It all Starts up Front

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Randy Murff


Over the years, I’ve written a lot about how the offensive line is really the most important unit on any football team.

I remember the day when I came to realize that as a very young football fan.

I was watching an NFL game in 1980 featuring the new NBC color commentator, (yes he started with NBC), John Madden.

Madden was explaining why if he were rebuilding a team, he would put the most effort and time into the offensive line.

For a barely 10-year-old kid who was always focusing on QB’s and RB’s, it was a shocking thing to hear. But then I came to realize how right Madden was.

This week, I’ve been focusing on the lack of success Columbia has endured when it comes to placing even a respectable number of running backs or offensive linemen on the All Ivy teams.

It is true that All Ivy recognition isn’t the be all and end all  judge of how good a player is in this league.

But when your team loads up on All Ivy players it’s usually a clear by-product of winning games.

(One recent exception in Columbia history is 2010, when the Lions packed the 1st and 2nd All Ivy Teams with a record number of players… even though the Lions went just 4-6 overall and 2-5 in the league).

So which teams have placed the MOST offensive linemen and running backs on the All Ivy teams since 2006?

The answer is the team that has also won the most Ivy titles since 2006 and it’s Harvard.

The Crimson have grabbed 16 total slots for offensive linemen on All Ivy 1st and 2nd Teams since 2006.

Brown is second with 12 slots and Penn is third with 11.

But let’s focus on the positive for a moment here when it comes to Columbia O-lines.

In 2009, when Jeff Adams first cracked the starting lineup and he was teamed with guys like Ian Quirk, Evan Sanford and John Seiler, things were definitely looking up for the Lions.

In those early weeks of the season before QB M.A. Olawale and RB Ray Rangel were injured, Columbia played the best football it ever did in the Wilson era. The offense was churning out big points in wins over Fordham and Princeton in particular.

Later in the year, the strong O-line made it possible for freshman emergency starter Sean Brackett to come in and win two of his four starts to end the season.

I don’t think there’s any question the ’09 Lions were the best Columbia team in the Norries Wilson era. And the strong O-line led by Ed Argast in his first year at Columbia was a  big reason why.

Looking a bit further back, the 1996 8-2 Lions did not have any 1st Team All Ivy O-linemen, but it did have two players on the 2nd Team in Austin Milliken and the late great Randy Murff.  It’s important to remember that the ’96 team was  a defensively dominated team kind of like the 2000 Baltimore Ravens.

The more offensively-powered 1994 Lions had two O-linemen on the 1st Team in Craig Valentine and Tony Petras.  They helped pave the way for some great rushing stats for QB Mike Cavanaugh and FB John Harper.

Going wayyyy back to Columbia’s Ivy championship team in 1961, the Lions placed THREE offensive linemen on the 1st Team in Bob Asack, Tony Day and Lee Black.


Mangurian’s Job

It took four years for Norries Wilson to really put together a top flight offensive line. He had MUCH less to work with than Mangurian has now in terms of talent and experience.

And that’s good because Columbia can’t afford to wait four more years to get a great O-line. Ideally, Mangurian and O-line coach Argast could wave a magic wand and get the O-line into All Ivy condition in time for this fall.

With guys like Jeff Adams and Bob Hauschildt graduating, that’s a really tall order even though the younger players on the line improved with experience last year especially after Adams was lost for the season in the Yale game.

But it all starts up front and as excited as we all are about our chances next season, the team will likely only go as far as the O-line takes it.

Prof. de Bary



Good Stuff

For those of you who think I only like complaining about the bad things Columbia’s administrators and faculty do, I give you today’s GREAT column, subtitled “Professors must teach, not seek public acclaim,” written by Professor Emeritus William Theodore de Bary in the Columbia Spectator.

We’ve been talking a lot about tuition here and Prof. de Bary says what really needs to be said very clearly and plainly in the following sentence:

“... it is student tuition that supports the institution, and the latter in all honesty should give students their money’s worth.”

Remember it was de Bary who wrote that nice letter to the editor in November praising the efforts of the football team after its win over Brown.