Class of 82

Succinct and totally accurate take there, Captain. This isn't so much about loyalty/disloyalty to Akron, in my mind. Dambrot likes it here, but he's a professional coach and a guy with a family. You go where your career takes you in the manner that's best for you and for your family. Period. That's what I've done in my life. That's what everybody does. It's life. I have no doubt KD loves Akron, but at this stage of his career, he's looking to achieve the things he believes he's capable of achieving. (A lot more money ain't too shabby, either.) I don't think it's disloyal of him to expect that Akron has to help create and continue the conditions where he believes he can achieve those things here. If they do, he won't leave. If they don't, he'll go. It's that simple, imo. Besides, if leverage from the fear of losing KD is what builds a new arena for the Zips (as it looks like it's going to), who could be disappointed by that?

Pretty impressive that he's a two-time state qualifier as a wrestler and state runner-up at 220 lbs. this past year as a senior. You combine that with his achievements as a D-1 football player, and it sounds like we got one hell of an athlete. Wonder why nobody offered this guy.

LOL... we had fun, for sure. And the co-eds... well, I was lucky enough to marry one of those fine young thangs! She's still gorgeous 26 years later, but 18 straight Ohio winters have destroyed what was once her permanent sun tan. She's never forgiven me for bringing her to Ohio. (Truthfully, she loves it here.) But I think you have the University of Arizona in Tucson confused with Arizona State in Tempe. UofA was, and still is, tame by ASU, or even Ohio U., standards. And it's hard to get into UofA (especially from out-of-state or for most graduate programs), whereas ASU is open-enrollment just like Akron. BTW. I studied public policy and administration.

Wow... congrats, zippy5. And best of luck the rest of the way!

Hey zesty, I think the reason people are responding negatively to you is that your assertions about the University of Akron show that you have absolutely no idea what you're talking about. I don't know if or when you attended Akron, but I attended there from 1977 to 1982, earning a degree in political science. I had good enough test scores to go elsewhere, but circumstances dictated that I live at home and work while going to school. So Akron was my only option. When I arrived on campus, I believed then exactly as you do now. But actual experience often differs from perception, and that was the case with my experience at Akron. While I did indeed meet a lot of under-prepared students due to Akron's open-enrollment policy, the faculty I encountered were generally quite good, even at the survey-course and General College level. As a junior and senior within the political science and history departments, the instruction I received was almost universally first-rate. Yet, as I applied to various graduate programs around the country, there was this fear in the back of my mind that somehow I would not measure up when I got to a "real" school. My GRE and LSAT scores were very good, but I still wondered if I could really cut it. Fact is, though, I shouldn't have worried. Graduate school at a "real," "selective" university... in my case, the University of Arizona... turned out to be a cakewalk compared to the rigor demanded of me in the poli-sci department at little-old Akron. Not only that, it became apparent to me almost immediately that some classmates of mine from places like UCLA, UC San Diego, Oregon and elsewhere were far less prepared for graduate-level work than I was. I met U of Cal graduates(!) who hadn't even taken an essay test since high school for God's sake! I shudder to think how they might have fared in Paul Weidner's Constitutional Law course at Akron. They would have pissed themselves, I'm quite sure. So, with all due respect... to hell with your notions of "nationally-respected" universities. And to hell with all the otherwise intelligent folk who can't get it through their thick heads that open enrollment reflects the quality of some incoming students, not the quality of faculty or programming or the quality of the students who actually complete degrees. In short, I'll stack my alma mater's quality against anyone's. I won't join in calling you a douche, but I gotta tell ya, your posts in this thread don't impress this Akron grad. Far from it.

I believe the two towers are Bulger (the taller one) and Spanton, both built in the mid-1970s along with Robertson Dining Hall. There were three (?) smaller, two-story dorms (Orr, Sisler-McFawn and Richey) right nearby. On-campus housing in those days was pretty slim, with only about 1,000 or so students living on campus. I think they built the townhouses on Grant Street for married grad students next, but that was a drop in the bucket. Interesting tidbit, there was a very nice meeting room on the top of Bulger Hall. On a clear day, you had an amazing view of the Little Cuyahoga and Cuyahoga valleys and could see the Cleveland skyline very clearly. Very cool. Truth be told, the Board of Regents at that time strongly opposed ALL on-campus housing at Akron and Toledo, primarily because BGSU, Can't and Ohio had just expanded their on-campus housing pretty dramatically, mostly on the state's dime. Their vision for UA was that it remain a commuter school serving a strictly regional market. It was similar to Columbus' strong opposition to the JAR being a true basketball arena, as opposed to a "physical education" building. Fortunately, it seems you can't keep a great university down. P.S. A minor piece of Bulger Hall trivia. The Board of Trustees held a special meeting in the room at the top of Bulger when then President Marion Ruebel unveiled the architectural and initial financing plans for the Landscape for Learning. That was a huge day in the history of the University.

