Monday, November 02, 2026

The Day After The Day After

 BGA Overtime had a note column last night and will have Your Mileage May Vary tonight.

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Dartmouth has a new commitment but the win over Harvard deserves top billing today. ;-)

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The Dartmouth has a story under the headline Dartmouth’s defensive onslaught delivers upset win over No. 13 Harvard HERE.

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The local Valley News has a game story HERE.

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SBNation's FCS Week 9 Recap: The Cream Rises begins with Dartmouth-Harvard HERE.

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Flo College's wrap headlined Stat kings: Who ruled FCS football in week 9? includes this (LINK):

(Xaden) Benson intercepted three passes against Dartmouth on Friday night, bringing his season total to nine and breaking Harvard's single-season school record. He also became the first Crimson player to record two three-interception games in a career.

Unfortunately for Benson, Dartmouth had an answer.

The Big Green intercepted Harvard quarterback Charlie Smith five times, including two picks by Best-Alston, and handed the previously undefeated Crimson a 24-14 loss. Harvard's defense won the individual interception battle through Benson, but Dartmouth won the game. 

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Looking ahead to this week's battle of Ivy League leaders against Princeton, old friend TigerBlog reminds us that Princeton coach Bob Surace tied his school record for career wins against Cornell a couple of days ago and will be bidding to break the tie against Dartmouth this Saturday. The record of 89 career wins was set 96 years ago. (LINK)

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StatsPerform's Craig Haley has a piece in The Analyst headlined FCS Playoff Bracket Predictions: Three Weeks Before Selection Sunday that continues to project Harvard as the Ivy League automatic qualifier and has the Crimson headed to 16 seed North Dakota. The winner would then travel to No. 1 seed Montana State. (LINK)

Green Alert Take: Should Dartmouth get the bid instead of Harvard and inherit that slot it would be a daunting but much more interesting challenge than staying in this region. It's always possible Dartmouth would instead slide into a slot Haley currently has for one of the other eastern qualifiers, with that team heading to North Dakota instead. Those other projections are: 

• Lehigh at No. 13 seed Monmouth, winner at No. 4 seed Youngstown State
• UAlbany at No. 9 seed Tennessee Tech, at No. 8 seed Illinois State
• Central Connecticut State at No. 11 seed Lamar, winner at No. 6 seed Northern Arizona

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And now for the commitment:

 Thomas is a 6-foot-2, 185-pound wide receiver from Indian Land HS in Fort Mill, S.C. His social media also reports offers from Brown, Davidson and Concord.

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EXTRA POINT
I suppose it could have been a prettier day on Maine's Mount Desert Island during our hike yesterday, but not much prettier. It's past peak foliage but as this shot just outside of Acadia National Park shows, it's still jigsaw puzzle beautiful.

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Sunday, November 01, 2026

Yesterday's Games

Here's the Saturday wrap with the game you might be most curious about this week at the top. ;-)

Princeton 21, Cornell 20
A blocked field goal with 4:07 left and an eight-yard Josh Smith touchdown catch with 1:33 remaining helped the Tigers score a dramatic come-from-behind win that sends them into week eight of the Ivy League season tied for the conference lead.
Smith had three touchdown and Josh Robinson 11 receptions for 122 yards for Princeton (5-2, 3-1 Ivy League), which was held to 14 yards on the ground but got 22-for-36 passing from 299 yards from its quarterback tandem of Ty Ciongoli and Wyatt Becker.
Garrett Bass-Sulpizio was 26-of-35 for 250 yards for Cornell (3-4, 1-3) which let a 20-7 third-quarter lead slip away before 5,097 at Princeton Stadium.

Yale 26, Columbia 8
Hugo Djeumeni Kemeni ran for 155 yards with a 63-yard touchdown run and the Bulldog defense limited the Lions to 34 yards on the ground in front of 3,024 at Wien Stadium.
Dante Reno was a modest 14-of-31 for 134 yards but had two touchdowns for Yale (4-3, 2-2). Chase Goodwin was 24-for-48 for 207 yards for Columbia (4-3, 1-3).
Lions’ freshman Bryce Coleman had an 11-yard reception in the third quarter and has at least one touchdown catch in all seven games this year.

