Tuesday's This And That

The mention in a recent USA Today column by former Harvard receiver Corey Mazza that one of his Marine Corps training partners is former Dartmouth defensive back/outfielder Jason Blydell sent me scurrying for a little more background. I came across this December mention of Blydell completing Officer Candidate School in Quantico, Va. (Editor's Note: If you know of other former Dartmouth players serving in the armed forces, drop me an email.)

I also stumbled across an undated Dartmouth Alumni page "Catching up" Q&A with former tight end Casey Cramer. The page features a photo of the Tennessee Titans' fullback/tight end carrying the ball against the Miami Dolphins and some interesting thoughts by the always interesting Cramer.

And as long as we are on the alumni trail, the Chronicle-Telegram has a story that expands on the May 14 posting about former Dartmouth pitcher Josh Faiola being put up in an assisted living facility while pitching for the Lake Erie Crushers independent team. Turns out Faiola's wife was looking forward to bingo with the residents and she joked that having daily meals prepared for her husband was setting a bad precedent:

“I told them I didn't think that was a good idea, because he was going to expect that from me when we went back home,” she said.

On the surface, this is a shocker. Bill Tierney, who led Princeton to six national championships, eight national title games and a 238-86 record in 22 seasons, is departing Old Nassau for the University of Denver. But a quote from an Inside Lacrosse story helps explain Tierney's reason for moving on:

“If I fall on my face and end up in a pile of snow, so be it,” he said in an exclusive interview with IL.com. “But I feel like I felt 23 years ago when I came to Princeton. I feel scared, I feel excited, I feel young. And these are all feelings that 57-year olds don’t normally get the opportunity to feel.”

Find the Inside Lacrosse story here and the Denver press release here.

An emailer yesterday explained why the video of Dartmouth football's lift test mentioned on yesterday's blog was flipped. Turns out it was filmed with a laptop that automatically flips the video so that when you record yourself the picture resembles a mirrored image. Because we are all used to seeing ourselves in the mirror, it's supposedly less disconcerting when we are sitting at the keyboard and see our image backwards on the screen in front of us. I believe that's the theory, at least ;-)