Looking forward to it tomorrow. Not going to lie, I had hoped they would move it to the dome because of the temps, and because I never wanted to step foot in KT again. Hoping to see some improvement and speed. No injuries please!

I look forward to the game! I think we are lucky in that temps are going up and Saturday should be warm enough to be enjoyable. Cannot wait until 12 noon tomorrow!

I will be there.

I'm in......

Can't make it. You all give us some updates.

So how was the game? Any of the red shirts from last year or newcomers stand out?

Seemed like Quan Harrison is going to be a good player for us on offense. Jeremy Lewis looks like he's going to continue to be solid for us in the secondary. No Stinson today and learned that Dalton Ponchilla has decided to forego his senior season and will graduate.

Foregoing senior seasons might start happening a lot here in the coming years. These students who we redshirt the first year, or those that were here for a year intentionally taking less than full time credit so that they would be eligible for 4 years are going to complete their bachelor's degree before their eligibility is up. It would be great if they go to graduate school. However, that assumes that 1) they want to go to graduate school and 2) they have the grades to get into graduate school.

(04-08-2017 07:23 PM)etsubuc Wrote:  Foregoing senior seasons might start happening a lot here in the coming years. These students who we redshirt the first year, or those that were here for a year intentionally taking less than full time credit so that they would be eligible for 4 years are going to complete their bachelor's degree before their eligibility is up. It would be great if they go to graduate school. However, that assumes that 1) they want to go to graduate school and 2) they have the grades to get into graduate school.

To me it points to a program maturing and coaches doing things the right way. I like the way we are shaping up right now.

That wasn't meant as a critique of the program at all.

(04-08-2017 04:06 PM)ETSUfan1 Wrote:  Seemed like Quan Harrison is going to be a good player for us on offense. Jeremy Lewis looks like he's going to continue to be solid for us in the secondary. No Stinson today and learned that Dalton Ponchilla has decided to forego his senior season and will graduate.

Ponchilla is headed to Western Kentucky...

(04-10-2017 09:05 AM)Buccaneerlover Wrote:  

(04-08-2017 04:06 PM)ETSUfan1 Wrote:  Seemed like Quan Harrison is going to be a good player for us on offense. Jeremy Lewis looks like he's going to continue to be solid for us in the secondary. No Stinson today and learned that Dalton Ponchilla has decided to forego his senior season and will graduate.

Ponchilla is headed to Western Kentucky...

I figured we would start to see a couple of these. Didn't think he would be one of them though.

He was one of the better receivers last year but most of the other guys were young so we may be ok. While he was sure handed on punt returns he didnt get many return yards.

His dad has a pile of money. My guess is that played a factor.

A couple things to note. First, players are going to transfer; that can’t be helped. It can be reduced, but not eliminated. Students who redshirt and complete their degrees prior to fulfilling 4 years eligibility (playing) can easily transfer to any program they wish because once the graduate, the NCAA rules no longer restricts them moving up or down. The university would have to pay graduate classes in order to keep a majority of their redshirts (experienced players). Think of it this way - if a student busts his butt to make good grades and to keep on tract to graduate, the university can elect not to pay that 5th year (4th year of playing) because the student would have completed a 4 year degree. Now the university has to commit more money to pick up that player. Normally this is not a big issue because you simply don’t recruit/sign freshmen that year because you don’t have the roster spot. I believe the program may have done it right by playing that first year and redshirting a lot of players. In each of the two subsequent years. This allows a smoother flow of progression rather than graduating most of the team and thus dropping experience. The trick is to keep the program in good shape to where the athlete doesn’t want use that forth year somewhere else. In short, if the program is successful and competing for a conference championship, then you stand a good chance players will stick around to fight. If the program falters (getting crushed, no fan base, etc.) then athletes tend to look for a better place to play that one final year before hitting the real world!

Second Item: I was not able to attend the spring game, but I spoke with a lot of people in attendance. I also spoke with some of the coaches and one of the officials I went to school with. The consensus was the team got word that some other schools might be in attendance, and therefore they did not want to really show anything. So, you did not see any speed plays, deep routes, reverses, motions, sweeps, gadget plays, etc. You also didn’t see a lot of blitzing, or different secondary packages/coverages. It was kept very vanilla. The coaches say they have all this stuff in place, but the primary goal was to get out of the spring without injury. So, this is also why the fans hid not see very much 1s of 1s (starters on starters). They played a lot of 1s on 2s, 2s on 2s, 2s on 3s, etc. This tells me they were looking for mental execution. I heard the snap problem looks to be getting fixed (last year the shotgun snap was consistently in the dirt). Apparently the one long TD came as a result of a busted play and would have come back in a real game because the QB crossed the line of scrimmage (the officials agreed to lay off the flags to keep the game moving). I was also told that some of the D starters from last year did not play very much (probably to keep them healthy). Absent from the offense was the starting RB and some of the other starters from last year’s O did not fare so well. After reading the reports, it looks like most of the names cited were players who either red shirted or who were not on the team last year. But like I said, the spring game is a tool to gauge where you are and to baseline a depth chart for the fall. Nothing more – so don’t get too hyped or too disappointed over a spring game where 50% of the plays and players are held out!

I was just excited to see the size and speed on display. Night and day from where we started.

(04-13-2017 01:55 PM)Spector Wrote:  Second Item: I was not able to attend the spring game, but I spoke with a lot of people in attendance. I also spoke with some of the coaches and one of the officials I went to school with. The consensus was the team got word that some other schools might be in attendance, and therefore they did not want to really show anything. So, you did not see any speed plays, deep routes, reverses, motions, sweeps, gadget plays, etc. You also didn’t see a lot of blitzing, or different secondary packages/coverages. It was kept very vanilla. The coaches say they have all this stuff in place, but the primary goal was to get out of the spring without injury. So, this is also why the fans hid not see very much 1s of 1s (starters on starters). They played a lot of 1s on 2s, 2s on 2s, 2s on 3s, etc. This tells me they were looking for mental execution. I heard the snap problem looks to be getting fixed (last year the shotgun snap was consistently in the dirt). Apparently the one long TD came as a result of a busted play and would have come back in a real game because the QB crossed the line of scrimmage (the officials agreed to lay off the flags to keep the game moving). I was also told that some of the D starters from last year did not play very much (probably to keep them healthy). Absent from the offense was the starting RB and some of the other starters from last year’s O did not fare so well. After reading the reports, it looks like most of the names cited were players who either red shirted or who were not on the team last year. But like I said, the spring game is a tool to gauge where you are and to baseline a depth chart for the fall. Nothing more – so don’t get too hyped or too disappointed over a spring game where 50% of the plays and players are held out!

I always appreciate reading your input. I enjoyed the spring game and to my eye everyone looked good. It is good to see people's opinion who have a more informed point of view.

That's literally what every program does for a spring game.