Brown 36, Penn 17
The Bears limited Penn to 99 first-half yards and went on to their most lopsided Ivy League win since 2019, and biggest winning margin against a conference foe at Brown Stadium since 2015.
James Murphy was 15-of-25 for 230 yards and one touchdown for Brown (4-3, 2-2), which got 75 yards and one touchdown on the ground from Matt Childs.
Penn’s Miles Teodecki was 7-for-21 for 49 yards before being replaced by Karson Siqueiros-Lasky, who finished 18-of-26 for 193 yards and two touchdowns for the Quakers (3-4, 1-3), who were held to 56 yards on the ground. Attendance in Providence was 4,183.

Lehigh 31, Bucknell 30
Trailing the struggling Bison by three points late in the game, Lehigh (7-2, 5-1 Patriot) used a touchdown and field goal in the final 3:05 to go up seven and then had to hold on. Bucknell scored a touchdown with two seconds remaining but had the two-point conversion pass for the win get knocked down.
Luke Yoder ran for 183 yards and two touchdowns to set the Lehigh school record for rushing yards in a career with 4,338 and tie the TD record with 46. Bucknell (1-8, 0-6) had a 416-318 advantage in total yards. The game drew 4,313 to Bethlehem.

Monmouth 34, Bryant 21
Elijah Jennings ran for 175 yards and two touchdowns and Kenny Smith Jr. 157 yards and two scores to lift the Hawks (7-2, 6-0 CAA) to their sixth consecutive win.
Monmouth ran out to a 24-0 lead by the midway point of the second quarter and carried a comfortable 34-7 lead into the final period before Bryant (5-4, 3-2) scored a pair of touchdowns. A crowd of 3,642 looked on in New Jersey.

Merrimack 19, Wagner 14
Quarterback AJ Hairston capped a 75-yard drive with a four-yard touchdown run with 3:26 remaining to give the Warriors (4-5, independent) a come-from-behind win over Wagner (1-8, 0-4).
Hairston threw for 199 yards with Austin Palmer catching three passes for 101 yards. Attendance at Merrimack was 1,245.
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EXTRA POINT
Greetings from outside of Acadia National Park in Maine. To quote Chicago, "Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?"
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Saturday, October 31, 2026

Happy Halloween

 It's 5:30 in the morning as I write this, just a little more than five hours since my head hit the pillow. I'll be writing my full game story in the car while Mrs. BGA drives. All that is by way of saying you don't get much on this page today, but BGA Overtime will have that full game story at some point this a.m.

Again, there will be full coverage from Dartmouth's huge win today, Sunday, Monday and Tuesday.

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In the meantime, to hold you over, there's a full game story in the Harvard Crimson HERE.

The Dartmouth sports information story is HERE.

And the Harvard sports information recap is HERE.

The brief Associated Press story is HERE.

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EXTRA POINT
Have a Happy Halloween!
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Friday, October 30, 2026

Game Day

The BGA Overtime Dartmouth-Harvard preview was posted on the site last night HERE. There will be a quick recap of the game late tonight to be replaced with a full game story tomorrow morning.
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The forecast for tonight in Hanover at kickoff is 48 degrees (feels like 44), partly cloudy with the wind 8 mph out of the northwest.
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Kudos to the Harvard Crimson school newspaper for having a game preview HERE. Unfortunately, there's nothing in The Dartmouth.
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There's a surprisingly detailed Dartmouth-Harvard preview on a Yahoo site that ends this way (LINK):
I'm guessing this game will be close for three quarters, but Harvard should pull away and win this game by 14 points, while once again scoring 30-plus points in the process.

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SI.com has a bracketology story that includes this regarding the Ivy League and the playoffs (LINK):

Locks: None

Should Be In: None

Work To Do: Harvard, Dartmouth


Harvard clearly looks like the best team in the Ivy League after beating Princeton 35-7. They have a chance to cruise to the finish line and will have a shot at a Top 8 seed if they finish 10-0. Don't forget, the Crimson looked dominant last season at this point before falling apart late in the season.


