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Be sure to read an excellent piece in the Philadelhia Inquirer about TV rights and the lack of a
national broadcast contract for Ivy sports.

The Inquirer piece is really very long but it's a vital store of information for serious Ivy fans. Take your time and read it all.

Author Jonathan Tannewald maps out the very extensive details on how the Ivy League is working to get a national TV deal for basketball and football.

Some of the highlighs are:

-The football deal with Versus has expired, and there is no guarantee it will be renewed by the network which is now named NBC Sports.

-The eight Ivy athletic directors are basically letting Ivy Executive Director Robin Harris take the lead in negotiating deals for the entire league. This is a big vote of confidence in Harris that many of the AD's did not have in her predecessor Jeff Orleans.

-Harris seems to "get it" as far as stressing the importance of more TV coverage, but does she get that not having postseason football weakens our brand? Until she puts two and two together, she's at a bit of a handicap.

-Columbia needs to learn from all of this just how important winning sports teams will be for the school. With all the media deals in flux, a winning CU football or basketball program is in a unique position to deal with the big media companies right on their home turf in New York City.

I've been a TV news producer for 18 years. It's hard for me to look at things through the eyes of a non-insider.

But I can tell you that you don't need to be an insider to realize the importance of getting Ivy sports on TV and marketing that package properly.

Versus did the best job yet of doing that in recent years, and I'd like to see the new NBC Sports network continue its relationship with the league.

But even Versus left a lot to be desired and there's much work to do.


The Lin Effect

Speaking of TV and media exposure, Ivy athletics are getting the best PR they've had in years as New York City is rapt in Jeremy Lin mania. I finally got a chance to watch him last night and the hype is deserved. Lin plays an exciting, but well-skilled game.

I'm not shocked that a league that has lost a lot of its fundamentals is being dazzled by an Ivy player schooled in the game properly and actually played his four full years in college.

I am willing to bet there are more Jeremy Lin's out there either playing Ivy ball now or sometime in the future. Maybe not one every year, and certainly not as great as Lin is now... but they're out there!

Davison Acknowledged

Before we all got giddy about Niko Padilla, (perhaps rightfully so), committing to Columbia, the talk of this blog was incoming freshman Alec Davison from Clements HS
in Fort Bend, Texas.

A new story out today about Davison reminds us that he is considered one of the top inside linebacker prospects in the entire country.

New Home

Fired Fordham Head Coach Tom Masella has found a new job close to home. He is now the associate head coach at Staten Island's Wagner College. Wagner is not playing any Ivy teams this coming season, but
has tangled with Cornell a lot in the past.

Shirt Controversy

Would anyone not attending a Charlie Sheen party confuse this image...

... with this one?

Well, the folks in the Columbia Athletics department aren't taking any
chances.

They have blocked the current Columbia College sophomore class from using the top image
in the official class t-shirt because it supposedly infringes on the trademarked image below.

This just doesn't seem like a smart move at all.

And creating new emnity between the student body as a whole and the athletics department is dangerous.

Check the comments after the linked story to see just what I mean.

Assessment Time (kind of)

Recruiting Class Overview, (rough draft)

It seems a little premature to give the recruiting class a real grade since we're still two or three players from rounding out our list.

But I do have a few quick thoughts that are important to make even now:

-The class does seem to be filled with more highly-rated, all-staters than we've seen in the past. The resurgence of players from Texas and Ohio after a bit of a dropoff the last two years is especially
encouraging.

-There's also a nice return to team speed in this class. The entire league started to get very obsessed with size over speed a few seasons ago, (with the exception of Cornell), and it may have cost us.

-My concerns are with what looks like a dangerously low number of offensive linemen, especially with some of the veterans OL's who have left the team in the last few weeks. My guess is that some of the existing vets may be switched to the O-line as well as some of the incoming frosh. But as I have written many times already, we all need to get used to a smaller roster because it's going to get smaller every month or so until the season begins. Mangurian is betting that a smaller, but tougher number of players will produce more wins than a numerous roster of 100+ men.

On another matter, I have no updates on Yale's attempts to poach Hank Trumbull or Trevor McDonagh. But I am starting to feel confident that these attempts won't lead to much.

Starrett makes a tackle


Starrett to the City

A very speedy 6-0 170 pound WR from the University School in Cleveland has committed to Columbia... but to run track.

Declan Starrett didn't put up super big stats as a WR, but he was a key part of a team that went to the Ohio state playoffs this year. He also played DB.

