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Players are going to other schools because of uniforms..........that's the whole point of why teams are doing these alternates, the recruits want them. Stop crying about it and get used to it. Akron pride? In what? A horrific program? There is nothing to be prideful about, these coaches are trying to create something players would like to come too. What were they supposed to sell? The pride of Akron that can barely get more fans than a high school game? For the life of me....I do not understand all the crying about uniforms.

For those Zips Mens Soccer fans who may not have noticed, this tidbit was included in the latest edition of Zips Line with Tom Witricill. Tuesday, Jan. 6 at 7 p.m. – Men’s Basketball vs. Western Michigan (which will include an on-court recognition and autograph session with former Men’s Soccer greats, including Evan Bush, Ben Zemanski, Darlington Nagbe, Mike Nanchoff, Steve Zakuani and more to come!) I'm beyond pleased to see our AD finally recognizing our own Zips professional greats. I know bobbleheads are a gimick, but if they do any in the future, I'd sure love to see any of these guys or Wil Trapp, Chad Barson, Scott Caldwell, David Meves, Teal Bunbury, DeAndre Yedlin, Perry Kitchen, Kofi Sarkodie, Chris Korb, Darren Mattocks, Caleb Porter, Jason Taylor, Dwight Smith, Dominek Hixon, Chase Blackburn, ...

It is amazing how much better Pat is playing with Tree out of the lineup. Tree gets triple teamed down low and the ball movement either stops, turnover, or it gets sent back outside without taking advantage of the triple team. When Pat gets the ball there is no triple team and he has been able to score down low. We definitely miss Trees rebounding and toughness on defense. We need to do a better job with Tree and Pat playing together.

I'll just speculate that if Tree should return to the team this season, the best news is that it would mean he was not guilty of an offense as serious as some have imagined. Tree would need to understand that he would be coming back to a team that has compensated for his absence by relying less on one star and more on many players taking on added responsibilities. The tricky part would be working Tree back into the rotation in a way that takes more advantage of what other players have shown they can contribute and not simply going back to the old way of relying on Tree to carry the team on his big shoulders. It's no longer Tree's team. But it's a good team that could use Tree's contributions to become an even better team.

So, prospective tailgater, you want to get in on the action? How do you obtain a pass for a "tailgating lot"? Clear as mud, right? According to the chart: $500 donation should lock you in for Lot 8. $1000 donation should lock you in for Lot 10 or Lot 8. If you donate between $2500 & $14999 you are all in the same boat. You could be in Lot 9 or maybe in Lot 10. Don't even think about Lot 6 unless you give $15000. Of course, they could put you in Lot 9 or 10 as well. (See that little *) When we re-upped season tickets last year a Lot 9 pass was part of the deal for Priority Reserved Seating. My question at that time was "what if a miracle happened and they sold out the entire P.R. section?" There aren't that many Lot 9 spaces. Not to mention one hell of a perk. $500 worth of seats gets you a $2500 parking pass! I don't know what people are donating to the Z-Fund. That is a private matter, but I have a sneaking suspicion a majority of the people in Lot 9 are below the $2500 threshold. I know for a fact that the Marshall fans and the Pabst Blue Ribbon RV gave less than that amount. Every year, people have been told they have Lot 9 passes when they purchased their season tickets and when they receive their package they have passes for another lot, so you have to call UA and try to get it worked out. There were some folks that had this happen to them this year who were told Lot 9 was sold out when they called to complain, which I am fairly certain was not true. Bottom line is that nobody knows if they are going to get the lot they want until they receive their package a week before the first game and then be prepared to fight for what you want. This kind of set up doesn't exactly encourage tailgating. It's a crapshoot. The way it is set up now, anyone can be displaced by a person who wants to donate more money. The deep pocket folks haven't exactly been lining up at the ticket office, but if they did your tailgate plans could be altered at the 11th hour and your tailgating friends could be scattered. UA needs to have a plan for tailgating. UA needs to utilize their plan to actively promote and encourage a vibrant tailgating community and culture. Unfortunately, there is no plan and the small number of tailgaters are in several lots presently. If someone appointed me Tailgating Czar, that would be my first order of business. Where do you want your tailgaters? I would think that the most logical lot that the U would want fill with tailgaters would not be Lot 9 but Lot 10. If we are going to continue the Roo Walk, Lot 10 needs to be full to greet the team. It is totally unrealistic to think that people spread all over campus are going leave their spots to hoof it over for the Roo Walk. The next reason Lot 10 should be the tailgating lot is because it is a nicer paved lot. It also has a green area on the east side of the IPF that is flat and suitable for tables, chairs and canopies as opposed to scoreboard hill in Lot 9. The third reason Lot 10 should be the tailgate lot is because the IPF is a windbreak. This should be reason enough to move for anyone who was in Lot 9 for the Eastern Michigan hail blizzard this year. That almost ruined the rest of my day. Since UA had no plan for tailgating to begin with, people have gotten used to their spots and are not going to want to move now. Lot 9ers are not going to get their heads together and request Lot 10 passes instead because we are creatures of habit and Lot 9 is where we dwell. The U should boot all the tailgaters out of Lot 9. Make that the lot for donors that want to show up right before game time and park close. All tailgating should be done in Lot 10 until it is at capacity, then expand it over into Lot 8 if the community ever got that big. Now, implementing this plan now will be painful and will really frost a lot of people, especially at first. Some may even boycott and not make the move. I do believe this would be the best thing for the tailgating situation and in time everyone would probably be happy in Lot 10. My fellow Lot 9ers: Please do not send me hate mail. Rant over.

