St. Francis comes to Harrisonburg this weekend for the Dukes home opener of 2014. And that means it’s time for our third prediction contest of this young season. By now you know the drill. Leave a comment with your prediction for the game including the winner and final score. The person who comes closest to predicting the outcome correctly (winner & score), will get to write a guest post. Pretty simple. Give us your prediction for Saturday’s game and Go Dukes!
[polldaddy poll=8295641]The Dukes evened their record at 1-1 with a nice win on the road against Lehigh. After the Maryland loss, there was a bit of a dip in fan confidence. Will Saturday’s exciting win be enough to see it trend back up? Vote in the poll and share your thoughts.
Everett Withers got his first win as head coach of JMU yesterday. After finding themselves down 21-10 at the half, the Dukes stormed back to beat the Lehigh Mountain Hawks 31-28. Lehigh drove down the field and had a chance to tie it with a 27 yard field goal attempt with 51 seconds remaining. Freshman cornerback Jimmy Moreland blocked the kick though and the Dukes ran out the clock. At the risk of over-simplifying things, the first half was not fun to watch and the second half was a lot of fun to watch.
JMU’s first half featured a whopping 296 yards of offense. Unfortunately, it also featured a overthrown pass to a wide open receiver in the end zone, a dropped pass that could have been six, a missed FG, and several untimely penalties. Despite moving up and down the field, the mistakes resulted in JMU only scoring 10 points. Lehigh’s offense was also moving, equaling the Dukes’ 296 yards. Fewer mistakes for the Mountain Hawks enabled them to convert that production into 21 points and an 11 point halftime lead however.
After an extended halftime break due to a lightning delay, JMU stormed back (pun intended). Pulling himself together after a rough first half throwing the ball, Vad Lee looked more comfortable and passed much more effectively. The Dukes put together scoring drives of 66, 99, and 98 yards. With their backs against the wall, the offense delivered. And the defense played a quintessential bend but don’t break final two quarters. The Mountain Hawks moved the ball, but the Dukes managed to limit them to only 7 points in the second half. Jimmy Moreland saved the day with a huge blocked FG to prevent Lehigh from tying it and seal the Dukes’ win. Below are a few quick thoughts on the game.
606, 322, 284
Those numbers equate to JMU’s yards of total offense, rushing yards, and passing yards respectively. While the mistakes that limited the Dukes to only 10 points in the first half were frustrating, they’re also correctable. And it’s very encouraging that the offense was able to move the ball so well. Lee looked completely out of sorts in the first half, completing only 9 of 22 passes. He calmed down and managed to go 11 for 15 after the break. It would be nice to see him and Daniel Brown connect more, but his second half play was impressive. He took command of the offense and the Dukes scored in bunches. Good stuff.
Rushing wise, the Dukes were overpowering. Khalid Abdullah got dinged up and didn’t play in the second half, but he cruised to 86 yards in limited action. Freshman John Miller carried the load in Abdullah’s absence and finished with 107 yards on 16 carries. JMU has a ton of talent at running back and an offensive line that was clearing huge holes all day against Lehigh. If yesterday’s effort is a sign of things to come, we could see some great running performances down the line.
98, 287
That’s the average number of yards rushing JMU allowed per game last season, followed by the number of yards rushing the Dukes gave up yesterday. Credit to Lehigh QB Nick Shafnisky and his teammates who played very well, but JMU simply cannot expect to win if they let teams move the ball like Lehigh did. Lehigh had 504 yards of total offense. They ran the ball between the tackles and they ran around the edges. JMU really struggled playing contain and gave Lehigh a lot of space. Hopefully the D is just experiencing growing pains as it adjusts to the 3-4, but there is work to do. Lehigh is a pretty good team with a good QB. The CAA has some better than good QBs who will pick JMU apart if they don’t fix some of these issues though.
22
That’s the number of months since JMU beat Maine in Orono for their last road win prior to yesterday’s victory in Bethlehem. That puts things in perspective. It’s only one game, and it doesn’t mean JMU is going to roll through the CAA, but it was a gutsy win. Obviously, there were plenty of mistakes early and we were as frustrated as anyone in the heat of the moment. The team hung in there and battled in the second half, outscoring Lehigh 21-7. While it would have been great to see JMU take control from the start, the team showed a lot of resolve turning things around. There are things that have to be fixed, and fixed quickly before CAA play starts. There is a whole lot of talent on JMU’s roster though. And the win was a nice step forward after a disappointing outing at Maryland.
The Dukes face Lehigh at 12:30 today. The term “must win” is grossly overused, but yeah, this is a big one for week 2. Consider this your open thread for all pre-game, in-game, and post-game conversation. Enjoy the game. Let’s Go! Let’s Go! Let’s Go!
After further consideration the New Era will start this week. At least we hope it will. Coming off a disappointing loss to Maryland, JMU travels 271 miles north to take on Lehigh from the Patriot League this Saturday. It’s a chance to right the ship and get to .500 for the Dukes, and the season opener for the Mountain Hawks.
The Facts
Match-up: JMU Dukes (0-1, 0-0 CAA) vs. Lehigh Mountain Hawks (0-0)
Kickoff: 12:30 PM at Lehigh’s Goodman Stadium
Weather: High of 88 with 80% of thunderstorms
Broadcast: Streamed (for free) here. JMU audio available via Madizone.