Could he possibly be lured to give football at Columbia a try?




Schedule Breakdown and Expectations

Let me make this perfectly clear: Pete Mangurian's first team at Cornell in 1998 was not good.

But the Big Red had a light early season schedule that year and Mangurian made sure his players did everything they could to win the games they realistically had a chance of winning.

The result was that bad Cornell team won four of its first six games, with victories over Holy Cross, (bad team back then), Buffalo, (ditto), Bucknell  and Dartmouth.

After that, the Big Read lost all the remaining four games and only one loss was really close.

The 2012 Lions already look like they will be a better squad than '98 Ithacans, but Mangurian will face a similar situation as far as schedule strength is concerned.

Columbia's first seven games are against what I would call five beatable opponents: Marist, Fordham, Princeton, Dartmouth and Yale.

If the Lions win those five games, and only those five games this fall is there anyone who would say Mangurian didn't pull off an extremely successful first season?

Of course not.

The point is, Mangurian has a track record of taking care of business in those winnable games even when he has a raw group of players to work with.

Getting back to the rest of the schedule, the other five opponents the Lions face surely seem a lot tougher.
The road games at Lehigh, Penn, Harvard and Brown would be big upset victories for Columbia if the Lions can pull them out.

The home game against the rising Cornell team, that will have the added drama of being the 100th meeting between the two schools, also looks tough unless something happens to Big Red QB Jeff Mathews before
November.

As I said before, the X factor is that the 2012 Lions really are more talented than the '98 Cornell team Mangurian had to work with.

That has to make 6-4 a more apt goal for a won-loss record this fall.

The Polo Grounds, circa 1900


Special Game

Speaking of that big game, how can Columbia and Cornell gin up some serious extra attention for the century mark contest?

Lafayette and Lehigh are considering playing at Yankee Stadium this coming fall. A venue like that would probably be a stretch for us.

But a night game might be fun, and some kind of parade or rally on campus the night before could work.

Lots of Cornell alums always show up to the Columbia game when it's in NYC.

I'd like to see some imagination go into the planning for this great game.

Hopefully, it will end better than the infamous 1901 Columbia-Cornell contest at the Polo Grounds.

The Big Red won that one 24-0, AND someone made off with about $1,000 in ticket receipts!

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Late to the Game

Ready to Play?

Marist will play two games before they travel to Wien Stadium for the Columbia season opener on September 15th.  (The Red Foxes’ first two games are at Bryant and then at home against Bucknell).

Marist went 4-7 last year, but one of those wins was over Sacred Heart which beat the Lions and Dartmouth in 2011. So this game could be a lot tougher than the easy win Columbia scored over the Red Foxes in
2007.

Call for Internship Help!

I know of three current players looking for summer internships in some form of financial trading.

They are Steve Grassa, Andrew McHugh, and Sean Bracket.

If anyone has any leads for them, please contact Greg Abbruzzese '91 at gabbruzzese@converse.com or call 978-360-5676.

Greg has their resumes and contact information.

Let’s help these guys stay in NYC this summer so they can train together!


Yale Tix?

This Saturday night's men's basketball game is sold out and I have a friend who would like to buy a few tickets from anyone here who might have a few extra. If you have some tickets, please email me at roarlions2012@gmail.com and I'll put you in touch with him.

Danny Welstad



Possible Late Add?

A 6-4 210 pound RB from Gig Harbor, Washington could soon join Columbia or Dartmouth's incoming freshmen list.

Danny Welstead had some gaudy running stats, but I'm told he would really be considered only as an OLB prospect in the Ivies.

Danny was late to the recruiting process for a number of reasons, but now he is determined to get on someone's radar.

Diversity Issue
I’ve spent a few days letting things cool off before writing one last piece on Ivy sports recruiting vs. Affirmative Action.

I hate to be baited into “proving” I’m not a racist. There’s no way a person of any race or ethnic group can prove than 100% and so it’s a loaded deal like saying: “when did you stop beating your wife?”

But let me clarify this issue one last time into one sentence, and then I’ll explain further.

Here’s the one sentence:  "Ivy sports recruiting is far superior than Affirmative Action because it works BETTER to create racial, economic, geographical, and intellectual diversity."

I’m not against all those forms of diversity; I’m DESPERATE for more of them! And any given Ivy football, basketball, or soccer team achieves that goal better in sheer numbers and in spirit than Affirmative Action.

But the added bonus from athletic recruiting in the Ivies is that it rewards the achievements of minority kids, not just the fact that they are minorities.

