Countdown To Brown

The game notes prepared by Brown's sports information office are up. Find them here. A quick perusal of the notes came up with a few scary numbers on Bear quarterback Michael Dougherty. He is currently:

• 8th in the nation in completions
• 11th in passing yards
• 13th total offense

The notes remind us that against Dartmouth last year he set a school record by hitting 82 percent of his passes on 41-of-50 passing for 403 yards. Of course, Big Green quarterback Tom Bennewitz also had a big day against the Bears, completing 28-of-38 throws for 312 yards. Brown won the shootout, 56-35.

The official Dartmouth sports information preview can be accessed here. ... For the full Dartmouth game notes, click here.

A headline in the Sacramento Bee:

Oh, darn – basketball star settles for UCLA
LANE WAS DUMPED BY DARTMOUTH, HIS PARENTS' SCHOOL, BUT HE DIDN'T CARE

This one should get you thinking about where the Ivy League is today.

Steve Lane '83, who played one year of football at Dartmouth, has a 6-foot-10, 205-pound son named Brendan who, given his size, made a pretty good choice pursuing basketball.

As the Bee story tells it, Steve and wife Leila, also a Dartmouth grad, "figured that having a son who is a good student and one of the top high school basketball prospects in the country might spark some interest from their alma mater, especially for a program that made its last NCAA basketball postseason appearance in 1959."

Lane told the paper: "That was kind of a funny deal. They basically sent him a rejection letter: Go to a prep school and try again next year."

Here's the next line from the story: "Dartmouth's loss is UCLA's gain."

I don't share the story to suggest in any way that Dartmouth made a mistake. Perhaps the younger Lane wasn't academically inadmissible. Perhaps the Dartmouth coaches knew it would be futile to put too much effort into recruiting a kid who would sign with UCLA.

No, I include the story for another reason. This single sentence from the story:

Steve Lane admits that he knew by the end of his son's freshman season that Brendan might be too good for the Ivy League.

While you think about what that means, the forecast for Saturday: a balmy 54 degrees at kickoff with showers throughout.