JJ Jackson Catching On

Dartmouth assistant coach JJ Jackson is leading the Arena2 Manchester Wolves in scoring with 102 points. He has 13 receiving touchdowns and three rushing touchdowns. He's caught two PAT attempts and run for another. The former Oklahoma Sooner standout also tops the team with 66 receptions. He's averaging 71.1 yards per game receiving, has brought back three field goal attempts 79 yards and tops the team in every kickoff return category: number (26), yards (428), average (16.5) and long (35). Manchester, 4-5, plays host to Albany Friday night and depending on how the family schedule looks, we may make the trip down. ...

Desmond Robinson, a Buddy Teevens assistant the first time around, will serve as assistant athletics director for football operations at Syracuse. He'll also serve on the athletic director's senior staff. A former Pitt start, Robinson coached inside linebackers at Dartmouth in 1987.

The Harvard Crimson has a rambling column that touches on the renovations at Harvard Stadium, the university's ambivalence toward athletic success and diversity in the school's athletic department.

It was back in 2003 that former Brown President Gordon Gee, in his role as chancellor at Vanderbilt, eliminated the school's athletic department in favor or running sports sports under the banner of Student Life and University Affairs. As this Gannett story says, "Media and fans, who already loved to poke fun at the ‘Ivy League’ member of the Southeastern Conference and the league’s only private school, had a field day." How has it turned out? The change has been successful enough that Gee is crowing. Here's what he had to say recently:

‘‘We proved you don’t need an athletic department that is isolated and segregated and separated from the rest of the university and acting as its own entity in some arms race for facilities. We performed surgery on that model. We removed the athletic director and the athletic department. We treat athletics the way we treat physics. What we did was get rid of a lot of mid-level bureaucracy. Our dollars go to student-athletes and coaches, not to a lot of assistant athletic directors and other bureaucratic nonsense.’’

A number of people I spoke to in athletic adminstration after Vanderbilt's decision called it a grandstand play. I'm wondering what they are thinking now. ...