Keith Ramljak
Our 31st incoming frosh became known late last night and he's another needed OL to help shore up the freshmen ranks at that position.
6-4 275 pound LT Keith Ramljak was the Lineman of the Year in Southern California's Marmonte League and was a California All-Stater.
Ramljak abd Westlake made it all the way to the state championship game before losing to De La Salle, ruining what would have been a perfect season.
You can see his highlight video below:
And here is the updated list of our 31 confirmed incoming freshmen:
1. Oluwatoba "Toba" Akinleye DE 6-1, 215 lbs. Fort Hamilton HS Brooklyn. NY
2. Jacob Ardron LB 6-1 230 lbs. Diamond Ranch HS, Pomona, CA
3. Trevor Bell WR/KR 5-7 190 lbs. Hamshire-Fannett HS Hamshire, TX
4. Brandon Blackshear CB/WR/KR 5-10 170 lbs. Sherwood HS Sherwood, OR
5. Matt Cahal DB 6-0, 190 lbs. Brophy College Prep Phoenix, AZ
6.Chris Cicilioni G/DE 6-2 225 lbs. Valley View HS Scranton, PA
7. Mark Cieslak LB 5-11 235 lbs. St. Joseph's HS Montvale, NJ
8. Chris Connors WR 6-1 205 lbs. St. Edward HS Lakewood, OH
9. Alec Davison LB 6-1 243 lbs. Clement HS Sugarland, TX
10. Andrew Dobitsch WR 5-11 180 lbs. Northern Valley HS Tappan, NJ
11. Nick Durham DE/TE 6-4 228 lbs. Bishop Fenwick HS Franklin, Ohio
12. Josh Foster DB 5-11 170 lbs. Delran HS Delran, NJ
13. Michael Gerst RB 5-10 190 lbs. Bergen Catholic Bergen County, NJ
14. Scooter Hollis QB 6-1 175 lbs. Bowling Green HS Bowling Green, KY
15. J.D. Hurt DE 6-2 270 lbs. St. Anthony's HS Melville, NY
16. Max Keefe S 6-2 200 lbs. Choctawatchee HS Fort Walton, FL
17. Erik Kuklinski OL 6-7 270 lbs. Arlington HS LaGrangeville, NY
18. Brett Leatherwood OL 6-0 220 lbs. Anderson HS Austin, TX
19. Kevin McCarthy, S 6-1 200 lbs. Hingham, HS Hingham. MA
20. Trevor McDonagh, QB 6-3 200 lbs. St. Louis University HS St. Louis, MO
21. Cameron Molina, RB/LB 5-10, 185 lbs. Tuscarora HS Leesburg, VA
22. Daren Napier DT 6-4 275 lbs. St. John's HS Houston, TX
23. Niko Padilla, DT 6-2, 280 lbs. Parish Episcopal School Dallas, TX
24. Darin Patmon S 6-1 180 lbs. Land O'Lakes HS Land O'Lakes, FL
25. Keith Ramljak OL 6-4 275 lbs. Westlake HS Westlake Village, CA
26. Travis Reim DB 6-1 185 lbs. Cedar Park HS Cedar Park, TX
27. Logan Scott QB 6-2 180 lbs. Chaminade HS West Hills, CA
28. Austin Stock, C 6-3 270 lbs. Solon HS Solon, OH
29. Hank Trumbull QB 6-4 210 lbs. Chadwick School Palos Verdes, CA
30. Julian Vigil DB 5-10 170 lbs. Mullen HS Denver, CO
31. Mike Zunica, FB 6-1 215 lbs. St. Rita HS Chicago, IL
Drive for Five
In recent years, Columbia's 5th year seniors have contributed greatly to the team in their final seasons.
But in the Ivy League, the only way to get a 5th year of eligibility is to lose most of a previous season due to injury.
In a a new article in the Express-Times, writer Corky Blake makes the case for allowing red shirting in the Patriot League instead of going with the just-approved athletic scholarship route.
The prohibitive cost of Ivy tuitions has made talk of deliberately taking extra time to graduate moot even if the league allowed it.
But perhaps it should be allowed without the obligatory torn ACL or broken bone thrown in.
Recruiting and scouting can be thorough enough, but every year Columbia and all the other Ivies get about 10-12 freshmen players who have a lot of ability but are just not ready to play varsity ball in their first year.
Giving them another year to get used to athletics and academics might work out extremely well for everyone involved.
And since Columbia would still get four years of tuition payments either way, I don't see the tremendous financial harm in allowing this process to work.
I realize it's not really a possibility right now, but if the Patriot League starts to whip Ivy butts in coming years and we can't find a suitable conference to schedule those three non-Ivy games to play each year, SOMETHING will have to get done.
Challenging Robin
Speaking of getting things done, oh how I wish I were a sports network TV boss right now.
