JMU vs. St. Francis (Pa.) Preview

Just get used to the fact that this week sucks. Mickey would say it’s a necessary evil, especially on a 12 game schedule, and it should give JMU a victory to pad their record, but other than the goodness that always comes from tailgating in the ‘Burg on a fall Saturday (and thankfully we’re heading for clear fall weather this weekend), there’s absolutely nothing else to see here.  St. Francis sucks ass. I mean they suck like a porn star that’s been finger dippin’. We don’t need to speculate about this based on their sucky conference (NEC) or their sucky results from their only game this season (another guarantee game blowout at the hands of the real GSU) because we all wasted our money watching the Red Flashes in all their suck at the beginning of last season when JMU destroyed them 55-7 at BFS and we’re all gonna do the same again this week.

KSt. loooves sloppy seconds!

The Basics (Mostly Verbatim from Last Year)

St. Francis is called the Red Flash.  Yes, that’s Flash, not Flashes.  They are from what appears to be a beautiful town on top of a mountain called Loretto, PA.  That town is likely just a small outpost where people talk about how you should’ve seen it when the mine was working.  St. Francis is one of the smallest schools in Division 1 athletics and someday they’ll probably make a great story for March Madness.  But limited scholarship FCS participation in the NEC is a tough way to go (ask URI) and they were terrible last year and are likely to be terrible this year.  This is not CCSU from two years ago or even CCSU from two weeks ago. St. Francis is moving to a more uptempo offense like the Dukes and actually had 79 plays and more first downs than GSU last week, but a blowout is inevitable and anything less is a disaster. This team is terrible.  If you want a more thorough examination, you’ll have to go over to JMU Sports.

Quick Note on Playoffs

In case you’d forgotten, the big news this year was the field expanding to 24 teams (and with only 90+ eligible not making it is a fireable offense no questions asked). But thankfully, at long last, mostly lost in the larger field, FCS is also instituting a “strength of schedule” component similar to the RPI used in hoops to make distinctions between potential participants. In the long run over the course of a CAA schedule that contains neither URI nor Maine, this should benefit the Dukes mightily.  But after CCSU, STFU, Charlotte, and even Akron, but mostly thanks to this crummy game, don’t be surprised that the Duke are going to be looking up at a lot of folks during the earlier part of this season.

Beer of the Week

This is important this week as it’s one of the highlights of the day. Could be one of the last warm-weather home games, so let’s keep rolling with the summery IPA types.  This week it’s Finch’s Beer Company’s Threadless IPA.  Just a solid, sessionable IPA from Chicagoland that comes in tall-boy cans, our favorite tailgate vessel.  We actually don’t love a ton of Finch’s offerings, including the more ballyhooed Fascist Pig, but the Threadless won’t steer your wrong.

Prediction

Dukes 41, STFU 10