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Yeah…you see a lot more Jesus’s in baseball and soccer.

This is kind of where I stand. Financially we're kind of constrained as a University. We simply can't out spend all MAC schools in everything. At least not without some billionaire alumni magically coming forward to fund the athletic department as part of a vanity project. We could theoretically strip funding from basketball and soccer to use towards football, but that's what other MAC schools have already done. Instead of having 2 great programs and 1 bad, we'd have 3 mediocre ones. The reality is our dollars go further funding basketball or soccer than they do football because you have fewer schools spending to compete in those sports. I'm sure hearing this won't be a popular take on the football board in northeast Ohio, where football is supreme, but it's the sad reality.

Reno Ferri's son was one of the Plain Dealers Players of the week. Reno Ferri, Hudson: A sophomore running back, Ferri rushed for 93 yards and two TDs on 18 carries to help Hudson to a 27-14 win at Cleveland Heights.

Thanks for this observation. It is an interesting data point. UC's upward trajectory corresponds to their investment in the physical campus (UA based much of the Landscape for Learning plan on what UC did), an emphasis on increasing their research portfolio, and advancing their athletics program from C-USA to the Big East to the AAC to the Big 12. UC is also in a much larger media market without other major public research universities (OSU being the closest). Which of these was a main driver of UC's image enhancement is unknown. As compared to UC and despite having transformed its campus, UA does not have a medical school (a major source of research dollars), is stuck in the MAC, is not sited in the epicenter of a major media market, and has another equally large public research university only ~10 miles away, and a second in Cleveland (CSU). The proximity of Case Western and YSU are also a likely detriment. It's fun to think what UA could be without the presence of KSU, CSU, and/or YSU and with NEOMED under its umbrella, but that's just fantasy. Side note: I just noticed that UC cut its men's soccer program.

It wasn't so long ago that UC was an open admission, commuter college. Today, they're more selective than OU and almost as selective as Miami. And unlike OSU, they aren't AAU or have a top 50 US News ranking or are a Big Ten school, so I wonder how they've managed to do it.

Dropping to FCS would mean leaving the MAC. Losing any TV revenue and postseason tournament opportunities as we would be independent then. Might be more expensive in travel costs to send our teams traveling over the country to fill schedule

Game time just announced 7:30 pm

Just from a competitive standpoint, scheduling two Power programs in back to back weeks is a terrible idea. 3 in the first 4 weeks is even worse. We are catching all 3 with physical offensive and defensive lines. That’s a recipe for a banged up roster and apathy. Thankfully, we catch a struggling Colgate team next week. I expect to see a much improved performance from the Zips. QB - Even though Finley was solid in spurts, he has to play better. I understand the happy feet and quick trigger when pressured, but he has to hit his open receivers. There were times where he either didn’t see them or just flat out missed them with a throw. It’s hard to consistently throw accurate passes when peddling backwards, don’t have set feet, or shoulders are not squared. We saw far too much of that. I will say, when Finley had time and stood in there he threw some nice passes. RB - Despite the almost even number of snaps between Simmons and Kellom, Simmons continues to separate himself. He doesn’t have the same type of ability to break tackles as Lingard had, but he’s quick and has a nice burst. Both backs could have done better in pass protection. WR - The receivers have to catch the balls that hit their hands. When the QBs are scrambling for their lives, balls that are thrown decently have to be caught. That said, Norton played a whale of a game and should have had more balls thrown his way. He was rightfully frustrated on a few plays where he was open and wasn’t even looked at. I also noticed Norton call out the pre snap CB blitz several times to the QB and OL. Impressive for a guy who is just a sophomore. It should also be noted Norton’s perimeter blocking was excellent. TE - For the second game in a row, Newell made the most of his opportunities. His blocking was solid too. OL - By no stretch am I saying the OL as a whole played well, but they did perform better against Rutgers than OSU. The OL was mostly solid when Rutgers only brought 4. The OL tended to struggle when Rutgers blitzed. In the run game, there were times the OL had a run blocked well on the read options and the QB made the wrong decision to either keep or give. Blanchard, Williams, and Seymore actually played very well. Davis, Thomas, Burrell, and James often struggled. DL - Tibesar threw all kinds of looks at Rutgers. For example, in the first series, we had 3 DTs along the DL (with Adler) and often brought a safety up to LB depth. Unfortunately, as the game wore on, missed tackles were prominent and any kind of pass rush basically became non-existent. Rutgers big OL and physical RB just wore us down. Lavea may have had his best game as a Zip. True sophomore Marcus Moore had his moments as well. Cheatom created a few pressures on his own, which is something even Nunnally was not able to do. Freshmen Hull and D. Frazier saw their first action of the year. Adler had terrible luck with the missed interception that turned into a TD. LB - I know our LBs are hurting after that game. McCoy, Fish, and Cooper gave as good as they got most of the contest. However, there were times where they were overmatched in one on one situations with Monangai. The trio finished with 26 tackles between the three of them. DB - The secondary actually played decently considering the lack of a pass rush. We got beat up back there though, so I don’t know what the availability will be next week with a few players. I was critical of Daymon David in week 1 and he stepped up in a big way this week. Golden-Nelson and Hunter looked solid at CB too. White showed some potential and will likely be a starter next week if Golden-Nelson or Hunter can’t go. JUCO signee Justin Anderson flashed at safety in a backup role. ST - Outside of a missed field goal, this unit performed well for the second straight week. Coaching - The delay of game penalties are concerning. Delay of games coming off of time outs are inexcusable. That said, I saw a ton of delay of game penalties across college football this weekend and I do wonder if the headset communication is causing some of that. Regardless, it has to be cleaned up. As far as play calling goes, the offense is only going to be as good as the OL and QB take it. There are some play calls that we’ll see in conference action that simply won’t work against a team like OSU or Rutgers. If it can’t be blocked, it can’t be called. Defensively, I thought Tibesar had another excellent game plan. QB: Finley Bullock HB: Simmons Kellom WR: Norton Davis WR: Golden Rush WR: Polk Granger Campbell TE: Newell Cravaack LT: Blanchard Shor LG: Davis Seymore Morris C T. Williams Mobley RG: Burrell Davis George RT: D. Thomas James DE: Adler Dall D. Frazier DE: Nunnally Cheatom DT: Moore Kapongo DT: Lavea Murphy Hull LB: Fish Benenge LB: Cooper McCoy Spriggs CB: J. Hunter White CB: Golden-Nelson DeWalt Jarmon NB: Greenwood D. Lewis S: David Anderson Roach S: P. Lewis D. Johnson R. Huntet Top Offensive Players (25 snaps or more): RB - Jordan Simmons OG - Laurence Seymore (was Blanchard) WR - Adrian Norton (was Seymore) LT - Josh Blanchard (was Norton) QB - Ben Finley (was T. Williams) Top Defensive Players (25 snaps or more) DT - Lama Lavea (was Hunter) DE - Bennett Adler (was Fish) NB - Darrian Lewis (was Nunnally) DE - CJ Nunnally (was David) S - Daymon David (was Adler) Top Special Teams (10 snaps or more) S - Noel Roach RB - Jordan Castleberry LB - Antavious Fish S - Aman Greenwood S - Paul Lewis