This DISPROVES the truly racist notion that to achieve racial diversity, you have to lower standards.

Isn’t it funny that Ivy schools can actually accept anyone they want, UNLESS he or she is an athlete… then they have to uphold certain rigid standards.

Isn’t it funny that the ONLY applicants held to a written GPA and SAT standard are actually MORE diverse than those who are not?

Isn’t it funny that former Ivy athletes tend to be more successful than they non-athlete Ivy grads of any race or nationality? This is a BIG sour spot with a lot of my non-athlete Columbia classmates who are STILL convinced they’re just so much better than our athlete counterparts. After 25 years of hearing this, I’m really getting sick of it.

I say it’s crazy to say there aren’t enough high achieving minority kids out there and thus Affirmative Action needs to incorporate lower standards.

Baloney! We just have to look harder/differently and/or find new areas of achievement outside of just SAT scores and GPA. Athletics is just one, but it’s a very successful one. Similar programs in the arts and
in specific areas of achievement, like science, work well too. 

In other words, we need to be more flexible in admissions, especially if we have potential applicants who are science geniuses or young and successful entrepreneurs who may not have aced the whole SAT or have a
perfect GPA.

As CU parent Mark Kosminskas wrote last week in the Chicago Tribune, if athletics is the lure that gets kids who otherwise wouldn’t be interested in higher education or have a chance at getting into an elite school… then so be it. 

This is a worthwhile cause and argument.

What Does this Have to Do with Columbia Football?

This issue has everything to do with Columbia football.

In case you haven’t noticed, recruited sports in the Ivies are under serious attack. People like Yale President Richard Levin and even former Columbia Provost Jonathan Cole, (who played baseball for
Columbia himself and should know better), are fighting hard to reduce the number of varsity sports at all eight Ivy schools.

I choose to hoist these guys by their own petard; their stated goal of diversity. They all say diversity is so very important to them, and yet they attack what has been the best diversity-creating tool on Ivy and other elite college campuses for more than a century!

If we want to protect Columbia football and Ivy football, the superiority of football recruiting must be trumpeted as much as possible.

I contend that the Jonathan Coles and even Lee Bollingers of this world don’t really want diversity as much as they want to control every aspect of admissions and be lauded for somehow putting together
a successful social engineering project.

Meanwhile, achieving real diversity would mean having to give more credit and power to the football coaches of the Ivies.

That’s something these guys would never accept.

But let's make them see the light.

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Schmitz Happens

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                                                                       Bill Schmitz


Land O’Lakes HS Assistant Coach Bill Schmitz is best known as the former Head Coach of D-III Austin Peay’s football team from 1996 to 2002.

A few years after that he had a brief and controversial stint as the offensive coordinator at Penn.

But few people know that Schmitz was a graduate assistant coach at Columbia under Bill Campbell and then Bob Naso from 1979 to 1980.

And it was Schmitz’s connection to Columbia, however old, that led him to guide incoming freshmen Darin Patmon our way during the recruiting process.

Was there also a little revenge involved considering the way he was blamed for Penn's offensive troubles even though he helped craft the offense that would win two straight Ivy titles just after he was fired in late 2008? 

Perhaps.

But if Patmon becomes an impact player one day, Schmitz will probably be smiling broadly if he ends up doing great things against Al Bagnoli's Quakers.

You never know!

Oregon Trail

The announcement that Brandon Blackshear is joining the Lion recruiting class put the state of Oregon in the spotlight.

In addition to former Columbia assistant Chip Kelly making history at the University of Oregon, the state’s high school football programs seem to be generating more talent lately.

But Columbia hasn’t lured an incoming football frosh from Oregon in 19 years when both Guy Poppe ’97 and Jamie Joe Diamond ’97 both joined the team. 

And both of them were gone from the roster by their junior seasons.

(The other two Oregonians in CU football history were Jason Smith ’93 and Steve Jenning ’72. Neither of them lasted into their senior seasons).

So Blackshear is just the fifth documented Oregonian EVER to become a CU football Lion, and if he lasts past his sophomore season with the varsity he'll probably be the best.

Speaking of good Oregonians, those of you who watched the video of his high school team’s playoff game that I posted yesterday were probably wowed by Blackshear’s teammate, #22 RB Paul Dodson
Like Blackshear, Dodson was a 1st Team all state player.

Unlike Blackshear, I don’t think Dodson has been recruited seriously by anyone to play college football, which seems odd.

