Putting a Number on Facilities Improvements

The Dartmouth Review last week ran an overview of the improvements in Dartmouth athletic facilities in recent years. Anyone who has been around Hanover knows there's an unbelievable amount of construction going on at the college as a whole and on the athletic front in particular these days. Just how much work has been done or is about to be started? Here's something eye-popping college president Jim Wright said May 19 in his remarks to the Dartmouth Alumni Council:

"If we look back over the improvements made over the past seven years and include also the work planned on the varsity house and the new soccer facility, we will have spent well over $70 million on athletic facilities and just about every part of the athletic program will have seen improvements."

Thanks to a subscriber for alerting us that the Ivy League Football Association has donated $50,000 to the National Football Foundation's Play It Smart Program. According to an NFF release, "Play It Smart trains 'academic' coaches to work with high school football teams in underserved areas during the entire school year, taking the transferable life skills learned on the field and applying them in the classroom and the community."

For its graduation edition, the Brown Daily Herald included a story about the turnaround of Brown athletics that came about during the tenure of the graduating seniors, notably those who played football. The Brown seniors started their college careers by losing their first eight games. They finished it as members of the first Brown team ever to win the Ivy League title outright. Every Dartmouth player hopes to some day echo these remarks from Brown tri-captain Jamie Gasparella:

"As more time passes, the significance of what we accomplished, on and off the field this season, has sunk in more. Being a part of the team that helped restore Brown's strong tradition of success was a goal of the whole team, but especially the senior class."

Matt Dougherty at The Sports Network ranks the I-AA quarterbacks heading into the 2006 season. Not surprisingly, Dartmouth will have to try to stop the QB that Dougherty has ranked as No. 1 in the nation: Ricky Santos. All the rising junior has done with two full years still remaining is throw for more than 7,000 passing yards and 70 touchdowns.