Top Rated Players after 2 weeks according to PFF (50 snap minimum) OFFENSE: RB - Simmons QB - Bullock WR - Golden RB - Kellom WR - Norton DEFENSE: DE - Nunnally DE - Adler S - P. Lewis DT - Lavea LB - Fish

Moved this thread just in a nick of time!😰

I like the looks of #1 on offense. C.B. doesn't look like precisely the kind of QB JoeMo's looking for to run his O.

Channeling the departed member GoZips here. The best scenario for UA would be to drop football down to D-3. Leave the MAC and join the Big East for all other sports. If we can continue to grow our NIL program for Basketball we would be a good fit. The BE would gain access to another media market. Good enough to compete but not currently a threat to the current members. Imagine the crowds we would draw at the JAR. The BE has a great media contract which would more than make up for any football dollars we recieve now. Even after paying the debt on the football stadium we would still be dollars ahead. Go back to playing Mount Union etc..

I'm not really sure a P4 job, even as an OC, would be any less stressful. The pressure to win would be much higher and you still have to worry about NIL and re-recruiting you players every year. At least in the MAC you're on relatively even footing compared to your competition (other MAC schools) and you don't have 100s of callers calling into sports talk radio shows every Monday criticizing every micro decision you do or calling for your job. Edit: Joe could get off the bus when he returned from Rutgers and take his wife to Luigi's or Lockview and it's likely not a single person would recognize him. That wouldn't be the case for Ryan Day in Columbus. Imagine the heckling he had to deal with after each loss to Michigan. You don't have to worry about that at Akron because Joe Akron frankly doesn't care.

ND has recently lost to a mediocre Marshall team, and Cincinnati at home. Awesome, jealousy-inducing win by NIU. But ND is prone to such losses.

As to whether NIU win is biggest in MAC history, I believe Miami had some biggies in the early to mid-1970s and early 80s. They beat LSU in Baton Rouge, for instance.

The game has changed a lot at the B10, SEC, B12, ACC level, but has much changed at the MAC level? I know NIL exists, but are there many, if any, MAC schools that are spending $1 million plus? I'm coming for a position of ignorance so that's a genuine question.

I don't really think it's the taxpayers funding athletics. The institutional support athletics receives from the University comes from student fees. The students already receive free admission. Edit: Ohio already ranks near the bottom in state funding per full time student. We're currently 44th out of 50 states. It's hard for taxpayers to make a justifiable complaint considering we're already getting shown up by much poorer states like West Virginia, Alabama, Mississippi, etc. https://ncses.nsf.gov/indicators/states/indicator/state-support-for-higher-education-per-fte-student

I don't feel it would be my place to tell anyone how they should spend their money. Theoretically it would still help the University if it meant the University no longer had to subsidize the cost of athletics.