If he has the grades, he may be worth trying to get him on the same plane Blackshear is taking to New York this August!

Getting back to the All State list from Oregon, none of the other members of the first team or any other team are going Ivy as far as we know.

The only other Oregonian coming to the league is Carl Kreitzberg, and OL who is committed to Yale.

So far, Texas still leads the pack as the top feeder state to Columbia football in the class of 2016. The Lone Star state’s six incoming players beats out #2 New Jersy with four players and Ohio and California are tied for third with three each.

Adams Online

There’s a good interview with Jeff Adams now on the athletic department website that details all the hard work he’s doing to impress the NFL scouts ahead of the draft in April.

I got winded just listening to all the working out he has to do.

And I also got scared remembering that the Lions face the 2012 without him. At least Columbia got used to it a bit last year as Adams missed the last three games due to injury. But it’s still going to hurt.

Baseball Time

In case you’re new here, you may not know that Columbia’s baseball team has become a power in the Ivies in recent years.
Coach Brett Boretti has created a fantastic program and is a gem for the entire university.

Perhaps the most exciting player on the Lion Nine is Dario Pizzano and he’s the featured interview today
featured interview today at College Baseball Insider.

The Columbia baseball season begins in just 22 days with a four game set at the Citadel.

Oregon Addition

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Brandon Blackshear



Add 5-10 170 pound CB/WR/KR and all-around athlete Brandon Blackshear to our list on incoming players.

Brandon was a 1st Team All State player from Sherwood HS southwest of Portland, Oregon.

He will be the first documented Sherwood grad to come play football at Columbia.

You can see some well-produced highlights of Sherwood's state semifinal game last fall below, (Blackshear is #4):

And here is the updated list of our 29 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. Brett Leatherwood OL 6-0 220 lbs. Anderson HS Austin, TX
18. Kevin McCarthy, S 6-1 200 lbs. Hingham, HS Hingham. MA
19. Trevor McDonagh, QB 6-3 200 lbs. St. Louis University HS St. Louis, MO
20. Cameron Molina, RB/LB 5-10, 185 lbs. Tuscarora HS Leesburg, VA
21. Daren Napier DT 6-4 275 lbs. St. John's HS Houston, TX
22. Niko Padilla, DT 6-2, 280 lbs. Parish Episcopal School Dallas, TX
23. Darin Patmon S 6-1 180 lbs. Land O'Lakes HS Land O'Lakes, FL
24. Travis Reim DB 6-1 185 lbs. Cedar Park HS Cedar Park, TX
25. Logan Scott QB 6-2 180 lbs. Chaminade HS West Hills, CA
26. Austin Stock, C 6-3 270 lbs. Solon HS Solon, OH
27. Hank Trumbull QB 6-4 210 lbs. Chadwick School Palos Verdes, CA
28. Julian Vigil DB 5-10 170 lbs. Mullen HS Denver, CO
29. Mike Zunica, FB 6-1 215 lbs. St. Rita HS Chicago, IL


Yale Poaching Latest

First off, I want to make it clear that while I hate that Yale’s new coaches are coming after our incoming freshmen, I acknowledge that it’s not technically against the rules.

I also admit that there’s no evidence we haven’t been doing the same to Yale and other schools.

While I rarely shy away from opinion-making on this blog, this story is still in the informative stages in my book.

I will keep you posted, but there’s also a good chance that in addition to Hank Trumbull, Yale has also made some overtures to QB commit Trevor McDonagh.

Again, I hope all these Yale poaching attempts are unsuccessful… but this may not be an indictable offense.

Home Cooking from MSG Varsity

I guess the people reading this in Texas and much of the Midwest are probably laughing at the paltry coverage of high school football in the New York Metro Area.

The NY/NJ/CT news media has been behind the curve for years in covering local high school football.

But the relatively new MSG Varsity cable station has started to stop this trend, and I really enjoyed watching the special program MSG did publicizing the National Football Foundation All Metro Area Football teams this month.

No known incoming Columbia freshmen, (or any other Ivy school’s incoming freshmen for that matter), are on the first team but 2nd teamer LB Mark Cieslak is on his way to Morningside Heights and that’s a
start.

Also on the 2nd team is Penn-bound TE Austin Taps.

BBall Blues

I have to agree with those fans who feel the Lions were royally shafted by the refs up at Harvard Saturday night.

But you can cheer up by watching 9:44 worth of great highlights featuring incoming Columbia basketball commit Grant Mullins, see below: