Ivy Power Rankings, Week Six
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Justin Nunez
Nunez Wins!!!
Who's the best athlete on Wall Street?
I think we have to give that title to Justin Nunez '07, the winner of The Decathlon held this Saturday at Wien Stadium.
Justin was an incredible plugger in his years with the Lions and was just a coach's dream. I never saw former Head Coach Bob Shoop cheer louder on the sidelines than he did when Nunez made plays.
Nunez remains a big supporter of the football program and a great salesman for season tickets!
Wise Words
Every once in a while, I fell compelled to reprint the comments from one of the readers right in the body of this blog so that every is sure to see it.
This morning, the following comment from a former player who was talking about what the Columbia football program was in the 1980's compared to how it is now:
"In fairness to Jim Garrett, he coached here one year and so he didn't really have any recruits to be responsible for. He inherited a ravaged program that had been run by a total incompetent, Bob Naso. Garrett was coach my senior year and I don't remember how big the roster was, but I do recall that we didn't have a lot of players. The QB was a converted safety. Not surprisingly, Garrett went 0-10, said some intemperate things in frustration, and got fired. He may have been a bad hire, but he didn't get a chance to recruit and develop his own players. I feel sure that if CU had kept Garrett that means his three sons would have played for him and we would've broken the streak a lot sooner.
NW has better players and better facilities to work with than Garrett had, and the Campbell Center is coming. Unfortunately, his game management and preparation is so poor as to render the team uncompetitive in most road games. Anyone who argues in favor of keeping him must ask how he is going to recruit this winter off of an 0-10 (or hopefully 1-9) season in his sixth year. He can't really say he's rebuilding. He can't say we're a piece or two away from contention. We start seven seniors on defense and we can't stop anyone. What does that say about NW's ability to develop players over four years? Worse, what is next year's D going to look like? I shudder to think.
NW's performance the past two weeks -- inept game management vs. Penn and a total lack of fire vs. Dartmouth -- have sealed his fate. Keeping him would be a statement that the administration doesn't care about providing a good experience for the players."
I really like the point about recruiting, but the final point is the most important one.
The PLAYERS, especially the seniors, deserve some immediate action.
Fans like us have been around, and God-willing we'll be around for many more years to wait for the Lions to finally win another Ivy championship.
But for the seniors, there are only four weeks left. I respect, but thoroughly reject, the notion that dumping Norries Wilson now would be too disruptive to make a positive difference. The biggest reason why is what the comment above says: it would show the PLAYERS that the administration is indeed committed to them.
Firing Norries now would also send the message to every player, that the administration is committed to winning.
Columbia last went 0-10 in 1987. There have been seasons since then where we've lived in fear that it would happen again, but this year is putting us at the greatest risk than ever before.
Columbia ranks 244th out of 246 college football teams in the latest Sagarin Ratings. None of the remaining four teams on the schedule are #245 or #246, so any victory now would be a real upset.
Ivy Power Rankings, Week Six
1. Harvard
Harvard's defense seems to have had a bit of a lapse to say the least in a 56-39 win over Princeton Saturday.
But the Crimson still won the game by three scores and it does look like Tiger freshman RB Chuck Dibilio is going to be a star.
I expect Harvard to bounce back strong against Dartmouth this coming weekend.
2. Brown
Looking better and better. The Bears beat an up-and-coming Cornell team by two scores in Ithaca.
I think they'll hand Penn the Quakers' first Ivy loss in three years this weekend.
If any Brown fans actually decide to attend the game, well that would be nice.
3. Penn
... but the Quakers are still darn good.
The convincing offensive performance versus Yale Saturday was a nice bounceback after a not-so-convincing win over Columbia the previous week.
4. Yale
The Elis have some good talent, but there's just no evidence they can beat top teams, especially on the road.
5. Cornell
If QB Jeff Matthews were a senior, I'd be worried about Cornell's future. But he's a sophomore and is clearly an aerial surgeon. Get him some running backs and the Big Red is a title contender.
6. Dartmouth
Whipping Columbia on a day when the Lions are without Sean Brackett all day is not that impressive... sadly. Teevens is still on the hot seat.
7. Princeton
Now the Tigers have something to build on: freshman RB Chuck Dibilio. But a 1-9 season is still very much in the cards.
8. Columbia
The Lions performance Saturday was probably the worst game the Lions have played in over a decade. The stats didn't lie, so... don't look at the stats.
posted by Jake @ 12:09:00 AM
14 comments
14 Comments:
If you REALLY want to get depressed just look up the Ivy league team stats. We are NOT competitive!!
Scoring:
#1 Harvard at 36 points per game
#8 Columbia at16.8 ppg
Defense
#1 Brown at 17 ppg
#7 Columbia at31.2 ppg
Doc/jock
Even if Matthews was a senior, I think Cornell has some good depth at QB. Unlike Columbia, I don't think that the entire Cornell team would go into the tank if their star QB got hurt.
