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I've been seeing a lot of negative comments about Ivey, but this one was really on the money. He's become a different player now that he needs to do more. It seems that he may not be equipped to be a featured player who can make things happen on his own. I'd bet that he'd really settle down and start producing if he could "mentally" take himself back to last year, where he was a very secondary option. May be? It's unfortunate, because we really could use someone like him right now. I addressed this a couple of weeks ago.

Grab the link through the school's website.

I think I'd take a signature win over a larger program in our region as having a greater impact on our program than hoping that a Florida kid might see us make an appearance somewhere in their state. Plus, our fans need something big that we can participate in. In 2005, we took a caravan of busses to Michigan. And thousands of others went on their own. It's been too long. We need something like that, if we have the chance.

By my count, we have just enough eligible teams to fill our existing primary and secondary bowl tie-ins. That would seem to make it highly unlikely that someone gets a chance to go somewhere outside of that circle.

I think that would definitely give Toledo a big edge in getting that bid over anyone else in the conference.

Yep. The only chance I see in getting into a bowl that is "outside" of that circle is to have a year where a low number of teams are eligible, and the MAC has an overabundance of qualified teams. And that's not going to be the case this year. Again, a prognosticator with no knowledge of the situation, and just plugging Akron into an available slot on his sheet.

A really fun place. I'd just prefer the cities that I like to walk around to not be 30 degrees when I go there I think the draw would be outstanding for Akron. I don't see it happening. Many of these prognosticators certainly just plug a school like Akron into any slot that they see available when they do these charts. And looking at their previous selections, and attendance, I see this bowl doing everything possible to get someone with a higher profile than Akron.

Me too. This would certainly be a case where someone with any sort of "name", who's 6-6, would get picked over the Zips.

I like the matchup (Boston College). Not sure I want a cold destination, and watching a football game in a baseball park.

In Florida, we get 500 fans. In Detroit, we get 5,000 fans. Plus, Detroit gives us a great chance to play a Big 10 team, which presents an opportunity for a long-sought-after win against a conference in our region that impacts our recruiting.

Lee, If you've never dealt with it before, this is the process we have to go through during the MAC Tournament in Cleveland for basketball every year. The seats are sorted among the purchasers, based on Z-Fund donation points. The "home" and "away" designation would determine the side where the benches of each team will be located, and the seating for the school's allotment will be somewhere behind that bench. My guess is that there is a designated side for "home team", which will probably be on the main press box side, and use the Detroit Lions locker room, etc. From what you describe, buying 2 seats on each side in the same area where they say that the school's allotments will be located will ensure that one of those pairs of seats will be near other Akron fans. You may have ended up being in the rows closer to the field with the school's allotment. But, that might have been the only advantage to waiting until Monday to go through the sorting process within Akron's block of seats.

Exactly. We were trying to hit those plays all game long. I didn't see us go to a ball-control, run the clock offense until we got the ball with about 5 min. to go. Heck, we don't even have the personnel to do that. And let me add this: Surprisingly, Kent's corners defended our long routes really, really well.

Give me the matchup that gives us the best chance of winning. The guys in the booth talked about this in the postgame. They talked about how Amato's defense has done well at stopping one-dimensional teams this year, but struggled mightily against teams that can do a lot of things well. And they specifically pointed out that NIU is that team that relies on one thing to beat you.

Or, have we just been ineffective offensively in the 2nd half of many games? I sure hope we haven't come out of the locker room at halftime in all of these games just trying to hold onto a lead (some of them very small) for another 30 min. It's certainly understandable when it gets later into the 4th quarter.

I think we've use it that way before? I agree. I didn't like the gloss blue sticker on the flat blue helmets at all.

Don't be so kind. That's the highest occupation that most of them will be qualified for when they finish their Kent State education too

Unfortunately, it's not going to be as exclusive as we had hoped. The MAC Championship game was put at 12pm on Saturday in hopes that we could get the early time slot on ABC. But they gave that to the AAC Championship game, and have it scheduled for exactly the same time.

If only it were that simple. Whether they'd tell you directly or not, they'll continue to have a "our patrons don't care about the Zips" attitude, unless the people start showing up and convincing them otherwise. I pretty much got the same response from our local newspaper the other day when they responded to my inquiry about why they are asking for only Ohio State tailgating pictures to post on their Website, rather than Akron tailgate pictures.

I agree. You now HAVE to give him the start next week. By giving him a full game last night, with your previous starter not playing for a month, you have no other choice. But, I think you'd be forced to do the same for the bowl game too. That would be the riskiest move of all, to switch back to a QB who hasn't seen action since October.

For once, I felt like I was seeing some things offensively that pointed to bad execution, rather than bad play calling. Maybe it was a result of some of Kato's unfamiliarity with some of his guys. There were several screen plays (when Kent started blitzing repeatedly after our early lead) where the pass wasn't completed, or an open field block was missed. And many, many downfield throws where the pass just wasn't where it needed to be. And we did have a beautiful TD to the TE, where everyone went one way, and the TE went to the open side of the field. I'm hoping the way the QB situation was handled doesn't hurt us over these last 2 games. But in hindsight, this may have not been the best outcome. First, I'll repeat that I don't know what I would have done. But, I thought the coaches were going to go back to Tommy. By not doing that, he's probably now somewhat "tuned out" for the remainder of the season. And who knows how Kato might be affected by taking some physical punishment last night, and not executing the passing game. It seems that giving Tommy a good game of work last night, and knowing that we now have a confident, capable and experienced backup ready at any time, would have been the better outcome.

I get it. Just when you have hope that we've developed something "special", we somehow end up turning it into a head-shaker.

La Var? Is that you?

You might be right. The desire will still be there, but my 30 year old body was much better equipped to handle the impact.

The last time I did that, Alcorn had just kicked the 57 yard field goal to beat Toledo in 1992, our first game as a MAC member, in front of packed Rubber Bowl for an Acme/Zip game. I was drunk, and fell over the concrete wall, with no regard for personal injury. I'm 25 years older now. No friggin way.

Yes, I like that one much better. I can see the thick band of rain stretching from Central Michigan to Central Illinois, and heading this way. I think we should hope for a couple of gusts of East-To-West wind to try to keep it from getting here until after midnight.