Camp Counselor, Denzel Bowles.
JMU Dukes senior center, Denzel Bowles spent this weekend in Chicago attending Amare Stoudamire’s big man camp. The camp, officially known as the Amare Stoudamire Skills Academy, brings together some of the top college big men and elite high school prospects for 3 days of training. Bowles was one of ten college post players selected to serve as instructors for the high schoolers. So, Denzel will spend his summer vacation as a camp counselor like many of you probably did. Except instead of teaching kids how to paddle a canoe or make one of those stupid fake leather comb-holder things, he’ll be instructing gifted 7 footers how to dominate the paint.
Take it from Coach Brady who succinctly summed it up like this “Yeah, it’s a big deal.” Obviously, Bowles selection as an instructor shows that folks recognize his skills and ability. However, the real exciting part about the opportunity is the fact that it will give Denzel a chance to play plenty of pick-up games with NBA players and elite prospects in the evenings. Bowles showed his capable of elevating the level of his play when facing elite opponents when he put up 31 points against VCU and its #15 NBA draft pick Larry Sanders. Hopefully Denzel will open some eyes with his play and start getting his name circulating amongst NBA scouts heading into the season.
The Basics: The University of New Hampshire is tucked away in the eastern New Hampshire town of Durham. For some reason the school’s football program is overlooked by a lot of CAA fans. Maybe it’s because the Wildcats are football only members. Maybe there is a Southern bias and fans group all the New England schools together. Whatever the reason, it’s kind of silly considering that the Wildcats have made the playoffs for seven straight years. To go along with the team’s accomplishments, UNH players have had a number of noteworthy individual accomplishments. Former QB Rickey Santos won the Walter Payton Award in 2006 and one of his favorite targets, WR David Ball broke Jerry Rice’s FCS record for career touchdown receptions. In short, overlooked or not, UNH has a really good football program.
2009 Season Synopsis: UNH rode it’s high-scoring offense to a 10-3 record (6-2 in the CAA), highlighted by a 28-24 win against eventual National Champion, Villanova. Of course Villanova also provided the season lowlight, avenging that loss with a 46-7 drubbing in the playoffs. The Wildcats led the CAA in scoring, averaging nearly 32 points a game. The offense was a fairly balanced attack, good for 27 touchdowns on the ground and 20 in the air. UNH had several solid RB’s, without any one individual putting up big numbers. Chad Kackert led the team with 780 yards and 10 TDs on the ground. Scott Sicko was the top receiver, reaching the endzone 9 times and hauling in 57 receptions. The Wildcat D was solid, yet not spectacular, and was led by a trio of All-CAA second-teamers, LB Sean Ware, CB Dino Vasso, and S Terrence Klein.
What They Lose: The Wildcats will enter the 2010 season without two of last season’s top weapons. The aforementioned Sicko and Kackert are just 2 of the 5 offensive starters who are gone. On the defensive side of the ball, UNH will have to make do without 2 of their top 3 tacklers, Sean Ware and Terrence Klein. The Wildcats lose 6 defensive starters, including 3 from the line.
What The Bring Back: UNH returns 43 lettermen from a 10 win team. The team will be led by Senior QB R.J. Toman who had a bit of down year in 2009 with 15 passing TDs and 4 rushing. He’ll look to return to his 2008 form when he put up 28 in the air to go along with 6 on the ground. Last season’s second leading rusher, RB Sean Jellison is back to pace the running attack. Senior DB Dino Vasso will look to improve on his stellar 2009 campaign and 2008 CAA Defensive Rookie of the Year, Brian McNally, will anchor the D from his linebacker position.
Fact You Might Find Interesting From Wikipedia: Former Wildcat WR David Ball’s nickname was “White Rice”.
Fact You Definitely Won’t Find Interesting From Wikipedia:UNH’s Conant Hall was dedicated as a National Historic Chemical Landmark.
2010 Prediction: I am going to continue the tradition of overlooking the Wildcats. The loss of 11 starters combined with the departure of perennial whipping boys Northeastern and Hofstra, makes me think this is the year the Wildcats find themselves on the outside looking in come playoff time. My best guess is 5-6 overall and 3-5 in the conference.
[polldaddy poll=3356796]
We’re still over 2 months from the 2010 CAA Football season officially getting underway, but the conference has already released the 2011 schedule. The CAA will be an eleven team league in 2011, due to the departures of Hofstra and Northeastern, and the pending addition of Old Dominion. Because of these changes, the CAA is moving to a single division, with each team playing 8 conference games.
Two quick thoughts on the schedule. 1. It’s weird to not play Delaware and 2. Mark your calendars now for the JMUSB Norfolk tailgate party before the ODU game on October 29.
The big thing that really caught my eye is that JMU doesn’t open conference play until September 24. Therefore the grand opening celebration for the new Bridgeforth Stadium (Bridgeforth the Sequel) will be against an out of conference opponent. Who do you think the Dukes should bring to town for the honor of playing in the grand opening? Let’s explore some possibilities.
A Creampuff
The Dukes could pull the FCS equivalent of a BCS “guarantee game”. Pay some terrible school to come to the ‘burg, take their beating, and get out of town before anyone notices. It would be a win for the Dukes, but I just can’t see folks getting too excited to open the stadium against some random team from the MEAC or Pioneer conference.
A Legit, But Beatable, FCS Team
Not quite bringing the Washington Generals to town, but not exactly scheduling a CAA level opponent either. The Dukes could play a decent program that the more hard-core FCS fans would respect. Playing a school like Liberty for example, would be a good test before CAA play, yet would still likely result in a Dukes’ win. Liberty plays at JMU this season, so it probably wouldn’t be them. A school like Furman would fit the bill though.
A Big Name BCS School
Not. Gonna. Happen.
A Traditional FCS Power
JMU is building the stadium to cement its place amongst the FCS elite (Ed. note: let’s save the “we’re going to the BCS” talk for another day), so maybe they should just get down to business on day 1. It would be tough to replicate the atmosphere from the 2008 clash against Appalachian State, but another showdown against the Mountaineers might do it. Playing a school like App State or Montana obviously might result in a tough loss, but a big win against a FCS power could kick start the season and keep Bridgeforth packed for years to come.
JMUSB presents a special treat for our third preview, an interview with senior Rhode Island correspondent, native “Newpsie”, and proud JMU alum, our friend G.G. But first:
No way to go but up.
The Basics:
It has to be said that The University of Rhode Island Rams are one of the perenial bottom-feeders in CAA football. URI, athletically most famous for Lamar Odom’s brief stay, is mostly undersized and slow, but they do return a ton of starters (18) and should be slightly better than last year. Of course, last year they were 1-10, 0-8 in the CAA, and they managed to do that while avoiding the mighty Dukes, a feat that thanks to the schedule hocus-pocus needed in the wake of Hofstra and Northeastern’s departures they’ve managed to do again. We could go really in depth, but Towson’s getting better and the Rams will be out of it before Sailing season’s even over in Kingston, pluse we’ve got an interview to get to.
The Fear: JMUSB does have one serious fear about URI, namely that they are a serious risk to follow Northeastern and Hofstra in the “cheap-assed, CAA North schools that are missing the football bandwagon and dropping football” trend. Even with ODU and Ga. State coming on board soon, the seemingly realistic possiblity of Liberty, and the “slightly” more pie-in-the-sky possibilities involving JMU in FBS, it’s a major concern to see the CAA struggling to keep afloat for football and we’d hate to lose the Rams, another school like UMass with a large enough student population and alumi base that you’d think they could hang in there.
2010 Outlook: 2-9, 0-8 CAA, good thing Fordham and Brown are on the schedule. Basically, the Spauldingesque boys from RhodeI will get nothing and like it.
Without further ado: here’s my conversation with URI insider and friend of the SB G.G.:
1) How would you describe student support for URI football? URI still has a football team.
2) How would you describe community support for URI football? See response to #1.
3) Can you name a current URI player? No.
4) Can you name any former URI players? No.
5) What is more likely, Rams discontinue football or have a winning season? Based on response to #1, I’ll go with discontinue.
6) Over/Under on 3 for the number of years before URI drops football? Under.
7) Can you give a top five items on the Newport/Kingston sports landscape?
a. Newport Gulls – great semipro baseball team plays in Historic Cardines field. Check it out.
b. great golf, including one of the first clubs in America, Newport Country Club
c. sailing, the word is that the America’s Cup might be coming back
d. The International Tennis Hall of Fame on Bellevue Ave.
e. Corn Hole at the Beach
8) Bigger deal statewide – URI bball or Providence bball? No good answer to this. I’m a URI guy, but would root for Providence in the Rams absence were they to make it. And Jim Donaldson sucks!
Now G.G., get your foot off the boat!
We’ve been busy at JMUSB headquarters watching the World Cup and continuously toasting Robert Green, so we’ve slept on some important and exciting news. JMUSB favorite, Arthur Moats, signed his rookie deal with the Buffalo Bills. The contract included a signing bonus of $112,000.
Moat’s deal is for 4 years and has a total value of $1.9 million. It also includes an escalator clause for the fourth year that can boost the total value significantly if he triggers it. Todd is the lawyer, so maybe he knows what that means. I have no clue, other than realizing Moats is due to make a lot more than I did graduating with my good ol’ CIS degree. Of course I also got stock options which the recruiters assured me would turn into a nice little nest egg. Not so much. Thank you very much internet bubble.
And as long as we’re posting about things we missed, go check out this article about Moats and Armanti Edwards on The Sports Network last month. It has the following quote from Moats about his experiences at the Bills first mini-camp:
The fact that I had to stand up, that was just a little different for me. And then on top of that, they had me at inside (linebacker) a bit, so I just changed how my eyes were as far as my keys and everything. That was a little difficult. But I definitely feel like I picked it up really well toward the end of (mini-)camp after we started watching film.
I’m not at all surprised to hear that Moats saw some improvement in his play over the course of mini-camp. I am a bit surprised to hear he was lining up inside however. In any case, it’s great news that he signed and can now focus on football and learning his new position.
The Diamond Dukes are picking up right where JMU football left off. After the Dukes saw Arthur Moats and Scotty McGee selected in the 2010 NFL Draft, the Arizona Diamondbacks selected JMU Junior Kevin Munson with the 121st pick of the 2010 Major League Baseball First-Year Player Draft.
Munson is coming off a terrific junior season, in which he was named the 2010 CAA Pitcher of the Year, and was selected to the All-CAA First Team, and All-America Third Team. As JMU’s closer, Munson compiled an 8-1 record with 10 saves. He had a 1.64 ERA and held opposing hitters to a ridiculous .174 batting average. The MLB.com scouting report had this to say about him:
Finding bullpen help is never easy, but it’s become much more common to do it via the Draft in recent years, as college closers are taken in the hopes they can move quickly through a system. Munson could be one of those types, with a very good fastball-slider mix and the right attitude to pitch in short relief. He’s strong and durable, though also physically mature.
In other baseball draft news, Villanova junior Matt Szczur was drafted in the 5th round by the Chicago Cubs. You might be asking yourself why the heck this even deserves mention on a JMU blog. Because if Szczur signs with the Cubs and foregos his senior season, then the CAA football race will get a whole lot more interesting.
For those of you who don’t recognize Szczur’s name, he’s the Wildcat WR who does a little bit of everything and does it all well. Extremely well. He was the MVP of last season’s FCS National Championship and he’d easily be one of the most dangerous players in the CAA this fall if he returns. In addition to his 51 catches for over 600 yards last season, Matt rushed for over 800 (Nova ran the Wildcat, no pun intended) and had another 816 yards returning kicks. And he scored 15 TDs. Oh, and he recently took a few games off during baseball season to donate bone marrow to a 19 month old leukemia patient whom he’d never even met! So yeah, he’s a talented and apparently decent guy. So, Godspeed Matt. Go sign a big contract and stay away from the Dukes this fall.
The FIFA World Cup is set to kick-off in just a few days in South Africa. Todd and I fall squarely in the “fanatic” category when it comes to the beautiful game. We’ve long been die-hard supporters of the US side (soccer lingo=soccer street cred) but are especially excited for this year’s team because of its strong ties to JMU.
Let me explain the connections. Former JMU soccer player, Kurt Morsink is currently on the roster for DC United. DC United played its opening match against the Kansas City Wizards. On the Kansas City Wizards is midfielder Ryan Smith. Smith previously played with Southampton in the English League Championship. Papa Waigo N’Diaye was his teammate on loan from Fiorentina in Italy’s Serie A. Fiorentina narrowly lost to AC Milan 1-0 on May 1 of this year. Yes, the same AC Milan team that acquired United States World Cup team member Oguchi Onyewu! Pretty crazy, huh? The team might as well purple and gold instead of red, white, and blue.
So maybe I exaggerated the JMU-US National Team ties. However, I will say that JMU sports and the World Cup do share one thing in common. Some people tend to sleep on both and those that do, really don’t know what they’re missing.
Why does any of this matter? Because we’ve gone ahead and set up a World Cup Pick ‘Em for you, our JMUSB readers. And the reader who wins the contest will become the lucky owner of a JMUSB t-shirt! Just go to the Yahoo! Sports World Soccer homepage, register, and join our group. The group name is JMUsportsblog.com. You’ll need the group ID (24974) and password (moats) to join. Once you join, just pick the winner of each game in the group stage, and then check back after the group stage is complete to make your picks for the knockout rounds.
Get your picks in and Go USA!
Days till Strasburg debut: 1
Days till World Cup begins: 4
Days till Half-Bridgeforth reopens and Dukes take on Morehead St.: 89
I know it’s hard to believe, but just like this week’s big events, the 2010 Football season, and with it the opening of Phase I of New Bridgeforth Stadium, will be here before we know it. We’ve been eagerly anticipating the happenings in South Africa and NatsTown (at least I have on this one) for well over a year and at times, it felt like they’d never arrive. But here they are, arriving as sports manna to fill in the normally dogdayish summer months on the sports calendar. (What, you don’t think the JMU Football season warrants comparison with these other events? Aren’t your currently reading a JMU Sports Blog?) Similarly, when I used to babble on about the stadium project, people would look at me like I’d just claimed I could eat my weight in Godfather’s Pizza, but take a look at this shot!
