We have been previewing every team in Virginia, and discuss the Tribe this week.

William & Mary Football Preview

What do you all think?

FYI QB Tommy McKee is not returning, you mentioned him a bit in the part about Jack Armstrong.

Otherwise a pretty fair (perhaps a tad more optimistic than most) outlook. Maybe Jimmyes retirement will spark some magic.

(08-10-2018 08:26 AM)TDenverFan Wrote:  FYI QB Tommy McKee is not returning, you mentioned him a bit in the part about Jack Armstrong.

Otherwise a pretty fair (perhaps a tad more optimistic than most) outlook. Maybe Jimmyes retirement will spark some magic.

Thank you. That was meant to be edited. We have since fired our proofreader.

Pretty major oversight: You say "His coaching tree includes NFL Head Coaches, Dan Quinn and Sean McDermott." You should also include Mike Tomlin with the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Tomlin played but never coached at W&M.

(08-11-2018 11:58 AM)virginiasportsreport Wrote:  Tomlin played but never coached at W&M.

That is not what "coaching tree" generally means. Every writer who discusses Jimmye's coaching tree mentions Tomlin. Also, did McDermott actually ever coach at W&M?

(08-12-2018 09:17 AM)Zorch Wrote:  

(08-11-2018 11:58 AM)virginiasportsreport Wrote:  Tomlin played but never coached at W&M.

That is not what "coaching tree" generally means. Every writer who discusses Jimmye's coaching tree mentions Tomlin. Also, did McDermott actually ever coach at W&M?

I believe McDermott was a Grad Asst in 1998. Possibly just in the spring. Maybe someone else recalls better

McDermott was a grad assistant.

the sportsblog guys should think about writing an article about the W&M coaching tree. Here's one that almost nobody ever talks about:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_Fears

He's been with the Patriots for 27 years.

McDermott was at least a Grad Asst for us, but maybe moved on to position coach in the NFL before advancing here. Alan Williams, while not an NFL HC, has been an NFL coordinator and was definitely the RB coach then the DB coach at W&M. If you're going to mention Tomlin, Dan Henning should also be included, although he hasn't won any Super Bowls as HC.

Edit: good catch on Fears, too, 32.

FWIW, Wikipedia has the same coaching tree listing, although also includes Bill Stewart who was an NCAA head coach at VMI and West Virginia.

As far as the preview goes, the defense breakdown talks about 7 returning starters, but none of them called out as key returns? Jack Armstrong is great, but I don't think the season will turn on his performance compared to some of the defensive players. Especially since we've traditionally had a deep group of WR. Jack's lack of TDs last year was more a symptom of our offensive problems than something he can improve on personally. Spending an hour or two on a couple threads on this board would have given more perspective to parts of the preview that are lacking, although overall it's not bad. The preview may well give an accurate impression of how people not familiar with our program see our chances this year.

As a side note, someone in the SID should clean up Laycock's Wikipedia article. Whether it's intern work or something else, it seems like Wikipedia should be at least as good as TribeAthletics.com.

Ivan Fears never played or coached for Jimmye. He was an assistant at W&M in 1979 but left to coach at Syracuse in 1980, the year Laycock arrived and was gone when he arrived.

So Fears can not be considered as part of Laycock's coaching tree.

I didn't say Fears worked for Jimmye. I was talking about the W&M coaching tree. We could go on and on including Charlie Sumner, Larry Pecatello, Bobby Ross, Lou Holtz, Marv Levy. You could probably do a six degrees of separation to connect W&M coaches to many hall of famers.