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We may need to relocate the Brass sign. 🤣

Game Day Notes: Redshirt freshman AJ Hairston remains the starter at quarterback, throwing for 812 yards with three touchdowns and four interceptions on the season. He drew significant P4 attention early in his prep career before it became evident the G5 level would be his path. UMass has struggled to find consistent production from the backfield, partly due to injuries that have limited their key players. Colorado transfer Brandon Hood and UTSA transfer Rocko Griffin have combined for 519 yards and four touchdowns. At receiver, Jacquon Gibson has been the most reliable option throughout the year with 358 yards, though it was redshirt freshmen Kenyon Massey — a player we once offered — and Kezion Dia-Johnson who saw the bulk of the targets last game. Dia-Johnson, like Hairston, also had plenty of P4 interest coming out of high school. Up front, the offensive line has been a major problem, giving up 16 sacks in MAC play — the most in the conference. They’ve also surrendered 127 pressures on the year. For comparison, Akron’s allowed 83. Defensively, UMass has held up reasonably well against the run in conference play, but the overall picture hasn’t been nearly as encouraging. The Zips offense should have a chance to put together its best passing performance of the season against a struggling UMass secondary. The Minutemen have surrendered the most total yards and points in the MAC and sit second-to-last in passing yards allowed. To make matters worse, they’re tied for forcing the fewest turnovers in league play. Injuries have taken a major toll on what was supposed to be a revamped defense, though one bright spot has been Dartmouth transfer edge rusher Marques White, who’s been a steady presence up front with five sacks on the year. On the other side, Akron’s defense has quietly become one of the better pass-rushing groups in the MAC, second in the conference in sacks — and honestly, I’m not sure when the last time that could be said. On paper, Akron is a bad matchup for UMass, as the Zips’ strengths line up directly with the Minutemen’s weaknesses. Akron should win this one comfortably. Then again, things rarely come easy for this program, so we’ll see how it all shakes out. Notable MAC only Stats: Finley is third in passing yards and second in touchdowns thrown. Gant is second in rushing yards. Mason is eighth in receiving yards and tied for third in touchdown receptions. Laventure is tied for sixth in tackles for loss and tied for seventh in sacks. DeWalt is tied for fourth in passes defended. Summers is tied for first in interceptions.

I was worried about the post Defense when I heard MMK was backing up Lyles in at the 5. He really impressed me. I think MMK can be a solid back up big for about 80% of our games. Only problem I see is we have offense guys and Defense guys. Right now I think there are 4 guys who are both. Tavari, Scott, young, Lyles. the hope is as the season goes on more become both. Or Groce will have to be a wizard with rotation.

Some quick thoughts: - Lyles was our best and most important player tonight, and may be the entire season. We were a different team when he was on/off the floor. - I am surprised Barre only played 2 minutes against YSU and didn't play tonight. I expected him to be an important contributor behind Lyles. I hope he just needs more time to feel comfortable, because I think we will need him against teams with size. - Young is the heart of this team. He plays with such intensity...I absolutely love it. If he stays here his entire career, I think he's a MAC POY candidate by the time he's a senior. - Eric Mahaffey looked tentative in the first half and seemed to relax in the 2nd. You can tell the athleticism is off the charts. - Evan Mahaffey is an elite defender and excellent rebounder. Not much offensive game, though. At least I didn't see much tonight. - MMK played really well. He's undersized as a big, but makes up for it with his motor. - I think Stankovic becomes an important part of this offense by conference play.

A good point made by our radio guys. Eric Mahaffey might be a redshirt freshman, but this was his very first college game ever. I will add that this was a high level game for a season opener and he looked quite comfortable out there.

By being in it? 🤔

Buy the cheapest ticket and you can sit anywhere in the stadium

My uninformed opinion is Groce was like honest with him and told him it was going to be challenging for him to earn minutes given our depth at guard. Probably gave him the option of mop up duty or preserving a year of eligibility.

We don't win that game without MMK. He had a few hustle plays on both sides that either led to baskets or gave us the ball back.

We got our revenge on JMU. Now Princeton is next

I don't know but I'm not mad. Got to watch the above highlight again.

https://csnbbs.com/thread-1019635.html all time crash out from JMU fans

My thoughts in the game. 1. The returning starters. Lyles, TJ and Scott all played great. 2. Young needs more minutes. He is a star. 3. The Mahaffey brothers looked solid. 4. Stankovic had some flashes of greatness. I think he gains playing time as the season goes on. 5. Hardman struggled 6. I love Marvin style of play and hustle but if he is our back up big, that's going to be a big problem. 7. Where are the big guys? Halligan got in before them?

I think the weekday games were 100% worth trying. But it's just reached well past its expiration date in usefulness.

From the presser, it sound like it is a fluid situation (14 minute mark)-

Falls into category of "two things can be true at same time." He's an amazing talent but not ready to play at this level.

