GP1

Wouldn't a new scoreboard cost less? Better yet, wouldn't it cost less to, I don't know, test the system before the game?

Good stuff. A few years ago, I called the MAC Dollar General. Lets be honest, it was complete crap. However, the league is much, much, much better now. I don't need a guy at ESPN to tell me that. It is now a very entertaining league to watch. All I want is entertainment and the Mac is providing a high level of it.

The weekend after this coming is the CCU game in Conway, SC. If you don't know where it is, it is very close to Myrtle Beach. This is the best time of the year to go to the beach for a lot of reasons. Since I live down here (Charlotte), I frequently go to MB. If anyone is going and would like recommendations on things to do, places to go, places to eat, places to stay, etc. reply to this note and I'll put something together.

First of all, thanks to Dave for the recommendation. I highly, highly, highly recommend the website and service. To Z.I.P., yes, they can make just about anything you want. They have a wide variety of clothing and can design graphics. Very quick turn around, which is what I needed. IMO, for what they do, the cost is pretty cheap. I expected to pay a lot more. Give it a shot. My only regret is I didn't know about this place years ago.

It's something we could debate, but remember how bad it was the last year of Faust and the first year of Owens? I'm starting to think I'm getting a lot of miles on me as a Zips fan.

Appeal to the now and the future. The past is the past. Many of these kids have very little to hang their hats on after many years of effort. I'm sure they know Ianello was an idiot and anything he thought or even worse yet, said, was nonsense. They saw the larger crowds than normal in past games they played in against Can't. They know how big the Can't game is for both schools. The future.....Let them know they can be remembered for something big. Beating Can't in a bowl season would be something they would be remembered for years from now when they bring their kids back to watch future Zips play. The "now" is more important than the future. Make it all about doing something great for the University, alumni and their fellow students. Don't motivate them by hating Can't. Appeal to the better nature of humans.....Giving enjoyment to others by working hard this week and performing at a high level later in the week. It's a bigger burden than the team just doing it for each other, but the enjoyment is greater when enjoyment is provided to the largest number of people as possible. Watch how happy the faces of the SF Giants are in a couple of days when they get a victory parade through SF and they see how happy the fans are. They are happy because the fans are happy. That's a lot better emotion than being happy because they hated the Tigers.

I'm in the market to buy some Zips clothes. Specifically, I'm looking to buy a long sleeve shirt that buttons down the entire front with a nice logo on it. Looked on GoZips.com and saw lots of nice things, but not what I am specifically looking for. Does anyone have a website I could go to in order to purchase one?

True. It can happen in 2-3 years.

It happens all the time. Especially in the MAC.

