Fun Friday

Greetings from Bellefonte, Pa., about a 12-mile straightaway from Penn State's Beaver Stadium. Two things of note:

1. The internet at our KOA campground is a world faster than the internet we have up on Moose Mountain. Pretty sad.
2. Sadder yet. I'm blogging to you from a campground. That campgrounds have wi-fi and that I'd be taking time to do this? Ugh.

First order of business, today's scrimmaging schedule has changed a few times. As of 9:45 this a.m., the team will be on the field at 4:15 with the scrimmaging set to begin sometime thereafter. The timing is dependent on the dedication of the new baseball stadium, also taking place this afternoon.

The Dartmouth sports information website has a thorough look at spring football so far here. It includes this thought:

Coach Teevens is adamant not only about making a commitment to running the ball much more in 2009, but also in defending the run much better.

Senior linebacker Andrew Dete and senior punter Brian Scullin have been honored by the National Football Foundation as scholar-athletes. Find a story here. From the release:

The National Football Foundation & College Hall of Fame (NFF) announced today the members of the 2009 NFF Hampshire Honor Society, which is comprised of college football players from all divisions of play who each maintained a 3.2 GPA or better.

Former Dartmouth tight end Casey Cramer of the Tennessee Titans joined a couple of teammates visiting wounded soldiers at Fort Campbell army post in Kentucky. A short blurb is here.

Harvard's spring football game will be played tomorrow night, the third year in a row it is being played under the lights. The Crimson has a story. An aside: Wouldn't it be fun if Dartmouth could do the same thing? Hmmm, how about over at Scully-Fahey now that it is FieldTurf?

Maine is dropping men's soccer and volleyball "to preserve the overall integrity and competitiveness of University of Maine athletics during these difficult economic times." The Bangor Daily News has the story. Although the first reaction is a shudder when you hear about dropping sports, I'm here to tell you I've had a number of people suggest Dartmouth needs to think along the same lines. Don't shoot the messenger; I'm only sharing what some of the readers of the blog have written.

Princeton sports information often pioneers new ground and it seems TigerTown is up to its old (new?) tricks by purchasing an inexpensive FlipCamera and turning it over to folks for quick and dirty (not that kind of dirty) video reports. Find a TigerCam report on spring football here.

The Daily Dartmouth has a story about the closing of two Hanover restaurants in the same building; Carpaccio and Quiznos. Location is cited as an issue by both managers and I can understand why. I never even saw the first restaurant and while the second has been closed for a month, I didn't even know it because it was hidden away on the second floor of a building. Whoever heard of a fast-food restaurant on a second floor in a town the size of Hanover?

The story notes that the nearest sandwich shop is now an 8-mile drive away. I'd love to see Hanover land a Jimmy Johns, where we will have lunch today. Great college-town business. Cheap and fast, fast, fast, exactly the way a sandwich shop should be.

And finally, for some reason Athlon Sports has reprised a preview of one of Buddy Teevens' Stanford teams. It's interesting reading because it shows whether he's wearing Cardinal or Green, the man is true to his color.

OK, one more thing. The drive out to Penn State in the '84 VW bus went off without a hitch. We stopped for about an hour at Bucknell, which we had visited about a month ago and confirmed the earlier impression of that certain Hanover High junior. It's a pretty neat place.