Cody Head is redshirting along with the freshmen. It could potentially be pulled down the line but it is the plan for now.

To tute my own horn I said at half-time that the Zips would need to rely on defense to create offense, which they did. I still have some concerns when we face more cohesive teams with better guard play. It won't be as easy for us to generate turnovers and score in the open floor. We should obviously look to run whenever we can, but it's going to be important for us to improve our half court offense as the season progresses. We can't expect our opponents to turn it over 20 times per night.

Could this be why Cody Head hasn't played?

Yeah that's nuts. They really should be trying to get as many people as they can (which will always be limited, given it's a Tuesday against UMass and the team is 3-6 in its possibly best season in almost a decade).

Won the game without Nate.

No, cheapest tickets are still $19 which is about $10 too much to be paying for this game. I can almost guarantee that if you ask some people tailgating that you should get a ticket for free from someone though

Soccer wins, Basketball wins, can the "Fighting Zips Football Squad make it a trifecta" tonight? Read that part in quotes as if its coming from Michael Reghi

I didn't know there were transfer penalties still in existence.

I have a white board in my office at work and I have the entire zip opponent list written out and I’ll update it everytime I’m in the office. (Format is record and Kenpom) We know the MAC did extremely well with a 9-4 day but our OOC did great also. They went 4-0 (other than JMU ofc) Zips jump up to 87 in KenPom also

Fall 2026 Zip commit Londen Sears selected to play in the High School All American game https://www.topdrawersoccer.com/high-school-soccer-article/boys-high-school-all-american-game-rosters_aid55290 Fall 2026 Zip commit Kam Warnke will be in action Wed. night Nov. 5th at Tallmadge High School as his high School team (Aurora) will play CVCA in the Division 3 State semifinals.

If you’re suggesting we benefited from some home cooking from the refs, I agree but payback is a bitch. I remember that game in their house very well. Anyway, the game was plenty physical both ways and I liked that the refs let the little stuff go. It allowed the game to flow and be enjoyable to watch. The MAC refs will still get their chance to grind our lives to a halt.

It all started to go well when we brought in Halligan at the end of the 1st half. Dude was money!!!

Good Lordy

Spoiler alert: JMU cracked under pressure.

I just wanna say this: I think college football will be fine, and I don't think NIL is ruining college football; I actually think it's good. First and foremost to my "college football will be fine" claim is that I believe that kids want to play. That is to say, I think the number of kids who are happy to sit on the bench, get that sweet NIL $, and jeopardize their potential pro dreams is negligible. I also think schools willing to pay benchwarmers just to keep them away from other programs is also negligible. So while we hate that the big $ schools seize the best g5 and poor p5 players, the opposite also happens: players not getting a shot at Blueblood U are transferring to smaller programs because they want to play, first and foremost. So I think that the talent transfer works both ways in a way that basically makes it not very different than it was before NIL, or at least before the advent of the transfer portal. It might even create more parity, because making it harder to transfer, well, made fewer kids transfer! Kids that, hypothetically, might've busted out in a different/better situation. Finally, just on a philosophical level, I think players should be renumerated for being the core component of the multibillion dollar beast that is college football. These are young adults, but they are adults, and I don't hold them with cynicism ("these are just a bunch of spoiled, entitled punks!") or contempt. We wouldn't tell a programming whiz kid looking at options that he oughta be happy with a free education, or that his options for profiting off his talents should be limited until he is a bit older. That's because a lot of us inherently respect a college-age computer programmer more than a college football player, and therefore are more comfortable giving him options and more independence than a college football player. I don't think that's right, though.

And you have to figure that we will be playing a team that is not quite as good as JMU who are the best in the Sun Belt. Although we will be playing on the road, we will likely be in mid-season form playing the Sun Belt's second best team. I like our chances. That also means that the second best MAC team will probably have to go to JMU, which is certainly a team that will benefit from playing half a season together.

Hell of a second half. Shammah just keeps getting better and better.

Look out Purdue. 😂🤣

Pretty incredible win.

Monster game from Lyles. Super impressed by his development. If he can play like this all season we're going to be a problem.

It was pretty obvious but he doesn't need to help. LOL.

Young is far and away the best player on this team.

I mean they're shooting 43% from 3 on 14 attempts in the first half and only put up 39 pts. Good shooting masks a lot of problems. Let's see what they look like in the second half if we start making our shots. Chemistry is exposed under pressure.

Not great Bob

I think I just saw Joe Akron.

JMU is shooting 40% from 3 vs our 22%. That's the great equalizer.

Whoever's wife said size doesn't matter was lying.

Can we get this defense all season, please?!

Evan Mahaffey looking really good so far.

Congratulations to DeAndre. At least 2 more years in MLS. 🙌🙌🙌

Zips commit Kam Warnke …

Zips up to #11 in the RPI - the highest RPI in the Big East.