Friday, January 20, 2012

Clearing Up




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Mike Zunica a 6-1, 215 pound fullback from St. Rita's HS in the Chicago area is indeed coming to Columbia this fall.

Zunica is the first documented St. Rita's player to come to CU, which is surprising considering how many players from St. Rita's league come to Columbia and the rest of the Ivies.

Mike's dad is the athletic director at St. Rita's and the baseball team coach.

You can see Mike's highlight video here.

Clearing Up


With the recruiting news coming in super fast, there are going to be some errors here and there and I will work hard to make sure everything that's wrong gets cleared up within 24 hours.

So here we go...

Clearing up a few things and adding a few things about Mark Cieslak who I reported yesterday is coming to Columbia:

1) Yes, his first name is MARK, sorry about calling him "Mike" earlier.

2) Mark does come from the same HS as Mike Capra ‘97, Ayo Oluwole ‘04, and Quentin Unsworth ‘02. That is St, Joseph REGIONAL HS in Montvale, NJ. Home of the Green Knights!

Mark's highlight video is here:





He's a natural middle linebacker and may be a good eventual replacement for the graduating Nick Mistretta, who played at St. Joseph rival Don Bosco.

Keefe Clarification

Also, I need to confirm that the Max Keefe who is still in high school and is the younger brother of current Lion John Keefe is still undeclared and will be on campus this weekend for an official visit.
There was another Max Keefe who committed to Miami of Ohio and he is not the young man we're looking at.

So, our list of confirmed, (by me), incoming freshmen is up to 11:

1. Jacob Ardron LB 6-1, 230 lbs. Diamond Ranch HS, Pomona, CA
2.Chris Cicilioni G/DE 6-2, 225 lbs. Valley View HS, Scranton, PA
3. Mark Cieslak LB 5-11, 235 lbs. St. Joseph's HS, Metuchen, NJ
4. Andrew Dobitsch, WR 5-11 180 lbs. Northern Valley HS Tappan, NJ
5. Michael Gerst, RB 5-10 190 lbs. Bergen Catholic Bergen County, NJ
6. Kevin McCarthy, S 6-1 200 lbs. Hingham, HS Hingham. MA

7. Cameron Molina, RB/LB 5-10, 185 lbs. Tuscarora HS, Leesburg, VA
8.. Daren Napier DT 6-4 275 lbs. St. John's HS Houston, TX
9. Logan Scott QB 6-2 180 lbs. Chaminade HS West Hills, CA
10. Austin Stock, C 6-3 270 lbs. Solon HS Solon, OH

11. Mike Zunica, FB 6-1 215 lbs. St. Rita HS, Chicago, IL


.. and in the Outbox

Four players on the Lion squad have left the team. I don't want to name them yet until I get better confirmation, but I can say that none of the players has and starting experience with the varsity.

I can also say that their defections have NOT yet been recorded on the team's online roster.


Mangurian Interview

The athletic department website has a pretty good interview with Coach Mangurian available right now.

There wasn't much info about personnel, etc. but I liked a lot of what I saw. You can see how serious the man is for one thing, and the acknowledgement that his age and experience are valuable.

I still maintain that our last two head coaches were too inexperienced and immature. That won't be a problem with Mangurian.



Yale Coaches Finding New Homes

While I have yet to hear of any of the relieved members of Norries Wilson's staff hooking up with new coaching jobs, the newly-relieved Yale staff is apparently a hot commodity.

Yesterday, Duane Brooks got the head coaching job at Colby College, and now we learn that former Eli offensive coordinator Brian Stark is joining the Denver Broncos staff.

5 comments:

Jake said...

And we have one late add to the recruiting haul! It's a NYC kid too!
He's 6-2 215 pound DE/LB Toba Akinleye from Brooklyn's Fort Hamilton HS.

lionrock said...

Need to change list of incoming recruits to show that Mark Cieslak played for St. Joseph's Regional HS in Montvale, New Jersey and not Metuchen.

RedTiger61 said...

Oluwatoba Akinleye from Fort Hamilton was 2nd team All State Class AA .... his father is Nigerian .... the kid wants to be a pre-med .... good and smart like Coach M's interview said he wanted ...

http://www.roadtosyracuse.com/reference/all-state-2011-aa.shtml

RedTiger61 said...

Looks like Jeff Adams had a rough start at the Shrine game pratices, but by the 3rd day had improved significantly ....

"The fastest learner this week shouldn't be any surprise—Jeff Adams (OT Columbia) received an Ivy League education in college, but arrived to practices no more than an average Ivy League football player.

On Monday, nearly everything I wrote about Adams was negative. He looked awkward in his stance, had no punch in pass protection and bent at the waste.

However, it's important to remember this is the best coaching Adams has ever gotten and apparently he soaked it up like a sponge. He was stoning defenders in the Wednesday practice and looked like a solid mid-round developmental prospect."

Go Lion !!!

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1030335-east-west-shrine-game-2012-five-upfive-down-from-the-third-day-of-practices

Anonymous said...

Re Jeff Adams and the coaching he received: I am stunned to hear that he has not been well coached. I thought that one hint Norries could do was mentor OLs. And what abou Ed Arghast?