When Penn won the 1998 Ivy League title, the quarterback was 6-foot-4 Matt Rader, a former starter at Duke. After two years with Rader at the helm, 6-6 Gavin Hoffman – who had starting experience at Northwestern – moved under center. He guided the Quakers to the 2000 Ivy League title, started for three years and still holds Penn career records for passing yards, completions and touchdowns.
Harvard also had a notable transfer from Northwestern in tailback Clifton Dawson. All he did was make the All-Ivy first team four times, graduate as the Ivy League's leading all-time rusher and help the Crimson to the 2004 Ivy championship.
At Yale Witt follows in the footsteps of tailback Rashad Bartholomew and safety Than Merrill, who helped the Bulldogs to the 1999 Ivy crown. Bartholomew, who graduated as Yale's career rushing leader, transferred from Air Force while Merrill, who had been in Stanford's camp as a quarterback, turned into a two-time, All-Ivy safety and an NFL player.
Dartmouth also has benefited from BCS transfers in the not-too-distant past. The leading rusher on the undefeated 1996 team was tailback Greg Smith, a transfer from Missouri. The fullback was Pete Oberle, who originally attended Colorado State. Oberle led Dartmouth in rushing in '93 and '94 while Smith led the Green ground game in '95 and '96.
Not all transfers from big-time schools pan out, of course. In 2002 Dartmouth welcomed a transfer quarterback from the Big Ten, but he threw just three passes that fall and left the team the next year after appearing in just two games and being replaced as starter by Charlie Rittgers.
The Yale Daily News has a story about new Yale quarterback Patrick Witt here. In an interesting accident of timing, the Harvard Crimson Magazine has a lengthy piece about athletes deciding to, as the cliche says, "pursue other options," that starts with the story of Witt's brother Jeff, a former Crimson quarterback. From the article:
Some, like Witt, cannot accustom themselves to the fact that they are putting in a Division I level of commitment while receiving paltry payoffs in appreciation and success.The Dartmouth football website has a feature on Kyle Cavanaugh, the talented but hard-luck senior safety who is finally healthy this spring and looking forward to returning to the gridiron next fall as a fifth-year senior.
The 2009 class of the College Football Hall of Fame was announced yesterday and center William Henry Lewis, who played at Harvard in 1892-93, was elected. Lewis was the first black ever to be named a first-team All-American. Find a release here.
There are a couple of stories this morning about the Ivy League Championship baseball series between Dartmouth and Cornell slated for this weekend. The Cornell Sun does a very nice job analyzing Dartmouth's team. The Daily Dartmouth also looks mostly at the Big Green's season.
If you are in town for Saturday's Green-White scrimmage (Memorial Field at 10 a.m.) and cross over to watch the baseball game, you'll come across a familiar name. The third baseman for Cornell is none other than Nathan Ford, the Ivy League's leading passer last fall. A potential pro prospect, Ford has understandably been named the Cornell Sun's Athlete of the Year.
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