The Myth
When the baseball team lost in the CAA tourney last weekend, that officially marked the end of the 2009-2010 athletic year and allowed us to rip open the box of rampant speculation and excitement for next year! The beginnings of a new stadium, two extra at-large berths in the FCS playoffs, and a training camp without QB controversy all appear ready to make this a fantastic fall season. And we haven’t even gotten to JMUSB’s other favorite team, the perennial powerhouse Field Hockey squad, also poised to make serious runs at hardware next year!
2009-2010 was a perfect example of the shifting perspective surrounding JMU Sports. Even some spectacular results that broke new ground weren’t enough to necessarily meet Dukes fan’s rising expectations. Just to cap the 2009-2010 year, here are JMUSB’s co-champions for Team of the year:
#1) Women’s Basketball – First CAA title in forever, trip to the big dance, empowering upsets of UVa, VT, and Georgetown!
#2) Lacrosse (no need to distinguish men’s or women’s) – Expectations met! Should’ve been ranked higher all year, but played their own game, pretty much whooped folks all season, won the CAA title, and advanced to the Quarterfinals of the NCAA tourney. Only a tough second half against Syracuse prevented them from taking this title, and maybe a much more important one.
Check back later this week for another 2010 CAA Football Preview (likely URI).
Just the Facts: The Black Bears are coached by Jack Cosgrove. He played QB for the school and is heading into his 17th season as head coach. His team is coming off of a 5-6 campaign in 2009. They actually did quite well against their CAA North divisional opponents, racking up a 4-1 record. Unfortunately, they still had to play schools from the South which resulted in 3 more losses (including one to the Dukes) and a .500 conference record. The Black Bears have had some success in the past, making the playoffs 3 times since 2000 and finishing with a winning record 5 times in that same span. In short, Maine has a pretty decent football program…for a hockey school.
FCS Nugget to Drop at Your Next Tailgate : Maine has produced more current NFL players than any other FCS school in the country. It’s true. Technically. A total of 7 former Black Bears were on active NFL rosters in 2009. Of course this includes Lofa Tatupu, who played at Maine for one year before transferring to USC. Still, that’s pretty impressive. And absolutely shocking.
The Real Skinny: Maine’s Morse Field at Harold Alfond Sports Stadium might only hold 10,000 fans, but it is in Orono, Maine. Ever been there? No, right? Well, neither have I but I assure you it can be cold and nasty. The Black Bears might not have the most intimidating crowds (2009 avg attendance 4,630) but it can be one of the worst places to play late in the season. The weather can be brutal and the lights in the stadium suck. Any team that finds itself playing in Orono after mid-October, needs to prepare for a very tough game. For instance, let’s say a school traditionally closed the season with it’s final game at Towson every other year. Then for some reason that same school was instead playing at Maine on November 20, 2010 that probably wouldn’t be a great thing. And yes, I am talking about JMU here. Towson for Orono straight up was a bad trade for the Dukes.
What They Lose: Maine is losing 3 starters on each side of the ball. This season’s receiving corps will have to make do without last season’s All CAA first team WR Landis Williams and standout WR Mike Brusko, who also saw action at QB. The duo combined for 123 catches, 12 TDs, and over 1,200 yards. The loss of All CAA offensive lineman Tyler Eastman will also be felt. Defensively, the Black Bears will struggle to replace All CAA third teamer Jordan Stevens, who had 10 sacks.
What They Bring Back: The Black Bears have a pair of returning QB’s who both saw considerable action last year. Chris Treister and Warren Smith were both starters at different points last year. Treister closed the season with 7 TDs in the final two games. Whoever gets the call as QB 1 will rely heavily on WR Tyrell Jones. The Junior from Good Counsel High School in Olney, MD (terrible school btw) has 79 catches and 10 TDs as a Black Bear. On Defense Maine will look to a pair of 2009 All CAA third team selections, LB Donte Dennis and DB Steven Barker, to lead the squad. The team is also anxious for the return of ultra talented LB Mark Masterson. He received a medical redshirt after injuries kept him out of all but 2 games last season.
2010 Prediction: 5-6, 4-4 CAA: Like I explained above, Maine has had a pretty decent football program for the past decade or so. Never great, but usually competitive. I see no reason why this team will deviate from that norm. Coach Cosgrove showed a willingness to air it out late last season, throwing it a ridiculous 232 times in the last 5 weeks. Of course, passing was a necessity with the feeble rushing attack at his disposal. The rushing attack doesn’t look to be much better this year and as JMU fans learned last season, sometimes having 2 QB’s isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. If the passing game clicks though, this team could surprise some folks.
Nothing much to add here. Just 93 days until football season and from the looks of things, the Dukes’ new and improved “half-stadium” should be ready by then!