Dartmouth is included here as they are the only other Ivy League team that controls its own destiny for the auto-bid. They only have one conference loss, but will play Harvard this week. It does not appear that the Ivy League has a real path to two bids unless Dartmouth can upset Harvard, and then the Crimson finishes 9-1.

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FloCollege’s FCS Playoff Predictions After Week 8 has Princeton one of the “First four out.” (LINK)

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Yahoo has a piece headlined 2027 NFL Draft Prospects to Watch in Week 9 that looks at who to focus on if you are watching the Dartmouth-Harvard game tonight. From the story (LINK):

This matchup has three names from the Shrine Bowl 1,000 watch list.

Harvard offensive tackle Spencer Doan did miss the Cornell game with an injury, but was back the next week. Harvard cornerback Damien Henderson is also of interest. For Dartmouth, safety Harrison Keith had six tackles and an interception last week against Columbia, so look for him.

Green Alert Take: As I often do with these "off brand" Yahoo and SI.com stories, I dug down a little deeper to see if this was written by a fan, by AI, or by a professional. It turns out this is an LWOS piece. With a little more digging, that's Last Word On Sports, whose writing FAQs include this: "You must be 16 years or older to write at LWOS." And the always important, "Be sure you proofread your article before submitting it."

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And if that isn't enough, FoxSports.com has a Dartmouth-Harvard statistical matchup that includes this "insight:"

The Crimson have registered 0 first downs in NCAA Division 1 for the 2026 regular season, good for fewest in the NCAAFB (min 400 first down opportunities; pop 264 teams).

Green Alert Take: Yeah, be careful swallowing what you see on the internet.

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EXTRA POINT
With Dartmouth playing on a Friday, Mrs. BGA and I are taking advantage of the rare weekend off* to head to Maine to see That Certain Dartmouth '14, That Certain Fellow and the new house they bought outside Acadia National Park, where they are now stationed. Given that it's at least a 5½ drive, Griff the Wonder Dog is staying with friends who picked him up yesterday on the way to their lake house and Mrs. BGA and I miss him.

* It's a weekend off only in that there's no game. I'm bringing my laptop and there will still be the usual BGA Overtime follow stories each day.
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Thursday, October 29, 2026

One Day Away

Dartmouth game notes for tomorrow's nationally televised showdown with Harvard have been posted:

Click HERE to access the notes.
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The Analyst includes a look at the Ivy League as part of a whip-around podcast headlined Around the FCS Football Conference Title Races. Here's a gently edited transcript of what co-hosts Craig Haley of StatsPerform and Zach McKinnell of FCS Football Central said about the Ancient Eight race (LINK):

Haley:The Ivy League is not quite the race that everybody expected. You have Harvard 3-0, (with) a win over Princeton at 2-1. The other 2-1 team is Dartmouth. And Harvard's at Dartmouth this week, so if they were to win that, they own the tiebreakers over those two teams, and that race is dwindling at that point.

McKinnell: The only race going on here is Harvard's race against itself just to finish undefeated. That's it. I think this is over. Harvard is by far the best team in this conference and I mean, they have been handling business now that they figured out their passing attack. That defense was already elite. (With) Charlie Smith started figuring it out offensively, this team is a terrifying matchup for a lot of those teams in the Ivy League that have been inconsistent. I think they probably win this weekend and I really do think they have a really, really good shot to finish 10-0. 

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The wise guys have installed Harvard as a 10½-point favorite for tomorrow's game. The venerable Dunkel Index expects it to be closer than that. (LINK)

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The Dartmouth has a lengthy story on the resignation of Provost Santiago Schnell for not being clear about the use of AI in his writings. (LINK)

The New York Times has a piece HERE, and Inside Higher Ed has a story that begins this way if you can believe it (LINK):

Dartmouth University Provost Santiago Schnell resigned Wednesday after a faculty-led review committee concluded that he “used AI to meaningfully alter his writing” and “fell short” of the university’s academic integrity standards.

Green Alert Take: Dartmouth University? In Inside Higher Ed of all places?

