{"id":11496,"date":"2021-02-12T08:25:13","date_gmt":"2021-02-12T13:25:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/?p=11496"},"modified":"2021-02-12T08:26:50","modified_gmt":"2021-02-12T13:26:50","slug":"jmu-football-is-back-and-so-are-we","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/?p=11496","title":{"rendered":"JMU Football is Back and So Are We"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"aligncenter size-large\"><a href=\"https:\/\/i2.wp.com\/jmusportsblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/eminem-guess-whos-back-meme.png\"><img data-attachment-id=\"11498\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/?attachment_id=11498\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i2.wp.com\/jmusportsblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/eminem-guess-whos-back-meme.png?fit=500%2C275&amp;ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"500,275\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"eminem-guess-whos-back-meme\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/i2.wp.com\/jmusportsblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/eminem-guess-whos-back-meme.png?fit=300%2C165&amp;ssl=1\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i2.wp.com\/jmusportsblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/eminem-guess-whos-back-meme.png?fit=500%2C275&amp;ssl=1\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"500\" height=\"275\" src=\"https:\/\/i2.wp.com\/jmusportsblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/eminem-guess-whos-back-meme.png?resize=500%2C275\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-11498\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i2.wp.com\/jmusportsblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/eminem-guess-whos-back-meme.png?w=500&amp;ssl=1 500w, https:\/\/i2.wp.com\/jmusportsblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/eminem-guess-whos-back-meme.png?resize=300%2C165&amp;ssl=1 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" \/><\/a><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>As you might have noticed, the blog has been a little devoid of fresh content for a while now. And we feel like we owe everyone an explanation. So here it is. Simply put, we&#8217;re lazy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Now if you could permit us to abandon our typical tone and actually approach earnestness, it&#8217;s more than just that. We started the blog all the way back in 2009. We&#8217;ve published 1,756 posts, several of them mildly tolerable. For the most part, it&#8217;s been incredibly fun and rewarding. But it&#8217;s a labor of love. And it&#8217;s been way more &#8220;labor&#8221; than &#8220;love&#8221; in those off-season periods in between the end of hoops and start of football in the Fall. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Sure, we&#8217;ve had fun writing about deep postseason runs by softball and lax, but the blog has primarily been focused on football and basketball. So when the college sports world shut down last March, the blog kind of did too. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Things had been slow in the weeks leading up to Covid anyway. Rowe was a dead man walking and we were just waiting for JMU to turn the page. We&#8217;d be lying if we said we had any sort of plan at that point. Scraping together &#8220;content&#8221; over the summer when there&#8217;s no JMU sports in progress, has never been our favorite thing. The thought of doing it for an indefinite hiatus wasn&#8217;t particularly appealing. We tossed around a few ideas, discussing posting about classic JMU games, creating some sort of wacky bracket, etc. But much like the jigsaw puzzle that currently sits 3\/4 completed in my house or the sourdough starter I carefully nurtured, but never used, some plans never came together during quarantine. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That&#8217;s enough looking back. It&#8217;s time to move forward. College basketball has been a stop and start affair, but the early returns on Mark Byington are positive. Our guy Coach O has a young team that has struggled to find consistency, but still has a very high ceiling and a bright future. And of course our Dukes are ready for the brave new world of Spring Football.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So we are back. We might be using training wheels for a while, but we&#8217;ll be trying. It should look largely the same for long time readers (if you&#8217;re still out there). We&#8217;ll be doing our weekly game prediction contests, Friday previews, and being smugly dismissive of Richmond. Beyond that, we&#8217;ll take things as they come. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p> <\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img alt=\"\"\/><\/figure>\n<iframe src=\"http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/plugins\/like.php?href=https%3A%2F%2Fjmusportsblog.com%2F%3Fp%3D11496&amp;layout=standard&amp;show_faces=true&amp;width=450&amp;action=like&amp;colorscheme=light&amp;height=80\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"border:none; overflow:hidden; width:450px; height:80px;\" allowTransparency=\"true\"><\/iframe>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As you might have noticed, the blog has been a little devoid of fresh content for a while now. And we feel like we owe everyone an explanation. So here it is. Simply put, we&#8217;re lazy. Now if you could permit us to abandon our typical tone and actually approach earnestness, it&#8217;s more than just [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":2440,"url":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/?p=2440","url_meta":{"origin":11496,"position":0},"title":"Diamond Dukes last thing between JMUSB and stadiumgasm","date":"May 17, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Unfortunately, the Lacrosse team's valiant comeback attempt in the first round of the NCAA tourney fell short in an 11-10 loss to Princeton.\u00a0 This means only the baseball team's CAA tourney run coming up Memorial Day weekend and hopefully a run towards Omaha following that stand between JMU Nation and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;JMU Football&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i2.wp.com\/jmusportsblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/05\/Ancarrow-300x224.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":9418,"url":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/?p=9418","url_meta":{"origin":11496,"position":1},"title":"Softball Battles, But Falls In Waco Regional Final","date":"May 21, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"There's no easy way to say this, but the JMU Softball team met a cruel ending to another impressive season. They fell 1-0 to an on-fire pitcher from Baylor who threw here second no hitter of the Waco Regional on Sunday. The Dukes beat Oregon St. 3-2 with a great\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;News&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":817,"url":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/?p=817","url_meta":{"origin":11496,"position":2},"title":"UMass Minutemen: JMUSB CAA Football Preview #1","date":"May 26, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"First of all, we must issue our first official correction.\u00a0 CAA football is currently down to 10 schools, not 12 as previously reported, due to Hofstra and Northeastern's decisions to drop football this past summer.\u00a0\u00a0This year the conference will be one superdivision instead of the previous North\/South alignment.\u00a0 That is\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;News&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":11882,"url":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/?p=11882","url_meta":{"origin":11496,"position":3},"title":"Bucknell at JMU: Official JMUSB Game #1 Preview","date":"September 1, 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"Looking forward to having Kaelon back at 100% The Basics Matchup: Bucknell Bison (0-0, 0-0 Patriot League (FCS)) at JMU Dukes (0-0, 0-0 Sun Belt) Kickoff: 6 p.m. EDT. Saturday, September 2, 2023, Bridgeforth Stadium, The 'burg Weather: Sunny, low 80s Broadcast: ESPN+ Boys in the Desert: Good luck finding\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;News&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"Running Back Kaelon Black carries the ball against Appalachian State","src":"https:\/\/i2.wp.com\/jmusportsblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/image.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":215,"url":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/?p=215","url_meta":{"origin":11496,"position":4},"title":"Breaking News: 2010 Schedule Finalized","date":"January 20, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Look, we love Dawn Evans, are looking forward to a RIC trip for the men's tourney,\u00a0 and consider the Field Hockey team our personal favorite, but let's be honest, nothing gets SportsBlog HQ excited more than football news.\u00a0 And today was a good one for the offseason.\u00a0 The 2010 schedule\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;News&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12069,"url":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/?p=12069","url_meta":{"origin":11496,"position":5},"title":"Weber St. at JMU Preview","date":"August 29, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"The Basics Matchup: Weber St. Wildcats (0-0, Big Sky) at JMU Dukes (0-0, Sun Belt) Kickoff: 6 p.m., Bridgeforth Stadium, Rocktown Weather: Sunny, high 75, low 55. Are you kidding me?! Great anytime, outrageously good for Labor Day. Broadcast: ESPN+ Boys in the Desert: JMU -24.5 (also worth noting, attractive\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;News&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"QB Alonza Barnett looks to throw","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/jmusportsblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/image.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11496"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11496"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11496\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11500,"href":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11496\/revisions\/11500"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11496"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11496"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11496"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}