UAZipster0305

I wouldn't think so. They beat us head-to-head giving them the tie breaker. If the shoe were on the other foot, I wouldn't want to be co-champs. We'd have earned the MACC outright as they did. I don't see them beating us twice in one season though. They can have the regular season. The MAC Tournament and NCAAT seeding are much more important. We are hot at the right time of the year.

Of course, take the points! And ball-control offense is not our game, as you mention. To win with quick strikes against a talented offensive opponent, our defense must get key turnovers AND the other team must make some crucial mistakes. Those factors differentiate the outcome of the Troy vs. the WMU and UB games for us. This is the MAC, so it's reasonable to expect Miami to beat themselves. And though we've won the WMU and UB games, those could have easily have been losses. What would all of us be thinking about the season and the future of Bowden had they been losses? The margin is razor thin. I'll take wins any way we can get them, and this is going to be a tough one.

You're right. An alternative to keeping the Miami offense off the field is also to pressure their QB enough such that that he doesn't have time to get the ball downfield. Against OU though, the starting Miami QB was a good runner. If he can escape pressure, our overpursuit at the line of scrimmage will be our downfall. I can't count the number of times we've been burned and beaten by an athletic QB. I still think our best chance to win relies on ball-control offense. This is a much more difficult match-up than it appears on paper. I hope the Miami team that Kent beat shows up on Tuesday night.

I've been absent from the board for a while, but have been following consistently ever since. I was a bit shocked to hear KD was leaving, but I am not disappointed or upset. Our program rose to new heights because of him, but it certainly plateaued many years ago. Even he knew that. It was time for him to move on while he was still respected in the profession and young enough to start a new tenure elsewhere. That said, the timing was ideal because Groce was available and interested. Aside from being my doppelganger, Groce is young and has experience winning in the MAC and the NCAAT with a MAC team. New pinnacles await! I think in five years or so, we will find that John Groce is to Keith Dambrot as Caleb Porter is to Ken Lolla. No more excuses about the MAC being a one bid conference or P5's not scheduling us. The bar has been raised.

I like our chances if we can limit James Gardner. That guy has NFL size and hands, if not speed. The best way to do that would be to keep him off the field with ball-control offense (i.e. an effective UA running game).

Looks like you were the only one in here, Z.I.P. Kudos on that passion. At 2PM in Hawaii, you shoulda been out on a surf board and watched the game on replay rather than live. Marshall played with heart, but just couldn't hang talent-wise. If not for some very solid play by their keeper, it would have been 4-0. I haven't posted in a long while, but have been following closely all season. Zips are in full form: composed, confident, and a complete team including the subs. Not a single opponent has scored more than one goal on us. We have only allowed 8 goals in 16 games, if I counted right. That's outstanding. The first two games were enigmas, and I don't think WMU can beat us twice in one season. Three more wins and we could be looking at a top 3-6 seed. I really wish we had those first two games back.

Just curious, where is the future Dr. Sanda headed for medical school? You can PM if such information shouldn't be posted publicly...or not it all if you or he thinks it should be kept private. I am in medical research, and my significant other did plant and soil science research in graduate school, which is the same field as Tyler Sanda's Honor's Research Project.

You disagree based on what? UA has never been held in high esteem as an overall institution by major rankings. This would not be any different had certain faculty remained in spite of the Scar. And its irrelevant here because the ABJ was reporting on one person's opinion that was ill-formed and has no impact on a UA-UM relationship; therefore, it's not news-worthy. My point of this being an example of bottom-barrel journalism remains. Yes, the ABJ should have reported on the issues you mention. You didn't need to be condescending about it.

http://www.ohio.com/news/local/indian-researcher-slams-university-of-akron-1.751631 How is this even news? A headline and story for this, are you kidding me? Maybe if it was included as a few sentences in the original article (cited below), fine. The guy who is quoted is not even a relevant administrator. Just an early-career UM alum who looks at the rankings and sees a problem. The ABJ might as well be reporting on what people write in opinionated blog posts. Always an agenda. A perfect example of why journalism in this country has been dead for 15 years. http://www.ohio.com/news/local/university-of-mumbai-eyes-akron-for-potential-u-s-campus-1.750745

Our victory over PCCC tonight is Lebron's family obligation!

I like the addition of UConn for football only with the requirement that they schedule significant OOC games with MAC teams in other sports. This is a solid academic school with a good athletic brand name...a definite step up from UMass. Talk about helping MAC OOC scheduling and RPI... Make them play 4 OOC games against top MAC men's and women's basketball, and rope them in for an ongoing home-home series with top MAC men's and women's soccer teams. Then, seal the deal.

It's 12:17 on Thursday, 2/16, and...

Who are the other 9? I am sure Huggins is saying the same about us. For me, the nightmare part of that scenario is playing IN Buffalo. While convenient for traveling Zips fans, Canada is a house of horrors for us. I don't expect that to be any different in the NCAAT.

Yes, JAR renovations as well, but nothing detailed. Dr. Z provided the specifics to the extent this was discussed.

The feed via ESPN3 last night was excellent. It looked like a professional production, and I enjoyed it thoroughly here in MD. This may be a helpful tool in national recruiting due to potential exposure to recruits' friends and family. Our AD impressed me at halftime. He has a vision for investment, and he mentioned the ESPN3 feed as a good means of exposure for other lesser known and celebrated programs of UA Athletics. I found that to be encouraging and refreshing.