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EXTRA POINT
Remember the first time you saw Christmas commercials before Thanksgiving and you could only shake your head? I was on my way to practice yesterday when I passed a house where a large Merry Christmas sign hanging from scaffolding hinted at a yard full of decorations going up before Halloween!
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Wednesday, October 28, 2026

One Day Closer

Harvard wasted no time getting its game notes up on Tuesday:


Click HERE to access Harvard's notes for Saturday's game at Dartmouth.
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For a sneak peek at the team invading Buddy Teevens Stadium Friday night, check out the Harvard highlights from last week's win over Princeton:


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Dartmouth social media takes you somewhere you will probably never go – the Big Green's football locker room. Check it out:

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Hank Paulson '68, who went from All-Ivy offensive lineman to United States Treasury Secretary, returned to campus last week for a presentation on "the implications of AI for economic statecraft."

From a story pulled together by the college news service ( LINK):

Dartmouth appealed to him, (Paulson) said, in part because of its rural setting.

“You could go fishing, you could do all kinds of things. It had a Skiway, a football coach who recruited, and obviously a great undergraduate education. Dartmouth was formative for me,” said Paulson, an English major and All-Ivy offensive lineman who was also a member of Phi Beta Kappa.

Paulson, twice an honorable-mention All-Ivy and a first-team pick as a senior, was Dartmouth's second recipient of an NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship.

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Bwog, an independent, student-run campus news site at Columbia has a story spun out of last week's football game under the headline, We’ll Get ‘Em Next Year: The Homecoming Experience. The story references the Lion's "humiliating" defeat and includes this (LINK):

If I had to leave one piece of parting advice, it’s to just go to the football game anyways. Even if you don’t like football, just go. It’s fun! People are there, tickets are free so you can leave whenever, and the soft pretzels are really good. Just have fun, and remember that some people go to schools where they actually expect good football and they don’t even get that. Go Lions!

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On a hike last week I listened to a 99% Invisible podcast headlined The Problem With Football Helmets. From the episode's 99% Invisible intro page (LINK):

(R)ecent concern around concussions and CTE have raised the question of whether it’s technically possible to develop a helmet that can totally prevent injuries during gameplay. “I remember chatting with a doctor who said, unless you strapped the helmet to a player’s shoulders so that your head couldn’t move around on your neck, the helmet really can’t do all that much to prevent a concussion,” says Kathleen Bachynski, an associate professor of public health at Muhlenberg College. “I do think you can tweak design around the edges, but I think you’re up against the law of physics.” As debate rages around the safety of America’s most popular sport, helmets will continue to be a flashpoint.
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EXTRA POINT
The thermometer read 22.1 degrees when I let Griff the Wonder Dog out this morning here at our Vermont hillside home, and sometime when I wasn't looking the colorful foliage bordering the sugar bush next to our house all blew down. This is the time of year in Vermont that spawned the song that helped turn a local singer/songwriter into an international star:
 
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Tuesday, October 27, 2026

Gearing Up For Friday Night Lights

Warning: The curmudgeons are stoppng by BGA Overtime tonight. I you check in before then you can read Your Mileage May Vary and not let the old guys bother you. (LINK)

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Ever wonder what a football locker room sounds like after a convincing win? Thanks to Dartmouth's social media, wonder no more!

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From Roar Lions podcaster Jake Novak after seeing Dartmouth firsthand on Saturday (LINK):

(Harvard has) an interesting test coming up at Dartmouth this Saturday. We know that Dartmouth, when they're playing well, can play very well. And they seem to have put most of it together against Columbia on Saturday.

But Harvard's going to be a much bigger, bigger opponent, a tougher opponent to deal with. What's interesting about this Harvard team is it really reminds me of the Harvard teams of the mid-2000s, 2006, '07, '08, '09, 10, when Harvard just had an amazing defense. And sometimes their offenses were great, too. 

Jake will offer up his pick later in the week, but in the meantime, here's his weekly Power Poll, which has Dartmouth fifth for the second week in a row.

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

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• Massey has Harvard winning, 27-20, with 73 percent confidence. (Massey predicted a 27-24 Dartmouth win last week with 60 percent confidence.)

• Sagarin has Harvard as a 9.5-point favorite. (Sagarin had Columbia as a three-point favorite over Dartmouth last week.)