And even then, we shouldn't want that. I'd rather a Billionaire fund the ACTUAL University, to help build it's profile for the students who come, and make the U more sustainable in it's goal of academics, rather than athletics. I've always wanted athletics to be a valuable avenue for Alumni to reconnect with the U ... but let's just be real here, the majority don't. We are the few.

The difference between Kent, OU, and BGSU versus CSU, UA, and UT is that the latter are urban campuses. Conservative media's constant bashing of urban areas as unsafe and undesirable havens of criminals and minorities has likely taken its toll, especially in relatively conservative rustbelt states like Ohio that have many other suburban and rural options (Kent, OU, and BGSU). I'd be interested to know if analogous schools in similar states (e.g. University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee) are seeing the same enrollment trends. (I realize OSU and UC are both urban schools, but I believe their brand strength and cultures overcome the urban divide.)

D1 gives 85 scholarships

Finley's mind set was that he was not going to take any hard hits and he ran away from pressure, threw the ball while back peddling, and made some terrible throws. He did have some nice runs and threw the ball well when not pressured. There were several bad drops. The interception in the 2nd half was indicative that it was time to pull him. However, he kept playing. Not sure why Tahj did not get more opportunities. Really disappointed in the coaching with regard to the delay of game calls. He called time out the first time and then let the time run on crucial plays and had 2 timeouts he never used in the first half. Just poor coaching.

Rip IUPUI. IU Indy just isn’t as cool

I'm as much a diehard zip as anyone. But somebody has got to be the canary in the coalmine. It's 2024. The answer for a Mid-Major isn't "spend more" in NIL 2024. Hell, if we're going to spend more put it into Soccer and Basketball where we stand a chance of being competitive at 1/10th the price of trying to be competitive in College Football.

Nice recap. I'm afraid these first two weeks could have damaged Finley's psyche to the point that he'll be quickly bailing on plays all year, even on perceived as opposed to actual pressure. Next week will be telling.

Howdy, I don't typically stick my head into the football forum, but this was just too good to pass up. It wasn't all that long ago that I mentioned that there were seasons in the past that I believe U of I avoided playing NIU like the plague because they feared losing to little brother. Not only does this win validate my case, it doesn't surprise me in the least. Awesome for the MAC!! Good luck to Akron on the gridiron and I'll see you all when basketball tips off.

This forum is just hilarious. ZERO people expected this game to be anything but a loss. ZERO people (except me the homer who alway says the Zips will win) thought this game would be anything but a devastating Loss. Yet everyone acts like the sky is falling, we need to fire Morehead now, after the two most predictable losses in the history of the program. Good lord. Folks: We've tried the fire-a-coach-every-three-years strategy numerous times, how the hell has that worked out over the past 20 years?

Next do Expenditures. Most of the Revenue barely covers the operating budget of the Football program: -$1.2 million for 62 Full-Scholarships (assuming basic tuition, room and board) -$1.4 million for coaches -$1 million at least a year for travel (The BIG-10 pays $7-million a year alone in travel expenses). -$5-million a year in debt servicing for the White Elephant (based on old data, but I can't imagine it's far from $3-5million) That's AT LEAST $8.6 million College football at UA costs. And even if we want to write-off the White-Elephant as "Infrastructure Capital Investment" (which would be an absolute, hysterical, joke) the basic operating expenses of the program are all that revenue covers. You could cut the Football program tomorrow, and thus lose all of it's revenue, and you either basically break-even, or completely come out with a net gain because you no longer have the looses. How are we supposed to compete? How are we supposed to be an actual university when we're dumping resources down the drain on a White Elephant program that's kept only because a very small alumni base expect it, and the administrative state wants to keep it because it's good 6-figure jobs they can use to springboard to other, better things by building their resume. What physical, tangible, benefit does Akron Football have to the Students of the University Akron (who subsidize the entire athletic departments $30-million budget to the tune of $19-million through student debt. There is none. Stop pretending Akron Football is something UA is neglecting and if only we spent a little more money we'd be able to compete. No, we won't. That ship sailed when you fired a named coach, with a college football pedigree in the same year the program beat it's first BIG-10 team ever, while the guy still had several years left on his contract. Enough is enough. Akron Football is never going to be competitive, especially in the years of the NIL. Takes like this are completely delusional of the reality of college athletics in 2024. They were clueless in 2012, and they're even more clueless today.

Bulletin board material

Mark your calendars, Enrique will likely be in Cleveland November 9th and 10th. Would love to see a big Zips crowd to support him!

The real issue may of been the 2 horrible coaching hires during the stadiums life. The first one not only being a bad coach but the guy came off as a jerk all time. This stunted the excitement from Joe Akron in only the 3rd season of the stadium.