Dartmouth-Columbia Press

The nice thing about playing Penn and Columbia is there's always extensive pregame and game coverage in the school newspapers. Today's Columbia Spectator features three stories on Saturday's Homecoming game in Hanover.

In a story headlined, Lions Set to Kickoff at Green, Columbia head coach Norries Wilson says of Dartmouth, “They’re no slouch team.” That's followed by this editorial comment:

Dartmouth doesn’t pose any unique challenge to Columbia, however, which means the Lions—1-4 at the midpoint of their season—might be able to focus more on getting their game plan back on track as opposed to taking down any element of Dartmouth’s.

A story under the headline, Lions Need Pride Against Green, includes these thoughts about the two 1-4 teams:

Maybe it’s the same old Columbia after all.

and ...

Dartmouth isn’t exactly a contender itself; its last two losses have been by 40 and 36 points, respectively. This means the Big Green will make mistakes, and if there’s one thing Columbia can do when it believes in itself, it is punishing the opposition’s miscues.

The third story is headlined, Bennewitz Leads Shaky Offense, and notes that despite the graduation of quarterback Mike Fritz and leading receiver Ryan Fuselier, "... the Big Green has managed to field an offense that, while certainly nowhere near the best in the Ivy League, has given the team a modicum of stability throughout the season."

Editor's Note: As of 8:45 a.m., The Dartmouth site wasn't working. It's safe to assume there will be some kind of football story in this week.

The Harvard Crimson takes a look at this weekend's games and calls the Columbia-Dartmouth game, "The dregs of the conference." That despite the fact that at 1-1 in the Ivy League, Dartmouth is tied for third in the league standings. The Crimson's prediction: Dartmouth 31, Columbia 17.

The Daily Pennsylvanian also backhands both teams in its look at Saturday's games. From the DP: "Leave it to Columbia to give Dartmouth another ego boost."

The Princetonian notes that Harvard and Princeton are playing for the 100th time Saturday and that got me wondering if Dartmouth were nearing a century celebration with any opponent. The answer: no. One was passed a decade ago, and several others are a decade or so away.

Dartmouth's games against 2007 opponents heading into this season:
Harvard-110
Yale-90
Cornell-90
Princeton-86
Brown-84
Columbia-77
Penn-74
Holy Cross-70
UNH-34
Colgate-21

Any Given Saturday is THE place for discussion of FCS (formerly I-AA) football. For a modest fee, donors from a particular school step up and help sponsor a well-moderated and informative message board for a month. For the first time since I've been visiting, an Ivy school has seized the opportunity. As the headline says, OCTOBER IS YALE MONTH AT AGS!!! A lot of fans (and potential recruits/recruit families) across the country visit the site and whoever stepped up for Yale is getting nice exposure for his/her buck.

Green Alert Take: November is sold out but would be kinda cool if someone from Dartmouth stepped forward so that DECEMBER IS DARTMOUTH MONTH AT AGS!!! (Check out the link; someone from Yale has been posting all kinds of information that -- hopefully -- is convincing people who look down on the Ivies that they play real football in the Ancient Eight.) ... If I'm reading the info correctly, the cost is just $215. You can find out how to do it here.

That certain Hanover High sophomore emailed me a link to this story about the Harvard fullback hoping for a career in opera yesterday from school. The AP had a short story; this is the full Boston Globe bylined piece. From the story:

So, people ask Harvard's fullback/tenor, is there any connection between football and opera? "Incredibly so," nods Noah Van Niel, who handles defensive linemen and Donizetti with equal aplomb. "It's rehearsing a set of skills and then going out and performing. There's pressure and there's an audience and there's nerves: Can I do this?"

Allen Lessels' story in the Manchester Union Leader has a capsule of Dartmouth-Columbia. An interesting angle in the story is about UNH trying to schedule a game with Boston College. It appears the Wildcats are becoming anything but America's guest. Lessels writes:

The fact that UNH has beaten Rutgers, Northwestern and Marshall in its last three FBS games -- and collected a check well into six figures each time -- hasn't helped.

"It's been a problem," Scarano said. "There's any number of Eastern schools that we're all well versed in that don't return phone calls to us."