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Blogger Paul Justafan makes an interesting point (LINK):

The Big Green . . .  control their own destiny. Because of Yale’s second loss, Dartmouth wins the Ivy Championship if it wins out. If the Big Green finish 6-1, they go to the playoffs based on the win over Harvard.

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Punter Luke Armistead, tailback Jacob Henry, safety Harrison Keith, and quarterback Grayson Saunier made the Ivy League honor roll last week. (LINK) 

Green Alert Take: Uh, Myles Craddock and his 128 rushing yards?

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From Dartmouth social media:

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An Associated Press story notes that "10 four-year colleges and universities started or re-started (football) programs this season, the most in a single year since 2013."

Wonder why? Here's the story's headline:

Small colleges are starting football programs, hoping to boost enrollment as student shortage looms.

Find the story HERE.

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EXTRA POINT
As this space suggested I probably would, I took the '84 VW poptop camper to my hiking trail yesterday, parked it in the sun and wrote in my "mobile office" before hiking.

It is just a two-mile drive to the trail, albeit on a very narrow, very hilly dirt road. What occurred to me as I drove a four-speed bus was how I transitioned from my EV to a four-speed transmission without giving a single thought to using the clutch and shifting. Apart from the VW, we haven't had a standard transmission in a long time but driving one was so natural that I never gave one scintilla of thought to the shifting process. I just did it. Muscle memory, I guess. ;-)
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Monday, October 26, 2026

A New Name

BGA Overtime had What They Did & What They Said last night. Come back tonight for Your Mileage May Vary, one of BGA OT's most read features. (LINK)

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Heading Dartmouth way next year is defensive lineman Jonathan Ibeawuchi of Rock Bridge HS and Columbia, Mo. The 6-foot-1, 265-pound Ibeawuchi, whose social media shows some impressive weightlifting numbers, also has offers from Arkansas State and Missouri State. (LINK)

Ibeawuchi is the 21st recruit BGA has identified in this cycle. Find the list before his commitment by scrolling down HERE.

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Speaking of recruiting, former Yale receiver Mason Shipp has done some digging and has an interesting post on his social media that begins this way:
It seems like anybody can beat anybody this year in the Ivy League

Except Harvard

Harvard is one of three undefeated teams remaining in the entire  @NCAA_FCS
 and is the only undefeated team in @IvyLeague conference play thus far

I was curious to see if their early season dominance links back to recruiting

My findings: They stand in a league of their own

When a recruit holds a Harvard offer & an offer to another Ivy League program (and commits to one of them), the recruit picks Harvard 65% of the time

Find Shipp's full post HERE, and be sure to bring up his chart of how many recruits at each Ivy League school turned down Harvard offers. His study suggests Dartmouth and Yale lead the way with three each.

Green Alert Take: The sense here is the numbers may not be completely accurate but the picture they paint is – if that makes any sense.

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The local Valley News has a Columbia game story HERE.

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The Columbia Spectator has a story HERE.

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Here's a video recap from Dartmouth's social media:

Recap

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Click HERE for another story about Dave Shula '81, the former record-setting Dartmouth wide receiver and later assistant coach, returning to run Shula's Restaurant Group.

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EXTRA POINT
The hourly forecast for our part of northern New England  suggests it will be mostly sunny with a high in the low 60s today. With colder weather just around the corner, this seems like a perfect day to fire up the '84 VW camper, park it somewhere interesting in the sun, and get some writing done in my "mobile office." There won't be many more opportunities before "Wiffle" heads into the garage for winter storage, and who knows what the future holds for the bus when it comes out of hibernation in the spring?


I ruined my share of model airplanes and cars growing up but Mrs. BGA gave me this kit not long after we got our bus and I have to say I did an OK job with it. Since putting this together I replaced the canvas poptop with a gray one that has screen windows on the side, but apart from that, this is a pretty fair representation of our old bus.

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While I'm in a weather forecasting mode, it could still change but the temperature at kickoff for Friday's game against Harvard is projected to be 57 degrees, going down to 48 by the end of the game. There's full sun in the forecast during the day and just a light breeze expected. Perfect.
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