If I were on the committee I'd suggest a slight rule change to keep with the original spirit of the trophy. I'd include teams in the border states if they played more than half their games against eastern opponents or played in an eastern based conference, but I wouldn't automatically include everyone in that conference. West Virginia and Navy should certainly be able to win it every year, but I'm not sure about the Bearcats or Louisville and TCU certainly shouldn't be eligible. If the award is going to continue to mean something, it's got to be stricter with the geography.

Any meaning the Lambert Trophy had evaporated long ago. It's irrelevant...

Personally I'd have them change the guidelines to the highest rated team amongst a very specific pool of schools. I'd do any Big East conference member based in any of the 11 northeastern states or the State of West Virginia, Boston College, Army, Navy, Temple, Penn State, Buffalo, Maryland, Marshall. If Nova upgrades they obviously should be eligible during their non-provisional independent years as well, UMass when they upgrade should be eligible once they aren't a provisional 1-A school.

But bit kinda has a point its not very meaningful anymore. As long as the eastern schools play in 4 different conferences (MAC, ACC, Big East, Big Ten) plus 2 independents instead of a less fractured arrangement its going to have less meaning. Increasing the meaning slightly could be helped by excluding the non-eastern schools in the Big East (USF, UL, UC and TCU) from eligibility.

I agree most of it's value is gone, but to the extent it still carries any value, it's in crowning an eastern champion. In that light, it should only be legitimate eastern teams that qualify.

The Lambert is irrelevant. Penn State doesn't play a quarter of their games against Lambert eligible teams, much less half. The 'traditional' teams considered for the Lambert Trophy don't even play each other - not all of them. There is NO meaning, and any history was lost long ago...

The Lambert Trophy is a tombstone for something that no longer exists...

(02-22-2011 11:25 AM)DFW HOYA Wrote:  Outside of the Big East and Penn State, who is eligible for the Lambert Trophy? It's not like they're going to give it to Colgate or UMass.

Established in 1936 as the Lambert Trophy to recognize supremacy in Eastern college football, the award has since grown to recognize the best team in the East in the Bowl Subdivision. In 1957, the Lambert Cup was created to recognize non-Division I-A teams, and in 1966 a Division III award was added.

Army, Navy, Boston College and Temple qualify for the Lambert Trophey.

Colgate, Umass, Villanova, Lehigh, Lafayette, Bucknell, Holy Cross and Delaware qualify for the Lambert Cup. The Cup is for FCS (1-AA) and Div II schools. Division III I believe gets the Lambert Bowl.