Looking At The Lombardi Bowl

Three of the eight Ivy Leaguers on the early watch list for the Lombardi Bowl, "the first- ever NCAA-compliant FCS-only Senior All-Star game," are Dartmouth players. On the list are Shawn Abuhoff as a return specialist, tailback Nick Schwieger and offensive lineman Ryan O'Neill.

Other Ivy Leaguers on the early list of candidates:

Brown - DB AJ Cruz
Columbia - OL Jeff Adams
Penn - OL Greg Van Roten, DB Erik Rask
Yale - LB Jordan Haynes

Find a release about the game here, and a website for the game here. From the latter page:

Long overdue, national recognition of NCAA Division I-AA football, its past and present, will be the focus of the Inaugural Lombardi Bowl that will take place over the MLK national holiday weekend. The highlight will occur Monday (January 16) when the Lombardi Bowl will be contested at the Virginia Beach Sportsplex as the nightcap of a unique gridiron doubleheader, following the Hansen (D-III) Bowl.

Among those on the board of directors of the bowl game with close ties to the Ivy League are Craig Haley of The Sports Network (former Princeton beat writer), Patriot League media director Matt Dougherty (onetime Dartmouth sports information intern), Steve Conn (Yale director of sports information) and Kurt Svoboda (Harvard director of sports information).

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The Star Newspapers site out of Texas has a terrific look at Dartmouth linebacker Tyler Melancon. The piece begins this way:

Dartmouth is filled with high-level athletes, elite students and superb scientific researchers.

Senior Tyler Melancon, a Plano East alum, just happens to be all three.

Melancon is a standout outside linebacker for the Big Green football team, a Norris Cotton Cancer Center Research Fellow, John L. Murphy Family Fund Award winner and intricately involved with cancer research at Dartmouth Medical.

From later in the story . . .

In conjunction with The Tucker Foundation, Melancon traveled to the Dominican Republic in March as part of an alternative Spring Break.

"That was a life-changing moment," Melancon said. "We got to work with a Haitian migrant community on a variety of improvement projects. We painted a lot and built infrastructure for an internet center.

"It was a really humbling experience that opened my eyes."

And this . . .

A typical day for Melancon during the summer has consisted of working in the lab from 7 a.m.-3 p.m., though that is sometimes extended to 5 p.m. if experiments are ongoing. From there, the former Panther works out until 8 p.m., grabs some food and goes to the library, where he also works. Melancon then returns home for bed, which is at 11 p.m. or midnight, "on a good day," and starts the process over again the next day.

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Closer to home, That Certain Hanover High Senior has enjoyed a terrific week of qualifying for the powerhouse Hanover golf team this week. He played football as a freshman and loved it, but being "vertically challenged" he switched to the little white ball as a sophomore and while he misses football, he'll be part of a team this fall that will be in the running for a state championship.

That Certain Hanover High Graduate appears to have put the sore knee behind her and has been running without pain for the past week or 10 days. She worked hard on the machines in the gym and in the pool while she was sidelined and hopefully that kept her from falling too far behind heading into cross country season.

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Next on tap on Big Green Alert premium is the Princeton preview, which will be posted later today. While I'm at it, thanks to those recent grads and their parent who have continued their BGA subscriptions. Hopefully there will be some good reading this year!