SeeTeeZip, All of us understand your frustration and share it. However, I think you are overstating the problem. The tone of your note seems to indicate winning at Akron may be impossible. It isn't. Faust produced the most wins in a season back in the 90s. Owens had a couple of good seasons and fielded some competitive teams. JD won the conference and put up some wins against BCS teams. Winning is possible. We are deep in a hole created by Tom Wistrcill and his decision to hire a buddy in lieu of a competent coach. Ianello didn't have the experience, vision or personality for a head coaching job and Wistrcill was too stupid to see it. The year before Ianello, the Zips had a terrible season and won only three games. To me, when a manager fires a guy, he believes he can do better with the next guy. Before owning my own business, I managed people at big companies. When I fired someone who was under performing, I was expected to hire someone who could stop the bleeding and get things turned around. Stopping the bleeding had to be immediate. Wistricill didn't stop the bleeding, he made it worse. Wistricill is a terrible manager and I still to this day can't believe he still has his job at Akron. He botched the biggest decision an AD has ever had to make at the school. In many ways, the Board of Trustees should have put Dr. P's job on the line as well for botching the hiring of Wistrcill. Ianello's job should have been to take the program from "terrible" to just "plain bad" in the first year. This didn't happen in our case. Under the leadership of Wistrcill, the football team went from "terrible" to an "abomination". When I watch Alabama play football, I'm sometimes actually shocked at how good they are. The opposite is true with the Zips. I'm actually shocked at how bad they are and the lack of talent. Ianello made the program this bad. TW hired Ianello because....well, he once told me what he thought and what he said was so stupid I refuse to post what he said on the board until he is gone because it is that embarrassing to type or say. Our problem is plain and simple. There is not enough talent on this team to beat a bad MAC school. Talent is everything. Part of the solution is to bring in guys who can impact the program right away. This is the stopping the bleeding part. KD did this early when he brought in his players from St. V even though he wasn't the head coach yet. They understood what he wanted to do and he quickly stopped the bleeding. TB can't do the same thing because it takes more than 2-3 players in college football, which means he needs a lot of JUCO guys who can impact winning immediately. Secondly, recruit their replacements as freshmen and coach them up as quickly as possible to try to create some depth. This program can't wait another four years to get to 4-5 wins. It needs to happen quickly. The turnaround is possible, albeit extremely difficult. You're right about recruiting. The way I see it, we have a HUGE problem within Ohio right now. Any kid you want playing for you wants to win and that his primary motivation for his decisions. Playing time is important, but they want to play for successful programs. In the MAC, Ohio, Miami, Toledo and now Can't are pretty good. I don't see Can't's success lasting long, but it is there right now and will be helpful in near future recruiting. It's hard to recruit high school kids when there are so many good schools in the state. It is a problem, but not one that can't be solved. We won with Faust. We won with Owens. We won with JD. We won with Mike Thomas. We won with the AD in the Faust years. We have won with Dr. P as president. We became a laughing stock with the Wistrcill/Ianello duo. You guys do the math..... There is no way on God's green Earth that TW should have his contract extended when the time comes. Any university president who hires him in the future should be immediately fired.

I'm not so concerned about ND being good or even winning last night. Watching teams coached by overrated meatheads from Youngstown lose has become a college tradition in recent years. I'm more concerned about the ND fans who have been storing their ND sweatshirts for the past twenty years. I can hear their echoes now, "I've been a ND fan my entire life." If some of you think osu fans are bad, you aren't old enough to have experienced ND fans when they are winning. They are the worst of the worst.

Actually, the proof is on the field. Rankings are ranking and much of that is opinion. The general opinion is correct though. The real problem in the Big Ten is there is getting to be little difference in the talent between it and the ACC. The games are about as entertaining to watch as a USGA Q-School match. Some of their teams now lose to MAC schools. It used to be they could hide how bad they were by playing two MAC schools a year, a I-AA team and some poor BCS team in OOC play. Now they are losing some of their MAC games. It just isn't in fourth place as a conference....it is a distant fourth. The addition of Nebraska has done nothing for the league. What next? Add Rutgers and UCONN? The Big Ten just isn't bad at this point, it is getting worse. One of their key teams is less than one year into a ten year punishment that will cripple the program. Nebraska is average and has a joke of a coach.....the coach can be corrected, but Nebraska being in Nebraska can't. Wisconsin?....Yawn. Michigan vs. OSU....Nobody outside of those two states cares. OSU is their best program right now, but nobody knows how good they really are because they don't play anyone...My guess is their one trick pony (Miller is a great player though) of an offense would get squashed against a good non-Big Ten BCS team. Don't tell an OSU fan their schedule is weak though, because you will have to hear about how they play Oklahoma in 2016.

A Jedi Knight are you? When Luke can't get the X Fighter out of the water and Yoda does, Luke says, "I can't believe it." Yoda responds with, As fans, we can read what players say in the papers and try to come to some sort of conclusion when we read the comments. I don't take too much of it too seriously. What we don't know is what the player thinks at night when he is all alone looking up at the ceiling. Does he really believe he can do the job or is he satisfied with just trying hard? There is a difference. We are going to find out this year if the Zips really believe they are as good as the talent.

Us fans can think because that's all we really have. It's easy to think. Actions are more difficult. The players need to "Do".

I prefer... or "Sweet 16 or Bust" This team is too good to be thinking about things. They need to be doing things.....Like winning 28 games as I predict. Don't think about winning 28 games and making the Sweet 16...Win 28 games and make the Sweet 16.

