Many Happy Returns

In what should be a surprise to no one, Dartmouth's Shawn Abuhoff has been selected the Ivy League Special Teams Player of the Week. From the release:

Dartmouth junior cornerback/return specialist Shawn Abuhoff (Hialeah, Fla.) brought back a punt for a touchdown for the third time this year, tying a school record, in the Big Green's 35-28 loss to Brown. No other player in FCS has more than two, and the only player in Division I who has equaled that total is Oregon's Cliff Harris who has four. He totaled 104 punt return yards, bolstered by his electrifying 76-yard return for for a score. Due to his return prowress, the Bears continually avoided him on kickoffs, squibbing several kicks.

Junior running back Nick Schwieger (86 rushing yards, 45 receiving yards) and freshman linebacker Bronson Green (11 tackles, pass breakup) were named to the Ivy League honor roll.

*

On his Roar Lions Roar blog Jake Novak makes the case for various potential Asa Bushnell Cup candidates as Ivy League MVP. While Jake mentions Nick Schwieger and Charles Bay, Abuhoff has to be in the conversation. In addition to being the Ivy League leader in pass breakups, he is tied for second in the Ivies in interceptions, and as a defensive player has scored four touchdowns this fall despite the fact that as the season has progressed teams have tried harder and harder to keep the ball out of his hands.

*

Click here for the latest edition of defensive back Kevin De Regt's blog The Deregtory. It includes some behind-the-scenes scoop on running that big "D" flag onto the field to start the game.

*

The Sports Network/Fathead.com FCS Top-25 College Football Poll

14. New Hampshire
16. Penn
38. Yale
43. Harvard
57. Brown

Green Alert Take: Voters in the TSN poll pick the only top 25 teams, meaning there are people who had Yale, Harvard or Brown in their top 25. As the list of names after the poll shows, I am one of the voters, and for as much as I would love to see more Ivy League teams in the rankings, my lone Ivy League vote was for Penn at No. 14. (I had UNH at No. 13 and Lehigh at No. 25.)

FCS Coaches Poll

16. Penn
31. Harvard

Roar Lions Roar Power Rankings

1. Harvard
2. Yale
3. Brown
4. Harvard
5. Dartmouth
6. Columbia
7. Cornell
8. Princeton

*

The Daily Pennsylvanian has a story on Penn playing like champions after the death of captain Owen Thomas last spring. Coach Al Bagnoli:

“You can play the best football you’re capable of playing in honor of him, or you can dwell on it for too long and maybe stumble. ... To our kids’ credit, I thought they did a really good job of really honoring Owen, devoting the season to Owen. Really he was front and center in everything we were trying to do.”

*

From Marketwatch.com: "Intel Corporation today announced that it is collaborating with industry experts and several universities to tackle the issue of football-related head injuries."

One of the colleges involved: Dartmouth and the Thayer School of Engineering.

*

The New York Times writes about Cornell's wrestling team being ranked No. 1 in the nation. That's right. Ahead of Iowa and Oklahoma and the rest. From the Times (and thanks for the link):

It is the first time a team from the Ivy League, which prohibits athletic scholarships, has had the top ranking in wrestling and is one of the rare times an Ivy team has been ranked No. 1 outside sports like lacrosse, fencing, squash, and ice or field hockey.

The full NCAA wrestling rankings can be found here.

*

Early decision applications for Dartmouth are setting a record. Again. The Daily Dartmouth has a story.

*

As you may know, Dartmouth is going to change over from its traditional BlitzMail to a Microsoft Online – my Mac just shuddered – mail service. Anyway, looking for a catchy nickname for the new service, a transition team came up with five final choices, sent out a survey with suggestions and is conducting a vote according to a story in the Daily D.

Green Alert Take: Next thing you know they'll be voting on a mascot for the new service. Nah, probably not.

*

Speaking of computers, former Dartmouth placekicker (and occasional punter) Erik Hinterbichler got some nice pub when a program he wrote for the Mac's native email program was labeled, "The Coolest Mail Plugin Tool Ever," by the website Mac360. You can find Erik's program on his website here. And you can learn a little more about Hinterbichler, a teammate of Maurice Clarett's on the 2001 All-USA football first team as named by USA Today, here. Maurice and Erik have since gone in different directions ;-)