Zips at home against BUGS is as guaranteed as it gets...much like a loss in Canada every year. Here comes #18 in a row against them. Their fans must despise us. Should be a blowout, but I am looking forward to watching on ESPN3 nonetheless.

The key to being good in spite of a bad defense is keeping them off the field. If we can manage a productive, ball-control offense and get a turnover or two, that may be enough to win. We have to be very good with offense and special teams though. If not, this game could look much like WMU.

The amount of money spent at MU games is pennies compared to the hundreds each of the tens of thousands of OSU fans spend on the game day experience. If MU falls flat, we see no rise in local interest or attendance....OSU on the other hand...it's all daydreaming anyhow. We need to be a consistent winner before anything else matters.

I should have said two of the best teams this year, skip-zip. Thanks for the clarification.

Fair points, kreed5120. I will take as many wins against traditionally strong programs like Marshall and Miami as we can get. Even wins against P5 schools or schools with big name recognition are great regardless of their football tradition. Syracuse, UMass, NC State, UCF, New Mexico, New Mexico State, Pitt, Army, Navy, Cincinnati, Utah State, and Temple...all either big, P5 schools or schools with some success in OOC football that we have wins over. In my opinion, these are all big wins for us. In deference to your point that we are still 41 points worse than the MAC's best team, WMU 2016 may prove to be the best MAC team ever. Miami finished #11 one season. CMU got their doors blown off by this WMU team nearly as badly as we did. With a healthy Woodson, a few things would have gone differently early in the game, and I think it would have been significantly closer than it was. In the end though, WMU wins. They are just a much better team. I'll be ecstatic if/when we get to the point of competing with the best of the B1G.

Thanks for the respect, kreed5120. Ditto. 1) We had only won AT Marshall once before in the history of our program...and we blew them out by scoring a program record number of points. I don't care if Marshall is having a down year. They are an overall strong program, and that was a quality win to me. Ball State is also a place where we consistently lose and would have for sure just a couple seasons ago. We were down at halftime and came back. In my opinion, that makes it a quality win. 2) WMU and Wisconsin are two of the best programs in the country. Against WMU we were severely injured, especially without Woodson. We don't have the depth to lose key starters at skill positions and compete with the best in the country. That's the state of our program, but it's significantly better than years past. The improvement just doesn't show up when handicapped against the best-of-the-best.

You should feel good about the win AT Kent this year too. Woodson out, Chapman in and played a terrible first half. Turned it around in the second half only to still be down to an athletic Kent QB playing his heart out and making an amazing play to take the lead with little time left. And we walked away with a W and the Wagon Wheel. There was no quit in the team and Bowden respects the significance of the rivalry.

Great topic, K92, and welcome back. I enjoy your contributions. Toledo, Pitt, and Utah State were quality wins in prior seasons as are AT Marshall, and AT Ball State this season. I think part of the disappointment comes from thinking we turned a corner with the impressive win at Ball State two weeks ago. I wasn't expecting it and thought it foretold of another record season for us. Hence, the epic disappointment with the performance against a terrible Canadian school. Buffalo was a huge missed opportunity for the progress of the program and the MAC standings. The OU win at Toledo the same night made it even worse. If this is the only blemish on the season, I find it acceptable given the injuries. However, the progress of the progrum is significant. I give Bowden a pass on the first season entirely. Bare cupboards = 1-11. Fine. Since then, we are at .500 overall, above .500 in the MAC, and 13-10 in the last two seasons with our first bowl win and are competing for a MACC this season. This will likely be our first season with a win against BUGS in forever, and if we play to our potential, the same could be said for OU too. Things were bleak at this point of last season, but it ended beautifully. Keep in mind, we are coming from a place (2013 as documented by Balsy, kudos) where getting a road win and winning multiple games in a year were milestones to now having the most wins in a season and our first ever bowl victory (2015). That is tremendous progress in 2-3 years. Bowden isn't perfect, but he is perfect for the long-term stability and building of our progrum. I look forward to the "winning big" phase and hope you (K92) can remain patient enough to enjoy the (sometimes bumpy) ride in the meantime.

I watched on ESPN3 as a rebroadcast before I knew the outcome. Tremendous quality of the broadcast! Having said that, we totally dominated BUGS, but their goals came on defensive lapses...goalie out way too far unnecessarily (but a great finish from near midfield), and a lack of communication and marking from the outside back and outside midfielder on a cross. What is so frustrating is that the talent is there...this is largely the same team that made the College Cup last year. This season has been characterized by poor discipline, defensive lapses, a general lack of focus, and no sense of offensive urgency. These all have to do with coaching, not talent. Can you imagine a Caleb Porter team performing like this? Me either. Embick has been good up until this season, but I am starting to lose confidence in him. I'm okay with a down year every once in a while; however, given the talent, this season should not be one of those.

I actually like the overlap between BCS and FCS. And it is objective and takes into consideration the strength of schedule. The campusinsiders is a joke; 2-5 Arizona is nearly 30 spots ahead of us. I have no idea who we've lost 4 in a row at Buffalo though.