I agree, there were plenty of points where things could have been turned around. My point is there was sort of a staring point to the down slide and the pick six was that point. It resulted in a loss that kept the Zips out of a bowl game that season. My main point is it didn't seem like much then, but looking back, it was the beginning of something we still haven't recovered from. More than anything, it took all momentum away from the win the week before. If the Zips win that day and go to a bowl, does Harvey become a malcontent and leave the team? I don't know, but a lot changed that day...none for the better.

The difference in going 5-7 or 6-6 and a bowl game that year was the pick six at CMU. The Zips lost by less than a TD that day. If they go to a bowl two years in a row, the state of the program in terms of recruiting and momentum would have been much greater. It all started at CMU. Can't, etc. just followed what was a terrible outcome for the Zips that afternoon. The loss at CMU didn't seem like much at the time, but it was the vibration that started the avalanche that concluded the JD years.

It's funny how everything can come full circle. A few years ago, the Zips went to Raleigh and beat a BCS team in NC State. We had just come off the MAC Championship and the future looked bright. A week after NC State, they went to CMU and a Getsy pick-six right before half resulted in not only a loss, but signaled the beginning of the end for the Zips season that day and the beginning of the end for JD. At the time it just seemed like an unfortunate loss, but the program never recovered. In retrospect, it was a deep cut to the program....One we have yet to recover from. Here we are a few years later. We get beat by a good team and are going to CMU. Could this be the week we pull one off in the place where it all started to go bad and it signals the beginning of the Zips turnaround? I'd like trips to CMU to be a memory of the beginning of something good instead the beginning of something bad.

Good points Lee. You and I are going to have to beat this drum until the rest of the board listens. Two schools run similar offenses as the Zips. Miami and Toledo. Miami's QB has net rushing yardage of 175 yards this season. Toledo's has a net of 242. The Zips QB has a net rushing of 24 yards. I don't think we are asking for a ton of yards...Just be effective and present the QB running as a real threat. It's foolish not to have a QB that can't exploit a 4 man rush with his feet once in a while. A QB running for 3-4 yards is better than an incomplete pass. A QB running for 3-4 yards is better than an INT throwing into 7 man coverage. A QB running for 3-4 yards is better than a sack. I don't want a running QB. I want a QB who can run effectively.

It's time for this team to take it to another level. Everything is there for the greatest season ever. They need to make it happen. I predict 28 total wins. The Zips go undefeated at home this year. The Zips don't lose a game in December. In order for my prediction to be correct (28 wins), the Zips need to win the MAC Tournament.

That would be great if Weeden was playing for the Zips. Am. The only one who notices maybe all of college football has caught up with the offense at about the same time? WVU, ok state,Zips all having trouble this year.

Agreed. I've been saying for how long now a spread offense needs the threat of running on the part of the QB and the QB has to be half decent at running? Defenses have changed from multiple zone blitz schemes to four man rushing and making QBs throw into incredibly small windows with complicated coverages. If the defensive line breaks down even a little, huge lanes open up for a QB to run (see what Miami's QB did to the Zips). I know this isn't TB's philosophy, but if it means we run 75 plays a game with a QB threatening to run in lieu of 80 plays with no threat of run, I'll take the 75 plays. More plays doesn't make a team better. More points makes a team better. Williams was sacked four times for a total of -28 yards. He had a total of six carries (sacks are considered a carry in college football and the negative yards count against rushing totals). He rushed a another two times for an average loss on those two carries of -8 yards. In 2012, this can't happen. A QB has to be able to pick up positive yardage in order to have success. BTW, below was NIU's QB's rushing totals...He was their leading rusher. He is in the Top 5 rushers in the country at any position. Rushing ATT YDS AVG LG TD LYNCH, Jordan 20 131 6.6 35 2 We would be better off is we had a QB who could produce 35% of what Lynch does on the ground.

Because too many people are betting on NIU regardless of the spread. Possibly a feeding frenzy going on in favor of NIU. Sucker bet taking the favorite on this one? Most people make money when they gamble doing the opposite of what everyone else does. Maybe a time to unload on the Zips.

According to....?

He'll fit right in with the QB they draft in two years.