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The Annual Zips Golf Outing was held yesterday at Shale Creek Golf Course in Medina. While attendance seemed to be down a little, it was probably the best Outing UA has run in quite a while. The day was absolutely beautiful, the coaches were all in attendance and happy to answer any-and-all questions, the door prizes were fantastic and the BBQ ribs and chicken were outstanding yet-again. Kudos to UA for putting on such a fun well-organized event. I wish everyone on ZipsNation could have been there! As posted by zzx, the Zips inked a new QB this weekend, Robbie Kelley from Quincy College, a graduate transfer. Apparently he was too small for D-1 ball coming out of high school, but grew 3 inches in college, and now stands 6' 2". He was an all-conference player. He'll have two years at Akron. He learned of UA through a past relationship at NC State during the Coach Amato / Stroud era. Woodson has started throwing, and the prognisis for an on-time recovery is good. If everything continues to remain on-schedule, he will be the game 1 starter. That said, the staff is very happy with the QB depth and competition this season. No one is as good as a healthy Tommy, but the other guys are more than capable of leading the team to some W's. MTB has both a hand and knee injuries, and will be out for the 2017 season. He is expected to get a medical redshirt and play in 2017. Newman Williams is purported to be as healthy as he's ever been during his injury-plagued UA career, and is expected to split the H-back role with incoming freshman Kobie Booker, whose combination of size and hands make him a perfect fit for the position. Brandon Junk will also see some time situational time at H-back, as he's a reliable blocker. Tra'Von Chapman has made the transition to receiver look easy, according to one coach. You might also see him line up at h-back occasionally. He's proven to be a leader, and one of the harder workers on the team. Expect to see a little more running early this year, the running backs have more talent and depth than the receivers at this point. The staff is very pleased with the depth at the position and Warren Ball is said to be one hundred percent healthy and ready to rock! Who will assume the much-needed role of "disruptor" on defense? In 2015, it was Jatavis Brown and Jamal Marcus wreaking havoc in the backfield. In the injury-plagued 2016, there really wasn't anyone. Look for Pitt transfer Jamal Davis to assume the role of Jamal Marcus, with a rising Ulysses Gilbert stepping into those big shoes of Jatavis Brown. Another disruptive force on the 2017 Zips defense will likely be St V's Justin Sampson. Most big schools shied-away from him when it appeared his grades would relegate him to a "non-qualifier" designation this season. But it appears he'll take care of the required academic work this summer and be ready to take the field this fall. He purportedly has as much talent and any d-lineman this Zips staff has recruited...they're very high on him. Help on the 2016 front seven may also come in the form of Aurora's Bubba Arslanian, who is a blue shirt. He very well could make an immediate impact for the Zips defense. Multiple members of the staff praised the kid's potential. WR Nate Stewart and is dealing with an unspecified injury, but should be ready come August. If you were hoping Oregon State transfer Deltron Sands would shoulder the load at RB this fall, you'll need to pray his recuperative powers are excellent. He came to the Zips program while healing from a shoulder injury. He took a spill a short while ago, and injured his other shoulder. If all goes well with his recovery, he'll be good to go in the fall. But two recently-injured shoulders is not something you want if you're bucking for 15 carries per game. Keep your fingers and toes crossed... Brock Boxen is back one hundred percent and will be counted on. Overall, Coach Bowden seems confident that his defense will be a force once again. One coach said he spoke to Steve Keim (Arizona GM) recently, and Steve indicated that Nordly Capi had a decent chance to make the Cardinals roster. Reggie Corner is a flat-out ballplayer, but he will likely sit out 2017 to get on solid academic footing. The staff is VERY high on incoming freshman Jordyn Riley and Jeffrey Lubin. Expect them both to be on the secondary's 2-deep this fall. Jordan George, Kyron Brown and Darian "Double D" Dailey will be the starting CB's, while Alvin Davis, the 157 lbs heat-seeking missile, will continue to start at safety. James King, the transfer from Miami, is an aggressive, talented, 190 lb kid with the mean streak you want on the defensive side of the ball. He'll see appreciable playing time this season. "How much?" will depend upon his coachability and learning of the playbook. Malik Woodridge and Dustin Burkhart are both 10.6 100 meter guys. The staff is really happy to get kids with that speed in the fold. They expect Woodridge to fill an AJ Coney-type role in the future. Suggs will enter the fall as the Zips #4 RB, behind Ball, Edwards and Morgan. While he doesn't possess sprinter-like speed, he's very elusive and will be fun to watch. As far as other comings and goings are concerned - Brian Bell's semester in exile is over, and he will be back for summer camp. The only "going" thusfar is Freshman OL Montel Jordan, who has left UA and returned home to Florida.

