Back At It ... With A Vengeance

While the calendar may tell you the New Year started on Thursday, the new year for the Dartmouth football team started this morning. At 6:45, to be precise. That's when strength training for the 2009 season began in earnest for the Big Green. Coach Buddy Teevens is determined that the team will be bigger, stronger and faster next season and the feeling here is that the message probably came through loud and clear at Floren Varsity House. ... And that it is coming through loud and clear in Barcelona, where a group of sophomores – including a good portion of the offense line – is studying this winter.

In case you are wondering, it's 257 days until the 2009 opener against Colgate ;-)

Speaking of days until (or between) games, an Alert reader shared these numbers:

• 63 – number of days between Dartmouth's first game and last game
• 33– number of days between games for Oklahoma and Florida

The Daily Dartmouth is publishing again and has a look at the overall early decision Class of 2013. The story notes that 401 applicants were admitted, roughly 35 percent of the full class.

Did you catch any of the high school Under Armour All-America Game on ESPN last night? I saw a bit of it and came away with two thoughts:

First, those kids can play.

Second, watching players publicly announce their college intentions during the game – including one who had family members wearing hats of the schools competing for his services and then choosing one – was theatre of the absurd. Listening to the young men's comments being broadcast over the sound system during the game was excruciating.

Not that I watched for very long. My curiosity had been piqued because one of the players in the game was a center who had Penn among his final choices along with Florida State, Cal North Carolina and Boston College. And his decision, I found out this morning on the ESPN recruiting site, was ... Cal.