I heard the lion's share of the interview on my drive in to the office this morning, and I can't really add much to the excellent summaries from Dr Z and scott above. I'd just say that Terry Bowden impresses me more and more every time I hear him speak. Articulate, intelligent, engaging and enthusiastic without being over-the-top in any way. I know Akron has a big hole to climb out of, but I am more certain every day that we have the guy who can finally get this program on a solid and sustainable footing. Listening to Bowden, you get the unmistakeable feeling that he is just one of those guys that players, parents and coaches, and certainly fans, would just naturally want to be around and be associated with. Without even playing a game yet, the whole vibe/aura of UA football has completely changed. I know we have to see that change play out on the field this fall, but here's to the better days we know are coming, Zips fans!

Tony Rizzo, the Really Big Show, had an interesting conversation with Jim Tressel this morning on WKNR 850 AM. While most of the discussion was about tOSU and JT's new role at UA, he did speak a little about Zips football. A couple of highlights: - He said the Field House is the best facility of it's kind in Ohio. - He really likes and respects Bowden, but he cautioned that it will take more than a couple of years to really turn things around. Sure hope he's wrong about that. I believe WKNR archives their interviews at www.espncleveland.com if anyone missed it.

Don't know if this has been posted before. My apologies if it has. http://boricuasballers.com/index.php?optio...king-like-a-pro

I was encouraged. With a few exceptions, I thought the quarterbacks and receivers showed a pretty decent grasp of Bowden's spread. Williams needs to stop staring down receivers, but I thought he threw some fine balls. I generally liked what I saw from Moore and Kohl, too. We're still a long ways from good, but I think at a minimum the game demonstrated that a lot of hard work and effort has been put in by the players and coaches this spring. Given our starting point, I'll take that as a positive step in the right direction.

I'll just comment on two of your points, and you can have the last word if you want. 1) For a new president to roll into town and sh*tcan a well-liked, successful and universally respected 20+ year employee was just, well, wrong. It's water long over the dam, but it is what it is. I know quite a few people in town who've neither forgotten nor forgiven. I am not and never have been one of them, since the University is and will always be far bigger to me than any one person, whether I view them positively or negatively. And I do agree with you that it's petty... and idiotic... to use a 20-year-old grudge as some lame excuse to stay away from Zips football. 2) We'll never know how Jim would have done when Akron went D-1, because he was never given the opportunity. But if you have to make excuses for Gerry's failure... facilities, administration, etc... you merely reinforce the general point Jim made that you took exception too... that Akron jumped to the next level well before they were institutionally ready. Again, that's water long ago over the dam, but it's a valid opinion with a solid basis in fact. At any rate, however we feel about the past, I know you and I can agree that the future... finally... looks a heckuva lot brighter. And it's a lot more fun (and fruitful) to consider. I sure liked a lot of what I saw in that Spring Game! Peace, brother!

Okay. So Gerry had three winning seasons... out of nine. His record at Akron was a sorry 43-53-3. Gerry is a really nice and likeable guy, but he couldn't carry Jim Dennison's jock strap as a college coach, imo. Dennison was 80-62-2 in his 13 years as Zips head coach. He had only two losing seasons. His teams were 30-22-1 in the OVC, finishing second in the conference three out of six seasons. His last season, the Zips went 8-4 (5-2) and made the I-AA playoffs. People can diss him all they like, but Dennison's record speaks for itself. He was a fine coach, and he was well-liked and well-respected by virtually everyone who knew him. The treatment he received from Bill Muse and the Board was an unconscionable and damned-near career-destroying kick in the nuts to a loyal, long-serving and high-performing employee. And whether anyone wants to acknowledge it or not, Akron paid a pretty steep price for that mistreatment. Jim had, and still has, a lot of very close friends in this area. Any way you slice it, the way that whole affair went down was shameful and an absolute embarassment. Treating people the way he was treated ain't good karma. We can only hope Akron's done paying for that bad karma. So, I guess I cut Dennison a good bit of slack, far more perhaps than some are willing to cut him. I don't think his public comments have ever been particularly mean-spirited, and I think he has generally dealt with his shabby treatment with class and dignity, far more than I would be able to muster had I been in his shoes. Anyhow, that's how I see things. My feelings aren't hurt if I am a minority of one.

