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I think Jake has a case, but for these rankings, Reggie probably took his spot. Pat will be on for sure, and I think Noah will be as well (but not a given due to the ACL injury, and Antino eating into his numbers). Really, it doesn't matter. As mentioned, anyone who follows this program knows individual stats aren't going to be in this team's favor. Last year was the first time in the KD era where you thought they may have had that one go-to guy (Tree) and it lasted all of two games. Still, this team won 21 games and made the MAC semis for the 9th straight year, even in an in-flux season. This year should be fun. You have the steady seniors in Pat, Reggie and Jake. Two sophomores in Noah and Antino that looked like they belong as freshmen. Kwan and Big Dog took steps forward and now are juniors, so another jump could be seen there. And Josh Williams and Jimond Ivey are two freshmen who I think will also look like they belong, this year. Ivey, especially with a year in the program, has the athletic ability to to do some nice things this season. Williams, IMO, is the best recruit outside of Zeke or maybe Tree, that KD has landed. Maybe not a physical freak, but a guy who is simply a baller. If he didn't commit so early (after his All-Ohio freshmen season at Barberton), he would've received a bunch of high-major attention (and going to SVSM kept his numbers down). I didn't even mention Aaron Jackson (who has some Deji, Quincy or Jimmy Conyers type qualities). Let's hope he's more Quincy than Deji or Conyers this year, but worst case, he looks like a guy who can put it all together as an upper classman when given a true chance. Nor did I mention the Nigerian freshmen. Maybe one, or more of them step up. That would be icing on the cake. I don't see a big opportunity, but that means things are going well, which, in Akron fashion, hasn't always been the case. But even with adversity, KD wins. So if something does happen, they will probably still get to that 20 win mark, and back to at least the MAC semis (nobody owns Cleveland like KD). But if things go as planned for a change, I love this team's chances of not only getting back to the tourney, but being able to make some noise. I'll stop at first (or technically second) round win, but wouldn't shock me to see this group being the one that finally breaks through. And if that does happen, between having the KD stability factor, along with the LeBron support, and the upcoming talent in the region, a big year for Akron could mean a major move up the CBB landscape. That's adding some pressure, but if this team, which has talent, can deliver. Maybe the Gonzaga of the East tag can be realistic.

This run on SC at noon.

Nate the Great, thanks for supporting the team and making the drive to Kalamazoo. I know that ME87, when I saw him at the Birmingham match, said he was making the drive to Kalamazoo and also going to the game at West Virginia. skip-zip, you analyzed the game very well. coach Embick talks about the intercepted passes given up on the zips web site. The Michigan State coach , on their site, talks about being up 5-0 or 5-1 in shots before Akron got the PK. Coach Embick also talked about poor passing in the first part of the Northern Illinois game. Hopefully, the zips can take their game from minutes 25-60 from the last 2 games....and expand that to 90 minutes when needed.

This is from someone who's not much of a soccer expert. I felt like we were not playing well last night vs. most previous games. I think the first penalty kick happened with ZERO shots on goal. We seemed to get somewhat of a lift after that, and improved offensively throughout the course of the game. But, I still think we played a lot of that game without mounting very many good scoring opportunities. MSU was very successful at spending plenty of time in their own offensive end.

Totally agree with this. Though I will say that it's somewhat Ironic; I remember back in 2012 we had near record enrollment at UA, about 28k students which was more than The University of Tennessee (27k). The decision to increase the standards by which to get into UA had a huge impact; both financially and in student growth. UA has been hovering around 24k ever since. It's almost as if they're abandoning what was working, barely working, for a drastic strategy that has no gurantee of being successful.

FCS is not cost/benefit-effective and we're not moving soccer/hoops/track/etc. to Div. II/III.

I read the slides from his presentation and the PD story about same. In short, I don't trust Scarborough and he strikes me as much more of a salesman/politician than a solid institutional leader. He is pinning everything on increasing enrollment, which will drive capital funding, and he plans to increase enrollment with the same race-to-the-bottom garbage that I see in private online university commercials these days. Online mega classes, "national presence", branding, growth, outsourcing, these are the plans of a guy who just wants to sell. I hear precious too little about serving the community and region, providing high quality education at reasonable cost, increasing the ability of the university to provide financial support to students, etc. He has of course surrounded himself with like-minded yes men and women, several from his very unpopular stint at UT. The board appears to be filled with non-entities who provide no effective oversight and are more than happy to allow UA to become something akin to College of the Grand Canyon. Say what you will, but UA for decades filled a much-needed niche as a local/regional university where anyone could attend, classes were available to adults in the workforce, and the quality of the education received for the price paid was very high. It was never a "name" school, but I have always been proud to tell people I graduated from Akron, and more importantly I have always felt thankful that the university was a solid school near home where I knew that I could attain a quality degree at a reasonable price. I have never been comfortable with the drive to grow the student population at all costs, the proliferation of private (and expensive) dorms in and near downtown, the notion that somehow, a UA with 30K+ students would be better than the old UA with 20K commuter students. I appreciated the core infrastructure improvements made under Proenza, but they could have scaled the goals to be more appropriate for the community, which would have meant closing the streets that cut the campus into bits, new and improved core buildings, dorms immediately adjacent to the core campus, even Infocision, albeit smaller and less expensive. Much of what I see along Exchange and downtown was too much, too soon. We now find ourselves in a situation where a once thriving local/regional school must allow itself to be taken over by a snake oil salesman to "drive growth" simply to be able to keep the whole thing going. It stinks, all of it, and I can't shake the strong sense that the city, region and university will all be worse for it when Scarborough and his ilk are finished here. I'm just waiting for Scar to try to sell the city on the idea of a monorail...