Zippy87

The season is near and there's a lot of excitement around the program. There's a lot of questions, too, as we officially enter the Dustin Ford era. 1. Will Evan Mahaffey and/or Kamrin Oriol be eligible? It doesn't look good for Evan IMO. Unless the NCAA allows a blanket waiver for players from his class (unlikely) or the Ohio Supreme Court reverses course (also unlikely), he will probably run out of options to play. Oriol seems like a more optimistic case, although that could change quickly based on continued legal action from the NCAA. 2. How does the program transition fron Groce to Ford? Groce was here nine seasons and clearly had a ton of success, especially the last few years. Ford has been here the whole time, too, and was regarded as one of the top assistants around. He loses a lot in Johnson, Scott, Lyles, Hardman Eric Mahaffey (and maybe Evan Mahaffey), but brought in some good talent in the portal. With so much roster transition everywhere in the MAC, coaching may be the ultimately separater. 3. What does the rotation look like? It's impossible to predict until we know if Mahaffey and/or Oriol can play. Staveskie and Pence will play big roles. Burton and Barre will patrol the paint. Beyond that, there's a lot that we'll have to wait and see shake out once the team gets going.

Good call, for some reason I was thinking they were in different cases.

If Evan is ineligible but Lyles is, do we go hard after Amani? I know @Hilltoppermentioned Providence and he may have G League offers, but maybe Ford can convince him to return?

Pulled this via Google Gemini: For Mahaffey to gain eligibility before or during the 2026–27 season, one of three low-probability scenarios would have to happen: 1) The First District Court of Appeals unexpectedly reverses course and decides the full appeal in favor of the players on an emergency expedited basis. 2) The NCAA decides to settle the Borovicanin v. NCAA case and grant a blanket exemption to the 2022 high school class (which they have aggressively fought against in court). 3) The NCAA grants Mahaffey an individual, retroactive hardship/waiver, which is rarely approved under these circumstances. Without an active injunction or a sudden NCAA policy change, Akron cannot put him on the floor without risking forfeited games and NCAA penalties. Barring an unforeseen legal breakthrough, he will not be eligible to play for the Zips this season.

There are two trains of thought when it comes to the football program. #1 is that we don't have much NIL, we don't have other resources, we're a historically bad program, and there's not much anyone can do to change that. #2 acknowledges we don't have much NIL or other resources, that we're a historically bad program, and that it's going to be really freaking hard to change that...but that with the right coach, it can be done. In everything I've seen and heard from Andrew Goodrich, I'd bet he falls in group #2. What that means for Moorhead, I do not know. But I don't think Goodrich thinks this is hopeless. Just not how ge seems to be built, and I love that about him as our AD.

24 days until the first basketball exhibition game!

That may be awhile. The House is currently out of session after Speaker Johnson sent members home last week to campaign for midterm elections after Thomas Massie introduced impeachment articles against Pete Hegseth. That means they won't vote on anything until at least mid-November, and even then, support for the bill will depend on the results of the midterms.

Yeah, if they don't win this one, it's hard to see them winning 5 of the next 7 to become eligible.

Struggled to beat Rice the week before, too. They'll be a good MAC team but don't really belong in any type of national conversation.

My point is that unless his eligibility was always going to be a huge question mark, I doubt we were his only offer. If it was always going to be a longshot for him to be eligible, you're probably right, though.

I respectfully disagree. We started the season with a redshirt freshman backup QB making his first career start then moved to our 3rd sting QB last week, also making his first career start. While Poffenbarger's experience does come in FCS, it's still experience - he's still started 26 college football games and played well in those games. His floor would have been higher than both of our current QBs, and ceiling much higher IMO.

I get your point and I agree with it, but I also don't know that Moorhead's team maximizes what little they do have. I can only imagine what percentage of the NIL budget they locked into Poffenbarger.