zipboy

KD mentioned a holiday tournament about a year ago. As you pointed out, he said that we need to get some big sponsers to make something like that happen. My guess is around 250K for some quality teams.

I agree, you never turn down a QB who has the chance to start. I like our guys but depth is good.

I was thinking about opponents for next year to improve our RPI. While it would be nice to get a home and home with a Xavier/Dayton type program which are both instate, those schools both draw around 10,000 per game. Unless we can guarantee that kind of crowd at the Q, and I doubt they come to the JAR, we probably don't get a home and home with them.So I looked up attendance for all Div 1 teams last year. If I counted right, there were 329 Div 1 teams. Akron finished in the top half of overall attendance. The Zips were 136th in the country averaging 3596. We even outdrew big name schools Colorado and Miami Fl. Looking at schools that averaged between 3,000 to 6,000 last year there were 63 teams not counting MAC schools. Those should be teams that from a financial standpoint we should be able to have a home and home with. Of the 63, 16 had an RPI last year in the top 100. Those schools includedButlerAlbanyBucknellDavidsonGeorge WashingtonHofstraHoly CrossHoustonUMassMississippiPennUSC - For a big name school, I was surprised. They drew about the same as ToledoVCUWest KyWinthropWright StateSome of these schools might have had unusually good seasons and will drop back down next year, but most of the teams listed above are quality teams year in and year out. I don't know what goes on with scheduling and I am oversimplifying, but if those schools above all have good RPIs and draw very similarly to Akron, I would hope that they have the same scheduling difficulty and it would be nice if we could get a home and home with 3-4 of those teams every year. It seems like we would all be in the same boat.A few other schools that did not make the top 100 RPI but draw between 3K and 6K that are still thought of as decent programs or big name schools includeTempleEvansvilleRichmondRutgersMurray StateAuburnUABTulsaSt JoesNorthwesternI know that getting a name school here especially if they feel they are have a good shot to lose is doubtful. But there are several quality teams from the A10 and Colonial and Evansville from the MVC that all seem like possible games. Anyway just some thoughts.Go Zips!

KD was on Kenny Roda tonight being interviewed about Lebron. Nice interview.

I saw an article in SI recently that girl's flag football was becoming the new sport of choice in FL. It has already been sanctioned and I thought about 4000 girls across the state were playing. I wonder if this becomes a sport in college over the next 10-15 years. It would have to be pretty cheap to have. Except for the scholarships, there would not be much more in costs.

Cassie Schenk, the girl from Crestwood won both the mile and 2 mile. She almost won the 800 as well. Adding her to the mix for cross country in the fall with the young team coming back - we should be loaded.Did Jeremy Royal from Clev Hts do any relays? Clev Hts came in 2nd and he was a big contributor throughout the season.

A few people on here made a few good comments a couple of years ago - JD is a new coach and we are going to go through some growing pains. I kind of laughed at that during the MAC title run and after the NC State win.Those words are turning out to be prophetic for me. JDs 2nd and 3rd recruiting classes which were so highly ranked have lost a lot of kids. JD said as much this post season and about some character issues and lack of leadership hurting the team.Time will tell about the incoming class, but I feel and hope that we have learned from our previous mistakes. I am excited about the incoming class and expect these issues to start dwindling. Not that I am the biggest fan of Terry Pluto, but towards the end of the season he was being interviewed pregame by Bill Morgan and said something to the effect - JD is a smart guy who works very hard. He will figure out what he did wrong and correct it. I agree with that. Unfortunately, we are bearing the brunt of the prior 2 years now.I have also learned that a lot happens over the summer both good and bad. If players are gone, it is an opportunity for others to step up. Assuming that Harvey and Lindsey are gone, I see 2 big potential holes this year, DL and receiver. Everywhere else, I feel pretty good and look for the young OLine to surprise.

Another championship for the women's team and the men nearly helped pull of the sweep! Great job

The first real sign of change in attitudes was in basketball this year. The football MACC was huge but it was more of an event to go the bowl game. When I hear that the coaches go into 2 different restaurants and get a standing ovation, I do seem some signs of change. What honestly takes it to happen is several sweet 16 appearances in basketball and/or a Boise State like performance in football. People like winners. If we are seen as not a fluke and a team that can play at the highest level for consecutive years, mindsets will change. I think that everyone will be pleasantly surprised with basketball attendance next year. And the AK Rowdies becoming alumni should help as well. There was about 50 hard core kids this year in the south basketball. If we get about 50 kids per year who graduate and like Akron Zips sports, that changes the dynamics of our fan base as well.

Great news!

I am glad that we are hopefully exploring options and don't have our head in the sand. Long term I don't know why we can't be good in both football and basketball. They feed each other. There is enough talent and there would be enough of a fan base to support winners in both of those sports. On conference aflliation, UCF moved up to CUSA and they did nothing in the MAC in football. They were averaging less than 2000 per game for basketball. But they gave O'Leary 750K, built or are building a new stadium. and committed a ton of money to athletics. I agree with another poster why not pour a lot of money into athletics and really try to accelerate the program. A way for Akron to distinguish themselves is to elevate to a Cincinnati like program in the NE. If we ended up increasing student enrollment 10%, this would pay for itself. I wish that we had had solid leadership since the mid 80s. The damage done for 15 years takes a long time to overcome. If we can get consistent leadership at the top, potential really is unlimited. I don't know why we can't become like a Pitt. I agree with CK, F the past. I heard Mike Thomas say once that to be big time you have to think and act bigtime and the university was going up not backward. I hope that is still the mindset and it should be.

