorly timed. My compatriot nescac1 will disagree with me but I am much less impressed by the WRs, I think the group lacks speed and the ability to create separation. So I say that to say that it is hard to pin the passing struggles on McHugh.

With that being said, they were EXCELLENT in the run game. I don't know what Matt Bott's injury is but at this point the RB room belongs to FY Jack Fabiano, who was really good again - 29 carries for 143 yards and 2 TDs. He looks like the next Mario Fischetti and has to be the early favorite for Rookie of the Year.

McHugh was also excellent on the ground, 21 carries for 84 yards and a touchdown. Remember that in college, sacks count as lost rushing yards, so if you take away Colby's 2 sacks, it was 19 carries for 100 yards. Some of it was on designed runs but he also had some really nice scrambles.

The defense was also excellent again, up front in particular. They held Colby to just 61 rushing yards following a week where they held Bowdoin to 12. If they stay healthy, which is a big if, they look like their front 7 could be the best in the league (could, nescacman, could).

Next week the Ephs head to Trinity. I would say they are roughly -19.5 underdogs given the struggles of the passing game and that running on Colby and Bowdoin is different than running on Trinity. Williams had championship aspirations coming into the season and those took a big hit when Owen Johansen went down for the season. I think there was a contingent that hoped McHugh could still do what Johansen would've done and while that seems less likely now, there is at least a blueprint and identity for Williams to win football games with a power run game that controls TOP and keeps the chains moving, and a defense that puts opposing offenses on the back foot in early down and distance.

While they are longshots against Trinity, McHugh and co. still have a lot of time to find their footing and fully gel on offense but in the short term it is nice to get out of Colby with a W and be 2-0.

Flip Nieves with Chin and I think I would have the same first team. Second team seems very hard to judge because of how many good players graduated and the team outlooks are up in the air but I bet a second Trinity player finds their way onto a team and someone completely off our radar does as well.

Good news for Jon Medley's POY candidacy is that this year is his senior year

Quote from: Nescacman on September 20, 2026, 02:42:37 PM

Quote from: SpringSt7 on September 20, 2026, 01:45:17 PMQuick week 1 reactions and overreactions

-Trinity and Wesleyan the clear top 2 - if Carroll plays like that all year Trinity will be tough to beat. Wesleyan just has so many dudes

-Kurzum has taken another leap and Hamilton will be a frisky out

-Another long year in Lewiston if Lynskey is out for an extended amount of time

Spring our dear Eph friend...didn't you forget one?!?   

I don't know what the reaction would be but if Owen Johansen is out for a while that would be news worth reacting to. But I am not a reporter and don't know what the prognosis is and will wait until we hear more.

Edit: Also realized this is a little hypocritical given I mentioned the Lynskey injury. That is on me

Quick week 1 reactions and overreactions

-Trinity and Wesleyan the clear top 2 - if Carroll plays like that all year Trinity will be tough to beat. Wesleyan just has so many dudes

-Kurzum has taken another leap and Hamilton will be a frisky out

-Another long year in Lewiston if Lynskey is out for an extended amount of time

Williams begins its 2026 season with a 17-7 win at home over Bowdoin. Unfortunately the headline news is that Owen Johansen left the game with what appears to have been a serious knee injury. He got dragged down out of bounds from behind and came up holding his knee. The camera panned away from him but he came off of the field without putting any pressure on it. So obviously that is a huge story for the team but mainly you just hope that he is okay. They are lucky to have Owen McHugh as the backup QB but on paper a lengthy Johansen absence right now would be a massive loss.

As for the rest of the game, it was in a lot of ways a typical Mark Raymond win, especially early in the season. The first half was a slog, the front 7 was flying around defensively and some fortunate bounces from the punt team resulted in some short fields and they were able to capitalize with a Johansen rushing TD from short yardage. Overall however the offense really struggled in the first half although in the second half they started to wear Bowdoin down and really ran the ball better, but in total, just 17 points to show for. It was a really ineffective day passing the ball and they turned it over 3 times - 2 Johansen interceptions and a fumble by first year RB Jack Fabiano who had an otherwise excellent day filling in for Matt Bott , who I assume was hurt.

The defense was excellent and would've pitched a shutout if not for a consolation TD on the last possession of the game. Bowdoin did not really test their secondary all that much but the Ephs covered well and also routinely put the Polar Bears in poor down and distance situations with 8 TFLs, led by Will Baker with 4 while Sean Rooney had 2 including a sack.

Going forward, the story will be the injury report. Johansen's health is the big one, based on the play I would be a little surprised if we saw him again this season, but hopefully it isn't as bad as it looked. They are very lucky to have Owen McHugh waiting in the wings, he played well in the limited action he saw when he came in and we know he is certainly capable of playing very well. Star junior LB Luke Mangini was also missing from action today, hopefully that is only a small thing. But all eyes will be on Johansen's availability going forward.

I see both arguments on the roster spot thing. I don't really think the money is a factor at all to be totally honest (on the Colby volleyball example, I would be shocked if that wasn't fundraised), it just comes down to whether or not you want 4-5% of each graduating class to be football players. Also, spare me the sob story on having to tell kids they were cut. These coaches know the roster rules and limits and some of them have been recruiting that way for years. This wasn't some big surprise that snuck up on people overnight.

I think there should be a bigger roster limit but I don't really care if it is that much bigger. They are never going to have the depth of a North Central or Mount Union.

Berry I guess could win POY as best player on the best team but I'd probably have 8 ish names ahead of him? Big difference between being a heat check scorer off the bench on a team with Vetter and Okorougo and being the dude for 30 minutes a game and the first name on the scouting report.

Agree with nescac1's list but would give a real shoutout to a potential Zion Watt player of the year bid. Their second leading returning scorer and best defender who actually shot it better last year than marksman teammate Dylan Reilly. Linton has earned the benefit of the doubt from me and I think they have a chance to win the league. If he goes 13-7 with some blocks and steals and guards the other team's best player I think he could win it. Averaged 1.5 steals and almost 1 block per game last year, he could have a monster defensive season and only needs to tick up the offensive production just a little bit to be in the mix.

Hamilton College alum and LA Clippers President of Basketball Operations Gillian Zucker was in the news this week.