No probs on this end, man. I try never to confuse disagreement with disrespect. My point has far less to do with Jim Dennison's greatness (or lack thereof) or even his character than it does with the validity of his overall point, which is that Muse's decision to take UA to D-1 as an independent was entirely reckless and counter-productive to the long-term benefit of UA's athletic programs. It certainly cost us the continued services of Bob Huggins, and it was bad for our football program, too, imo. At any rate, say what you will about Dennison, but when I studied and worked at the university in the Dennison years you'd have had a hard time finding anyone on campus or in the community who did not hold him in the highest regard. Shock and disbelief was the general reaction to the whole process when he got "promoted." And no small amount of anger, too. Jim took us to a Div-II championship game in 1976, and despite what you say had Akron competing very well after we made the jump to I-AA in the OVC. His last year was one of his best (8-4, 5-2), and many of those same senior players who Jim had recruited and coached played a large role in giving Gerry his only winning season at Akron. Jim's summary "promotion" turned off a good many loyal Akron boosters, fans and supporters, a number of whom remain bitter and angry to this very day. There were indeed many lost years after the bump to D-1. I guess you and I just disagree on why those years were lost and who is ultimately responsible. From what I know, I lay the blame squarely with Bill Muse and the Board of Trustees he was able to bamboozle. Peace. Out.

With lots of respect sent your way, I think you have a rather distorted view of history here, GP. While Dennison was given the title and salary of AD, he was never really in charge of athletics. Our carpet-bagger president at the time, Bill Muse, and his office were running the whole athletics show. Dennison being given the AD title and salary was simply a way for Muse to get what he wanted and look a little less cruel than he would have by kicking Jim to the curb entirely. But Dennison was no more "directing" athletics at the university than you or I were. I don't blame Jim for keeping the title and salary and credits toward his STRS retirement before gracefully bowing out and getting back into coaching at Walsh. And I certainly don't blame Jim for the shambles left in Bill Muse's wake. I don't see how anyone can argue that the way we jumped out of the OVC served us well in the short OR long term. Bill Muse's self-serving desire to be big-time so he could land a bigger job for himself cost us the continued services one of the best young coaches in college basketball, AND we replaced a proven winner as our football coach with a guy who...nice and personable as he was... had already shown that he was clearly ill-suited to be a college football coach. The time to go D-1 was when we received the MAC invitation that was pretty much inevitable down the road. And we still have not fully recovered from that bone-headed decision. I see that as the context for Jim Dennison's comments, and in my opinion he is dead-center, right on the money.

I get ya, Lee. I was just trying to cheer lance up a little. But seriously, whatever the win total this fall, I think Terry Bowden has already taken Akron football away from the brink of oblivion we all felt it was on when Winters turned us down. There is an entirely new feeling of optimism permeating the program, certainly this board, and even some of the marginal Akron fans I see at my local watering hole. Most of us are tempering that optimism with the reality that the Zips have a long way to go to become what we hope them to be. But I'm not going to let that realism keep me from being excited again about what I believe the future holds. I have hope, even if the reality might be that even a greatly improved Zips team could still be a long ways from good. So... fear the dadgum Roo! And GO ZIPS!

As Captain Kangaroo once said, it ain't easy being an Akron fan. But when you've reached the depths our program reached after the last two or three years, the only way to move is up. I don't know how many games we'll win this year, but I have faith in this coaching staff. And it sure looks to me like a lot of these players who have stayed have some of that faith, too. So keep your chin up, man. Better days are coming!

If I'm not mistaken, the scholarships of players who have voluntarily left the university are available to give, complicated only by the number of years left on those particular slots and any limits on how many new additions you can make each year. Junior-college players who were NCAA qualifiers out of high school can transfer after only one year at the JC level and play right away... so long as they earned the minimum grades and transferable credit hours during that one year (24 transferable credits with a 2.0). Most of the JC's who signed with D-1 schools in February played two years at the JC level. There will be some good... and probably a few very good... 1-year players who didn't sign with anyone in February who will decide to transfer this summer, especially if a D-1 coach comes a calling. Maybe (more like definitely) a little riskier, but I'm pretty sure those are the kind of guys Bowden is looking at. The key, though, is that they have to have been NCAA qualifiers out of high school, which limits the available number significantly and makes the competition pretty fierce. Being no stranger to the JC system and given his personality, though, I like Bowden's chances in that competition.

