ZachTheZip

Non-TV games should get announced in a few hours. I think we played ourselves out of getting a premier match-up.

Hopefully Ianello and staff are using this weeks' recruiting rules to their advantage. Coaches are allowed to make an unlimited number of phone calls to recruits from 7 AM today until 7 PM Friday. Normally you can only make a certain number of calls per week.

This is very bad for us. I know Andrew's parents, yes he's a very good kid and a hard worker, but in no way is he a D-I recruit. His only offers have been Patriot league schools like Bucknell and Holy Cross. Youngstown State isn't even giving him a look. Looks like we're getting a bit desperate. I don't think our coaching staff makes a distinction between MAC-level players and D-II players. They're all lumped together as "not what we used to get at Notre Dame".

We need more depth before the tournament gets here. We need more options on offense and someone who relishes the challenge of locking down the other team's top player on defense. So I'm really glad to hear Egner is begin given a chance. I hope Euton gets a similar chance, if only to keep his freshman year from being completely wasted.

Aaaaaaaand now he's going to UConn.

I was surprised to Egner come out and play a little in the first half. He made a mistake and was pulled quickly, but at least he saw a moment of "real" action and got a rebound. Expect to see more of him as we get into the softer part of the MAC schedule.

OL Andrew Hampton from Warren Harding was spotted on campus today making a visit.

GoZips.com has put up a Signing Day Central. It will provide live updates as the LOIs get faxed in. I love this idea.

http://zipsnation.org/forums//index.php?sh...=14330&st=0 The Instructor. Well worth watching for a trip down memory lane in Akron with lots of local spots featured.

I like his reasoning for choosing Akron. He looked beyond the coaching staff and chose where he would be happiest based on the university as a whole. He's smart to realize that the coaches/assistants might not be there by the time he graduates, for better or worse. That is true for any school that's recruiting a player, but most recruits don't seem to show that level of wisdom, instead falling for the hype.

Some TV show I don't watch mentions Akron.

Actually sounds much worse.

So all last season you post ad nauseam how 2011 was going to be worse than 2010, now your predicting we win 3 times as many games!?! We were pretty unlucky last season losing two overtime games and one in the last few minutes. We were basically a better kicker away from being 3-9 or 4-8. But this year we don't have Igor to lose games for us. We can be worse but have a better record due to simply being a little less unlucky.

We're probably desperate to fill our recruiting class. 4 spots to fill in only a few days. This is probably a sign we aren't pursuing any more JUCOs.

If they are, it's a step forward in terms of getting timely information put up on the site.

Maybe we'll finally see WR Marquelo Suel this year. He was a JUCO brought in last season, but never played despite our huge need for a reliable receiver.

Uh oh... be careful. Honestly, I don't think it would change anything. It all begins in practice. Dambrot runs incredibly difficult practices. it's drilled into their heads every day for hours that they need to work on their problems. So even if he gives them a long leash in the games, they're still thinking too much about their own faults. Dambrot needs to relax in practice, use that time to let the guys work out their own problems and remind them to have fun every once in a while.

After they released the full schedule, and looking at how our recruiting class is shaping up, I think we'll be lucky to get more than three wins. OSU and Cinci are automatic losses. Even if we did have the talent on the field, we don't have the coaching to get us road wins against the BCS. VMI should be a win, but so was Garder-Webb... FIU went to Detroit and beat Toledo in a bowl game. I don't see us winning even at home. In conference, we might beat EMU or Buffalo on the road. Doubt we'll see any home wins.

Wow. Pretty cool, but the current high bid is a bit beyond my budget. A pretty cool item to have, though. It's autographed by the entire team.

It may look that way at times because Zeke tends to overtly beat himself up on the court after every little incident he perceives as being an error on his part. I think he enjoys playing, but can't stand making mistakes. That attitude may make him more tense and wound up as the game goes on, which only leads to more errors. While some players might benefit from being a little more serious and less loose, Zeke is not one of them. I think Zeke would benefit by learning to quickly let loose of mistakes and adopt the attitude that he's going to make more great plays than mistakes, so the mistakes aren't worth distracting him from making a great play the next time the ball comes his way. After the game, Zeke can talk to the coaches about mistakes he made during the game and how he wants to learn to correct them during training and scrimmages. Thats fair enough Dave, I might have been a touch harsh. I want more than anything to see Zeke succeed, I really do. I want to see him improve and reach a higher level of play. Zeke needs a big boost of confidence for sure. He must realize that he has a God given gift, a gift that should allow him to become a great, great player. But to get there he needs confidence, he needs an inner fire and he needs to have the will to dominate. Until he finds that he's not going to be a great player. The good news is that he's only a soph. and still has time and a chance to become the great player that we are all expecting to see. The pressure on Zeke is high, we all know that but Zeke needs to know that a few mistakes are OK. He in himself is not going to lose us any games for us but he sure as hell can win us a few. Zeke needs to play angry. It's when he says to himself "f--- it" and just plays the game instead of beating himself up over every little thing that he is at his best. Same could probably be said for McNees. Dambrot likes his recruits to be somewhat self-critical, and for some it leads to improvement, but for others it simply shuts down their ability to play. It's just a game. Have fun. Do your thing and stop worrying so much.

"Kayvon Afsarifard" And here I thought we would never see a player with a more difficult name than Ampaipitakwong.

One week until Signing Day. Four spots left. Only two JUCOs known in a class that's reportedly supposed to be "heavy" on them. No Wide Receivers even after graduating all our talent at that position. A bunch of recruits that will be learning new positions. And the class at a glance doesn't look any more talented than what Brookhart used to bring in, although that's yet to be determined.

On this day in 2002 Andy Hipsher had 22 points and Rashon Brown had 25 points to beat CMU. Do we have players that can score like that any more? Can McNeese stop overthinking and just start playing basketball? Can someone teach our players how to defend?

This guy thinks Akron's recruiting class could be a special one. I'm not quite as optimistic. You can't judge a recruiting class by just the top few players. It's ultimately the recruits in the middle who will make up most of your team down the road. A solid core of recruits builds depth and keeps you consistent throughout a season. The top few recruits could push a "good" team into "great" territory, but they lack the ability to make a poor team good.

Here's a nice sports cross-promotional idea. NIU's football coach will do his signing day press conference live before the NIU basketball game that day. Would Ianello be willing to actually connect with a large number of fans by going in front of a live audience of several thousand to reveal his signed recruits? Is he confident enough in the quality of his recruiting class to do something like this?