Blue & Gold

One thing about Kwan Cheatham is that he has a huge upside as he is young for his class. Though Kwan is a senior, he just recently turned 17. So he'll still be 17 when he steps on campus next year. Kwan's probably a good candidate for a redshirt. Let him eat and lift next year & just fill out his 6'9" frame.

You can get GA online. You'll just print the tickets off at home & take them with you; won't have to bother with the Will Call window.

This isn't breaking news, but I thought I'd post that MaxPreps.com has Cincinnati Walnut Hills (which Isaiah Johnson leads in scoring & rebounds) ranked #22 in the country (#1 in Ohio). Interesting tidbit: MaxPreps ranks Columbus Northland #25 in the nation & #2 in Ohio. Since the 2006-07 season, Columbus Northland is 163-8!

Which game? Last night's game vs. Pickerington Central? Btw, A-Jack scored 20 points last night as Gahanna beat Pickerington Central 72-62. Earlier in the season Gahanna had lost to P.C. 59-46 while AJ was suspended. If the game they're televising is the Dunk For Diabetes Shootout game, don't bother watching. AJ was in foul trouble the entire game & ended up on the bench for most of it. I still think he scored 10 points, but it wasn't much to watch (I was there).

Jerome was beast last night as Firestone edged Buchtel for the City championship. 37 points 17 rebounds 2 blocks 2 assists 2 steals Akron.com

Good point. The story's photo shows Tree sporting an outrageous pair of solid black socks. But good article. I enjoy the insight into Tree as a person.

I split my undergraduate work between Walsh and Malone. When I was in school, both schools had great student support. But at small schools like Walsh & Malone, I was friends (or at least acquaintances) with most of the guys on the teams, so it made going to the games a lot of fun. Until Akron develops a culture where going to the games is a resident-student social event that's not to be missed, it's probably a very good idea to create as much interaction between the players and students as possible.

This isn't national news, but I guess WKDD's been mentioning the Zip's win streak a lot. I was having dinner last night w/ a group of people and one of the girls (who doesn't even know what color a basketball is) asked me, "So have you been to many of Akron's basketball games? I guess they have the longest win streak in the country? They talk about it all the time on the radio!" I asked what station she listens to & she said KDD. Props to WKDD!!!

I posted this in another thread, but I'll copy it here: I really like this class. Considering we're coming off 3 consecutive 1-11 season, I love this class. I think the fact that LB's Jon Shelby and C.J. Mizell should be eligible to play next season is huge. Also, the signing of JUCO DT Keontae Hollis is huge - I've been looking into him & the guy's a big, strong, mean, aggressive, hard-working stud. We were in so many tight games last year where we just couldn't overcome our lack of depth. Since we've now got Keontae Hollis, C.J. Mizell & Jon Shelby in the box, I'm going to say that the key to us going bowling next year is how DT Lavonne Gauthney pans out. If he turns out to be a player, that would give us 4 solid DT's. IMHO, that's where we lost a number of games last year - Cody & Caponi are very good, but by the end of games they were simply gassed. Our front seven has a lot of potential: DE------------------DT------------DT------------DE Presley-----------Grice--------Caponi---------J. Turner C.J. James-------Hollis-------Gauthney--------??? -------------------J. Price ---------LB-----------------LB---------------LB ------Shelby-------------Mizell------------March -----J. Brown----------K. Baines--------J. Williams ----D. Moore-------------Rizzo------------J. Lane

This is true. We also miss a healthy Chauncey. I wish McAdams would try to penetrate. For being 6'6" he looks pretty quick. Pass, pass, pass, pass, pass, jack up a contested 3 is old Akron-style b-ball.

I'd like to say/believe we've simply been disinterested these past few games but the plain truth is that we just don't look very good. Right now, we're certainly NOT a Top 25 team; we're the typical Akron one-and-done NCAA team. We'd better strap it up soon. I've already purchased tickets to the OU game.

He's still listed on OSU's roster.

In the baseball thread I noted that we're playing almost half of our games at Canal Park this year. It looks as though we are moving more toward using Canal Park permanently & only needing a baseball field for practice & for those dates when Canal Park has a conflicting Aeros game.

Yes, but remember, the new owners will be able to keep all the $$$ earned from beer sales.

Well, if this is going to happen, I'm definitely glad we're getting a team. I'll certainly buy season tickets. Anything for Akron.

Eh. Bleacher Report is sort of the National Inquirer of sports media. I think our class filled areas of need. CJ Mizell should be the best LB in the MAC for the next two years. Jon Shelby adds quality depth. (J-Lane & D-Moore are excellent signees but I think redshirts would do them well; give them a year to fill out their frames.) DT Keontae Hollis is a stud. He'll push Caponi & Grice to start next year. If DT Lavonne Gauthney turns out to be a contributor, we'll have 4 quality DT's. That's all you need (assuming health). Throw in C.J. James (& a non-rusty Jamel Turner) to compliment Albert Presley @ DE & the front 7 could be rather stout. IMO the front 7 was our greatest area of need and we stocked up there.

Honestly, I think both UA & OU are without-a-doubt NCAA-quality & deserving teams. It's just a shame the rest of the conference is so weak.

Where are you getting this? (Obviously the R-Bowl's foundation wasn't in as bad of shape as UA let on?)

Last week I was in the Team Shop at InfoCision Stadium and they have soccer jerseys. I believe the Team Shop is open 9-5. It's locate right on Exchange Street adjacent to the ticket lobby. Go Zips! Go Pioneers!

This season we're playing almost as many games at Canal Park as we are at Lee Jackson Field. 9 @ Canal Park; 11 @ Lee Jackson. Good move. Both Walsh & Malone have fields much nicer than Lee Jackson. (Edit: by "field" I mean a fan-friendly facility.) It's really rather embarrassing. Honestly, most high schools have nicer fields than Lee Jackson. I live near Lake High School's facility & it blows Lee Jackson away. It'd be tough attracting top talent playing solely @ Lee Jack.

The "Fire"? Hmm. I don't think I'm too down with that nickname. Pretty generic.

I think it has more to do with us staying a hot topic in the national media than us really deserving to be selected, should we lose the MACC. We only have two signature wins on the year - OU & MTSU. Both at home; MTSU taking us to overtime @ the JAR. Losses to CCU & Detroit are killers. Creighton destroyed us. Additionally, our winning streak, though nice, is probably fool's gold, as much of it has come against the MAC. Posters here know I'm rarely negative, but we've been playing awful recently. Embarrassingly bad. We should have absolutely throttled both CMU & Miami. KD says we're going to be taking every team's best punch. Whatever. If we're as good as we say we are (National Championship, Rico?) CMU & Miami's best punches should be like my little sister hitting me. Instead, they almost knocked us out. So I think keeping our name in the media is vital. Keeping the streak going will do that. I think it'd be almost impossible to keep us out if we went into the MACC game at, what, 28-4, no matter who the cupcakes we've devoured happen to be.

Is this game on t.v.?

Better to let Chauncey heal fully. We'll really need him come the MACC and if we hope to win any games in the NCAA tourney. When healthy he's still our best all-around/most-versatile player. Keep your head up, Chauncey! We need you!

Where'd you hear that? And any talk of a desired seating capacity?