ZP - I came down with something so stayed home to listen to the game and heard the interview. My takeaway was Mack got a little overwhelmed with the schedule. I have the sense that the league does not do us any favors and he was taken aback. I was disappointed the way he came across. I was also diasappointed with Mack playing it close to the vest about the stadium. It made me worried that it will not be ready as hoped.What I did like - he made good comments about the coaches, trying to do what we can to keep them happy but within our constraints. When I think of strengths and weaknesses, I see Dambrot kidding with him after games and it seems like he has a good relationship with JD as well. He signed arguably our top 3 coaches KD, Mitchell, and JD to longer contracts with raises. Sure they may not stay, but I would think they all feel appreciated. He has had a huge turnover in coaches and seems to have hired good people. He seems to reach out better to the business community than the common fans but if it gets the stadium built, I am all for that. On the weakside, I hope that some plan is in place to get people excited about the Zips. We have a pretty good product now. It is a lot easier to sell the programs today than what we had 5 years ago. Gameday experience is still a struggle, and we seem in over our head with scheduling.Just some thoughts. Not everyone hits the ground running. This year is the big one for me with the administration. I hope that they hit a home run. And I do think that things will be better than last year.

This goes a way back, but I think it was the infamous Kenny Woosley. Ah those were the times. Anyone remember Mario Bell? I think he was all MAC freshman team and then left to be a rapper. How about Chris Hahn? He left a game at halftime and never came back. Sorry, going off on a tanget just thinking about weird endings to careers. I just don't see that happening anymore with Dambrot.

A friend of mine saw Proenza being interviewed on channel 5 about a month ago. They were talking about the new stadium, retail etc. The reporter asked the same thing, how could all of this be ready by 2009. Don't you have to buy more land. Proenza replied, we have all the land that we need. We would like to get a few more parcels for the long term of the project but can start building with what we have. And if the holdouts don't sell, we will build around them. Again, I did not see the interview, just what was relayed to me.

rocketfootball,Any heat on Amstutz? I would not think so given his past record but if another blow up occurs, is he on the hot seat?

A very good article with some stuff that was new to me. So how do we end up getting decent teams at home? What I thought this year was that no one would come to the JAR even if we overpaid them. Are we targeting the wrong teams?KD also said a while back and Tim O'Shea mentioned this last year going to 22 conference games. You then have more funds to set the nonconference schedule with quality rather than just fill it out. Once you are in conference play, RPI never moves anyway. Something new has to be done. Call me a cynic, but if the RPI of the MAC shot up, I somehow feel that RPI would not mean as much anymore. RPI only means something when the selection committee wants to trumpet it.

Between Rasor and the daily updates on gozips.com, this is the most information that I have ever seen from spring ball. Thanks guys I am excited for the spring game. Based off the tone of the articles depth at RB is better than I expected. The Johnson kid (for next season) seems like he can help. Alex Allen is on schedule and you never know with ACLs. I don't know Alex Allen and don't know how he is in the locker room, but from watching him on the sidelines last year, he became one of my favorite Zips. That guy was into the game as much or more than anyone on the sideline.I have a worry that the QB situation may not be decided all year. For those closer to the team, has any of the 3 stepped up as a leader? The other guys need to respect the QB. I wonder now if the move of Jabarri to WR 3 yrs ago was the right move. It is too late to change now, but from a leadership standpoint at QB, it seems like he has those intangibles. The D-Line scares the heck out of me. ITZ mentioned this in an earlier post. If we just get 1 guy coming in to play well on the DLine we will be lucky. I don't know what we do to hide that hole this year. Go Zips!

I may be the only one here who has trouble, but I can never get 640 in where I live in Northern Summitt county. 1350 is much more clear for me. Seems like we need more multiple stations to accomodate everyone.

On a side note, a guy called up Kevin Keane a few months back and said that he was Derrick Tarver's uncle. He said Tarver was tearing it up oveseas (Turkey I think) and was what the Cavs needed to get to the next level.

Does Christian's name get bantered about again as well?

Even when Joe Dunn had his weekly call in show once a week about high school sports, he talked about the Zips half the time. Just gettting something like that back would be a good step.

I do hope that the talent is deep enough and KD has enough confidence to give 9-10 guys decent playing time each game. This helps in the long run. I look for Wood, Dials, and Middleton to be the only guys getting 30+ minutes per night and hopefully in the low 30's. Steward is the one guy in the new class that I hope is ready to contribute now. As a few of you point out above, we need a true PG. If Steward gives 20-25 quality minutes per game, we will be in good shape.

A very sad and explosive situation. This is not how I want to see any of our competitors go down. From the initial article, I doubt that anyone in administration at Toledo would have known or helped this. But if other players names surface, this could really hurt Toledo. And it is a huge blackmark for the league.I heard about it 1st thing last night on a national sports call in show. Caller interest was moderate, between this and the final 4. Rasor had a link to the Toledo Blade article on it which had a lot of info.

It seems like a longshot but does Rodgers have any chance of getting in the mix? From a leadership standpoint he helped generate some bonding with the current recruiting class. He also has good credentials coming in.

Conyers has the physical makeup to be that guy. I look at this year as one to get the rust off. I hope that he makes some big strides next year. The only other guy who is athletic enough is Middleton. Wood can be tough down low but it is too easy to deny the big guys the ball late in the game.