We’re in just our second week of our brand new experiment to gauge JMU fan confidence. We’ve asked the same question, “Are the Dukes Playoff Bound?”, twice now. Once before the Maryland game, and once after. The Dukes’ loss was either incredibly enlightening, or we have a rather reactionary fan base. Regardless, there was a pretty steep drop in fan confidence. Last week 84% of respondents thought JMU was a playoff team. This week only 56% believed that.
Fun for NC Triad Dukes
Anyone in the Greensboro area who’s looking for something to do tomorrow evening, can join Todd as he watches JMU soccer take on UNCG at 7:00 on the UNCG campus. He’s new to the area and would love to meet some other JMU fans or alums. He’ll be the guy in a JMU polo looking like your run of the mill unkept middle-aged who‘s wandered into the wrong place and will stand out as a non-parent, non-coach just by being there. Those are his words, not mine by the way. I actually think he’s a handsome young man. Younger than me at least.
Last week Matt won the prediction contest and as a result he got to write a guest post. In it, he reminds us the importance of having perspective and appreciating the little things. A reminder we could probably all use after last week’s disappointing result. Take it away Matt.
Yes, the Dukes’ loss to Maryland was disappointing. Terribly disappointing even. But JMU has a chance to get back on track with a road game at Lehigh Saturday. And we’d like to hear your prediction for the game. Let us know who you think will win and what the final score will be in the comments. The person who comes closest to nailing it (winner & score) will get to write a guest post. Pretty simple, right? Let us know who you think will win and Go Dukes!
[polldaddy poll=8280544]Last week we kicked of our new fan confidence poll and asked readers if they thought JMU was playoff bound. A resounding 84% of poll respondents said “yes” the Dukes will make the playoffs. Now we’re one game into the season and the Dukes are coming off a pretty severe loss to Maryland. Maybe you think the loss foretells a season of disaster. Maybe you think the Dukes’ performance can be written off as an anomaly. Regardless, we ask again. Are the Dukes making the playoffs?
So obviously that wasn’t pretty. In fact, it was just awful. Not even exactly painful, just really unentertaining, undisciplined, awful football if you can call it that. But we’re going through our normal Good, Bad, Ugly process of recapping the game and we all need to calm down about this one until we see the Lehigh game.
Reality Check/Reminder
Remember this was the start of a shitty year.
In 2004, when JMU won the Championship, the Dukes lost to West Virginia 45-10, and that was in Week 3 after two games to iron out the kinks. In 2008, when JMU had it’s best season ever (where it didn’t win the NC of course), the Dukes opened up with a similarly uninspired 31-7 loss to a then punching-bag Duke team. This weekend the following happened to other CAA squads picked ahead of the Dukes: CAA favorite New Hampshire lost 52-20. Delaware lost 62-0 to Pitt. Towson lost at home to CCSU. Stony Brook lost 13-7 at home to Bryant. William & Mary played well and still lost 34-9 to Virginia Tech. Maine won by the oh-so-flattering score of 10-6 at home over a MEAC team. Only Villanova’s painful 2OT loss in the Carrier Dome Friday night looked like any sign that a team might be really good. We’re not saying that justifies or excuses this game in any way, but it’s just to say I think we can reserve judgment on this season and the Withers era for at least one more week.
The Good
The secondary actually looked improved. This seems counterintuitive in a beatdown like this, but there were bright spots in the back (in fact, the avalanche of points in the first half was largely on the offense’s mistakes). In particular, Jimmy Moreland looks like a true baller and it was nice to see both Taylor Reynolds and Aaron Peak contributing positively at times.
Major injuries seem to have been avoided. No way we can overstate how big this is. Whether that was 52-7 or 31-20, a loss to an BCS team is just a loss to a BCS team when it come to FCS playoffs so this is big.
The Bad
Discipline and Penalties, especially early. Simply killed any chance the Dukes had of being competitive.
High snaps. Hate to pick on an individual player, but hard to ask Lee to do anything when he’s leaping to bring it down every time.
Both of these items are in the Bad, not the Ugly, however, because they can be fixed. On the other hand…
The Ugly
Gameplanning. It’s tough to say, but it sure looked to us like Vad Lee had instructions not to keep the ball (to protect himself?) on any read option action. Other than the over-amped, undisciplined start from the defense and special teams, it sure looked like the coaching staff trotted out the ole Mickey vanilla-in-our-FCS-take-our-check-and-get-on-the-bus game plan. New era?
Lack of pressure from the front seven. Maryland returned almost every starter on O from last year and we’re really hoping this is just a massive talent advantage on the O-Line, but for a unit that the coaches were touting as JMU’s best, the complete lack of pressure on Maryland QB CJ Brown was shockingly disturbing. This makes the ugly because I don’t know how you fix this one. Just an awful performance that put the secondary in dire straights all day. Not even the most improved secondary can cover forever. It should be noted that at least in the run game, the missing Gage Steele probably would’ve made a huge difference and we hope he was smartly held out and is on track to make it back soon, but even he probably wouldn’t have effected the missing rush.
Dukes in the League!
On a positive note, lots of good news on former Dukes in the pros this weekend.
Josh Wells made the 53 for the Jags. Akeem Jordan held on to make the 53 for the Skins (Mike Caussin was also IR’d by the Skins so may not be done yet). Jordan Stanton was signed to the Giants practice squad. And of course Arthur Moats will be suiting up for the Steelers and Earl Watford is expected to play a much bigger role for the Cardinals this year. Great work from all these guys and Go Dukes!