The coaching staff is very excited about Robbie. Apparently this kid was very small coming out of high school and just kept growing. There is a coach relationship on the Quincy program. I'm drawing a blank as to what coach Bowden told me yesterday. Somebody on Akron's staff coached with somebody on Quincy's staff somewhere (NC State maybe) and was told about this kid. The staff is trying to avoid what happen to the team last year. As many fans realize, the QB position injuries (among others) devastated our team last year, this will not be the case in the near future. BTW, lots of football notes coming from yesterday's golf outing. We are still comprising our notes. Look for a separate topic sometime this weekend.

SIUE?? SIUE. Yes!! This is the best thing to happen to MAC men's soccer in a long, long time! For one thing, it automatically doubles the league's number of NCAA champion teams (I think Hartwick also was a one-time champ, but they're gone, and they were never a real addition). They (SIU-E) won the national title in 1979, and were a perennial top-20 team in the 70s-80s. That was one of the greatest stories in collegiate soccer history -- and I remember the season. (I'm old enough, believe me!) The Zips, under coach Bob Dowdy played the Cougars in mid-Sept., I recall, and they were about a .500 team early in the season. We defeated them at the Lee Jackson -- on the same day the Browns beat the Steelers, and the Nanchoff Brothers were there cheering on both teams, as I brought my transistor radio along on the bike ride from Green that day. I think it was a close game, but what is remembered by history is that that was SIUE's last defeat of the season. The team's coach, I think it was Bob Guelker, mentioned above by fknbflobo suffered some kind of illness -- possibly a heart attack -- just after playing Akron, and the team rallied around him and went on to win the NCAA title that season. And Mario Sanchez is their coach. I've heard really good things about Mario -- who I believe was Ken Lolla's goalkeeping coach. He got really screwed over after leaving Louisville to take the HC job at UNLV, and the school almost immediately dropped men's soccer out of the blue. Not sure how long he's been at SIUE, but after UNLV he was coaching with a youth club in Vegas that provided 3 or 4 girls players to Akron. I knew another (GK) coach from that club, who really liked Mario. Bottom line is, this addition will give instant RPI points to every MAC school. And a very real possibility of a second NCAA berth. Great move! Edit: To add a little to what skip and Zip_ME87 were discussing, Edwardsville had a good D1 athletics program (they were as good or better in many sports than the OTHER Southern Illinois U.) that was reduced to D2 status sometime in the 1980s, and I know their men's basketball program just returned back to D1 about 3-4 years ago. I read this on the wiki page that fknbuflobo linked: "Toward the end of Guelker's tenure, scandal in some of the university's other sports programs brought about a major reduction of funding for all sports, and the program went into a period of decline."

Your height fetish is bizarre.

I get where you were coming from now, skip-zip. For MAC and Akron Mens Soccer, SIU-E joining is a plus up. As far as overall bump for the MAC, no. When I first saw this news that SIU-E was joining the MAC for Mens Soccer, I couldn't help but immediately think of Billy Berger, may he rest in peace.

That scholarship was taken by the new freshman PG who needs a hair cut.

Back in the 70's and 80's SIUE soccer benefited greatly from the big St Louis soccer scene. They will be a great addition. http://www.siuecougars.com/sports/m-soccer/2016-17/releases/20170602ekhbew

I'll take that bet