Because if I were, I'd have a very simple offer to make to Robin Harris, the executive director of Ivy sports who just happens to be shopping the league around to TV networks right now.
Here's the offer: "Robin, we'll televise eight football games and 10 basketball games nationally every fall if you get the Ivy presidents to waive the postseason ban for Ivy football. Otherwise, no deal."
I can't think of any other way to bring the reality home to Harris and the presidents keeping the ban in place right now. The Ivy League's academic requirements and storied history are good enough to withstand just one of the Ancient Eight teams going to the FBS playoffs every year. And if they don't it will continue to cost the league money.
Enough said.
Kelton Recognized
Former Columbia defensive coordinator Aaron Kelton is featured in this new article about African Americans leaders in Massachusetts.
Roar Lions Roar 2012 is brought to you by StealADiamond.com
***REMEMBER Enter the coupon code “ROARLIONS” for a 10% discount off anything on the site!***
12 comments:
Outstanding high school player from a strong league--another very good pick-up by the the new coaching staff.
Impressive pick upz1 Small correction, Marmonte is in the Bay area, not Southern CA.
-Dr.V
My bad. I confused Marmonte, which is in southern CA, with Miramonte, which is in the Bay Area.
-Dr.V
Very hard for an OL to play as a first year. Not even three time first team All Ivy LT Jeff Adams saw any playing time as a first year, as I recall.
Following up on the comment by CULionPride from yesterday .... when I played back in the late-60's, we had four Soph's start (freshman were not eligible) .... that was actually a lot .... I would not expect more than 3 to start by opening day .... as the season progresses, we might see a few more get playing time .... remember freshmen may have loads of athletic ability, but they lack experience ... even though we were only 1-9 last year, the talent was better than that .... we have a decent core of returning players .... because of injuries we had several underclassmen on the O-Line gain some experience ... we have pretty good experience at LB ... we should be healthy and have depth at RB (including 1-2 freshmen) .... DB is a spot where Coach Lemka has his work cut out .... the D-Line should be improved and may see 1-2 good sized freshman playing a bunch ... I still think the Recievers will be pretty good and believe that there are some underclassmen who could make an impact ....
Let's not get bogged down in terminology about "potential starters" and the like. The good news for Columbia Football Fans is that for the first time within recent memory we have an incoming group of freshmen football players that is on par or better than all of the other Ivy League schools. We also have a very talented group of returning players including some who missed all or a portion of last season due to injury. Also, we ended on an extremely high note with the exciting victory over Brown. To win in the Ivies you need a contribution from both the experienced players that Red Tiger and CU Lion Pride are referring to as well as the newcomers. What has hurt Columbia in the last few years is not having some of the freshman skills players step up immediately. That should change this year.
He played in the same strong football league as incoming quarterback, Logan Scott. Very good technique on film and seems big and strong.
We had the talent to win another 5 or so games last year. Three in which we were out coached for sure were Penn, Princeton and Fordham. Games we could have won were Cornell and Yale. We didn't show up for Dartmouth. We played hard against Harvard, perhaps as well as we played all year. If Brackett is healthy and he stays that way we will have a good year.
Earlier in the year he's listing H, Y, P and Stanford as the schools in which he's interested. Wonder whether he was waiting on Stanford and then when Stanford got commits from a series of 5 star OLs he became available for us. Whatever, looks like a very nice get.
-Dr.V
Regarding Brackett, he is an outstanding quarterback when healthy and a very gutsy and talented quarterback, even when not at 90-100%. I greatly admire his courage and determination in playing hurt all of last year. However, I'm glad that the new coaching staff is bringing in four very promising quarterbacks. Hopefully, Brackett will stay healthy and lead us to an Ivy League Championship. But if help is needed, I believe the newcomers are capable of stepping in doing the job. We also seem to have several fine quarterbacks returning this year, including two up from the junior varsity, so the depth problem of the last two seasons is unlikely to recur.
We were not a six win team last year. We outscored our opponents in a grand total of two halves all year, the first half v. Cornell and the second half v. Brown. Yes, the coaches bungled several games, but we lacked team speed and a solid OL, and we were injured all year. The recruiting class looks good and we should be better in 2012, but given the lack of speed and experience among the DBs, we're going to be challenged to stop the pass. I recall last year people on this board predicting an Ivy championship. How about a few wins and a better level of play in the third quarter? I'd take that.
How do we know this class is "on par" with other Ivies? Its all conjecture. I read the same stuff every year about our recruits and how these freshmen are gonna come in and win jobs and make us a winner. Not gonna happen if your counting on freshmen! Let em come in and develop. If they're good enough to play so be it, but you have to know there's a big difference in fr. And upperclassmen. Just look at your local highschool scene---see many freshmen on the field? No you will not.Same thing here, they're just not physically mature enough in most cases and not experienced in the system, campus life, and new environment.
Post a Comment