Pride in the school. Pride in being Akron. If wearing blue and gold does not mean something to us then we might as well wear OU jerseys. They have nicer black ones.

Best part of the game so far is listening to Frenchy and Dunn's open mics during commercial.

This post sponsored by January of 2014.

Sorry to beat the off season training drum ............. But I do think that this off season will be of utmost importance. In my son's two visits, we spent a lot of time with Coach Gildersleeve (S and C coach) and Coach Stroud (Director of S and C), and was very, very impressed with the sell on the new philosophy in the strength and conditioning program. It will be Coach Gildy's first full off season as the S&C Coach (GA last year). What I believe needs to be considered is that most of these guys come in and are 2 star and below ranked (if you buy into that crap). The reason they are rated as such is for the most part because of their size and the fact that they may not have been "marketed" well enough (attended the costly camps, hired a recruiting service to market them etc.). They simply, for one of many reasons, have not gotten themselves on the recruiting map.......... The kids that are more physically advanced and better genetically have been gobbled up by the big schools. The kids that UA attracts (most anyway)don't fit into the physical "mold" of what the power 5 schools are looking for (doesn't make them bad athletes). ............. Quote from Coach Stroud : "We, unfortunately, are probably not going to get those genetic freaks that are ready to step right in and play at a high level when they walk on campus. We have to develop them" ................... Reasonable quote if you ask me.. These guys need time to develop in size, strength and speed ......... Case in point, on my son's second visit, (when he went through all of the physical and prior injury analysis by the trainers and team physician), we spent about an hour discussing where Coach Stroud thought he needed to be coming in and where he envisions him playing (size wise) into his sophmore season (after a red shirt year I'm sure) and how they are planning to get him there (diet and the areas of big opportunity in strength). They were detailed in discussing the differences in the training philosophy (Strength and fast twitch muscle agility vs. the prior philosophy of just strength). Unfortunately, the gains don't happen overnight and during the season, the philosophy is more of a recovery and maintenance program, thus the major importance of the off season program. Some of these kids come from high school programs that are not extremely advances (no offense to any program) and have a tough time transitioning to the "grind" in the weight room and agility training. Some have some pretty bad lifting and training habits from high school that need to be changed. I stand by my earlier posts that I do believe the talent level of recruits in the 2013 and 2014 classes (more the 2014 class) are visibly better on film than prior to Bowden. As for transfers (from other programs of JC), they are necessary and will be necessary for the foreseeable future (IMO), but obviously will not be the foundation of the program (or shouldn't be). You would hope to (or I would) be able to find that WR who can stretch the field (as we need), or that feature RB (as we hopefully have coming) that make immediate impact. We would obviously hope to get transfers with a couple of years of eligibility that a string of one year guys. Recruiting has taken a hit for sure with the outcome of this season, I know there are a few guys that my son met while on visits and have kept in touch, that are much colder now about UA than at mid season. And I would think that some of the "higher level" recruits that may have had big interest in UA are a bit colder .............. But that remains to be seen. Does anyone have access to or know anyone close to the S&C department to be able to get some insight of the "physical benchmarks" (bench press, clean, squat, 40 times, shuttles, etc) of the players and how they progress over the off season ? That will give us a insight of where we will be going into spring 2015 ................. Don't mean to sound like a know it all, just trying to give insight ..................................... LOL, and hope !!!!