The real question now is not if he gets fired, but when he gets fired! I would think based on the direction the program is going, there is no other options on the table but to terminate the coach!
Let’s knock it off about the QB situation at Columbia. If Sean Bracket is hurt and not ready to go Saturday then you put the junior QB in Andrew Weiss. I watched the Dartmouth game on the live feed and when they put Weiss in the game he looked poised & confident. This young man threw some nice balls and his decision making is that of a seasoned QB. His ball handling & play fake even faked out the announcers during the game. If Columbia’s starting QB is not 100% then the only chance we have to be competitive or win against Yale is to start Weiss. The short time this kid was in the game the offense started to show signs of life.
Current players host the recruits for the 48 hours the recruit is allowed to be on their official visit, including overnight. Not only does NW have an issue with what he tells recruits if he remains coach, how would one like to be the host answering questions from the recruit? Official visits start the first week of December, so decisions need to be made so recruits know who the coach is going to be, or I fear we lose a full year of recruiting. Tick tock.
I joined the program in '07 specifically to play for Norries Wilson. I was recruited by a few other Ivies and D-2 schools, but after Norries' home visit and a trip out to NYC I was sure (as was my family) that I had to play for NW.
It didn't take long to figure out that NW wasn't the man or coach i thought he was. Don't get me wrong, I think NW is a ok guy and I really don't want to bad mouth him. But he really had me convinced that he was something he was not.
I agree with Jake that the players deserve better. I can also say that the players know they deserve better. Every day they have to go to 7am meetings, class, lift, position meetings, practice, special teams meetings... in this negative atmosphere is a day moving in the wrong direction.
ANY well managed coaching change will improve this team both on and off the field.
I don't regret for a second my decision to come to CU, more because of the great guys I met that my on-field experiences. I can only imagine how great it could have been with a real leader for a coach.
Make the changes now.
p.s. I won't bad mouth NW, but ask me about Vinny and you'll get an earful.
Just curious as a former player, when's the last time an Ivy Football coach was terinmated in-season due to the team's record, etc.? Has it ever happened? I'd be surprised.
Am I better of writing to Dr Murphy or Bollinger expressing my feelings on the state of the football program? Or am I better off doing nothing. I don't think coaches have been terminated in season.
Got my thank-you note to contributors today from AD Murphy.
Said donations to CU athletics topped $2 million for the first time. Does that mean we'll have enough money to hire a first-rate coach who will promise excellence and professionalism AND, will also demand the same from the CU Admin and AD.
Jake, If we go 0-10 do we get the first pick in the draft????
It's bad enough that we're Princeton's only win so far this eason. But we're also Fordham's sole win so far too.
The letter from the former player on this thread is awfully vague, however (and a sign that folks are piling on when Norries is well down enough already). Really, what does a line like "I think NW is a ok guy and I really don't want to bad mouth him. But he really had me convinced that he was something he was not" even mean? Who doesn't come off as something he or she is not at times?
Even Saban and Miles and Paterson, I'd wager, all come off as one thing during the recruitment process, quite another come opening practice.
Dear anonymous player who apparently felt compelled to "bad-mouth" Wilson even though he didn't want to, what exactly did Wilson claim to be and what exactly did he turn out to be that so disappointed you? (And, to help us assess your credibility, did you stick with the program for 4 years, and how much playing time did you get?)
The team obviously is in disarray and Wilson certainly shares responsibility, but unsubstantiated character assassination really should have no place here, whether of Wilson, Murphy, Campbell, or the football committee. But that's up to the moderator (hint, hint). There's enough substantive basis for the argument against Wilson without stooping that low. It just undermines your point.
As Bill Parcells said: "You are what your record says you are." The current season and NW's career record state the obvious - a change is needed. I don't know NW, but I presume he is a nice man. Some of the attacks on his character are out of line in my opinion. Valid criticism of the program and his coaching abilities is fair. Criticism of NW the man in not. How many of the posters know him and know why he stated what he did in The Spectator? Has the AD ever surveyed the players on why they selected Columbia? Is it the school or the football program? Being a private school, NW's annual reviews are not made public (if they are done). There are many issues we do not know the answers to surrounding the football program and the athletic department. Feel free to criticize the job performance of the individual, not the individual.
"If any Brown fans actually decide to attend the game, well that would be nice."
Stop. There are those of us who care about Brown just as much as you do about Columbia, Jake. Know why Brown doesn't draw well? Rhode Island has a population of just over a million. NYC has a population of over 8 million, plus the surrounding suburbs in NJ and CT. Who has the terrible attendance now? Proportionally, we're owning you at the gate.
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