Roo... respectfully, are you nuts?! Fact 1) Akron's basketball program at the D-I level has never, ever, been stronger or more competitive than it is today. Fact 2) Keith Dambrot is the reason for Fact 1). He's made an impact since year one, the only team more talented than the one he had this year will likely be taking the floor next year. While you might not be overly impressed with the job he's done here, people who know more about college basketball than any of us fans do seem to hold KD in pretty darned high regard and consider him an outstanding coach. Was this year disappointing? At the end, yes, sure it was. Did we lose to an inferior team in the MACC game? No, we did not. We lost by a whisker to a damned good Ohio team that missed the Elite 8 by a single missed free throw. We'll get another bite at the apple next season, and maybe things work out better, or maybe the MAC gets more than one team in the tourney. But whatever happens over the next couple of years, there is no conceivable scenario I can imagine where there could be a serious discussion about retaining one of the best coaches in the history of our program.

I think they're referring to seven consecutive 20-win seasons.

For Akron, Buffalo and Toledo, my guess is that it's a matter of location in relatively large population centers where reasonably and consistently successful programs in football and basketball should be able to be profitable enterprises, or, at the minimum, be able to operate somewhere close to the black. Ohio, even though it's fairly isolated, has always had the ability to draw decent numbers of fans when its winning. For most MAC schools, it's reasonable to assume that they don't see a whole lot of upside in committing too many resources to athletic programs that they probably can never operate at anything other than a loss. That said, Akron has invested probably more than anybody else in football with a gorgeous field house for indoor practice/training and a sparkling new stadium, yet, to date, we have pretty close to zero to show for it. Will Bowden & Co., turn the ship around and finally justify the investment? I'm an always optimistic fan, but only time will tell.

I think it's a real stretch to read too much into any of this. What are Cooper's real options? Transfer and sit out a year to play a year? That seems unlikely. Enter the NBA draft? Cooper is a great college talent, but he sure doesn't look NBA-talented to my eye. And the D-league is a total wasteland. Go play in Europe? Maybe, but an agent will be able to command a lot more money for him there if he can help OU return to the post season again next year. My guess is that a lot of OU's players are quite naturally bummed that their coach bolted, but they're not stupid. They know what they just did, and they know what they have back next year. Christian won't be looking to run anybody off that team... indeed, just the opposite; he's going to come in promising to help them keep a great thing going, and I expect that he'll will win them over, including Cooper. All of this momentary angst will pass, and OU will be just we expected them to be next year... really, really good. P.S. The only kids who might have reason to be worried are the young guys on the back of the bench. They may be back next season, but they are all just a JUCO transfer away from being shown the door. That's Christian's M.O., and I don't see any reason it will change, unless OU administration forbids it. But I doubt that. He'll have a free hand, or he probably wouldn't have taken the job.

If KD ever leaves Akron, I'd guess it would only be for a premier job at a name school in a top conference. Not only do I think he's happy at Akron, but he is entirely accepted here. Were he to leave, all that garbage from his time at Central Michigan once again will get dredged up and rehashed and blown out of all proportion and he'll have to relive it once again and answer the same questions over and over again. Is it fair? Of course not it's not fair, but that's KD's reality whether he likes it or not. It might be worth going through all that again if the job were, say, Ohio State, but he's not going to do it for what is, essentially, a lateral move with only marginal upside in salary and prestige.

Agreed. Zeller got him pretty good. It looked to me like it was well after the shot and that it was unintentional, which is why it was a no-call. Looking at the replay from under the basket, you could see the ref had a birds-eye view of the whole thing.

Awesome effort by OU. Holding UNC to 63 in regulation was an amazing feat, even with no Marshall on the floor. Once again, their helps and switches on defense were executed nearly to perfection. The only flaw was that they got absolutely killed on the glass. Great defense too often went unrewarded when UNC's bigs got huge offensive boards all night. Offut, Kellog and Baltic... wow. Great efforts. Cooper? I'd still take him. Even on a bad shooting night, he helped a lot with his ball-handling and passing. Groce? Outstanding prep and game-day job. Last night's game was worth at least an extra $500,000 annually at the new job he takes sometime in the next few weeks. Congratulations to OU for representing. Looking forward to kicking their rears next year.

Fair enough. Peace, friend. Always enjoy your input here. P.S. Bobkitty fans have to now that even though we "hate" them in the largely meaningless sports sense of that word, most of us are wishing their team well... for now. I certainly am. I hope they can find some way to beat the Tar Heels.