Top O' the Mornin'

Dartmouth President Jim Yong Kim has been an ardent and outspoken advocate for the Big Green football team, but he has nothing on Tulane's Scott Cowen, one of Time Magazine's Top 10 Best College Presidents.

In coordination with Tulane AD Rick Dickson, Cowen kicked off the (revolutionary?) TulanePlayBook.com this week. Cowen, in a Times-Picayune story:

"You don’t have to wait a decade. I don’t have the patience to wait a decade. ... So from the board down to me down to the athletic department, we’re here to let you know this is our line of sight now, our line of sight is football, and we’re going to work as hard and long as it takes to get this done.”

If you want to see a thorough statement of purpose, by all means check out this Tulane Playbook PDF. Whether it will work remains to be seen, but it is clear these guys mean business. If you don't believe it, fast-forward through this introduction of the Playbook video to the 31:45 mark where Cowen says:

In the end there is only one way there is only one way I will measure success and that is wins and losses.

Dartmouth coach Buddy Teevens, of course, was the Tulane head coach from 1992-96. The Green Wave was 4-8 last fall and hasn't had a winning season since 2002.

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Following up on yesterday's post about Ivy League facilities, a little hardball between politicians could slow progress on Columbia's 48,000-square foot Campbell Sports Center. The New York Daily News has a short story under the headline:

Turf war between City Councilmen delays construction on new Columbia University sports center

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Longtime opponent Colgate will appear in a dome for the second time in three years when it plays South Dakota in 2012 in the Dakota Dome. The Raiders visited Syracuse last fall for a game in the Carrier Dome.

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So far so good for onetime Dartmouth baseball standout – and jayvee quarterback – Eddie Lucas in his bid to make the Atlanta Braves roster. MLB.com wrote earlier this week:

The Braves are excited about what they've seen from Lucas during the first two weeks of the Grapefruit League season. The versatile utility man had hit .391 (9-for-23) with a triple entering Monday afternoon's game against the Cardinals.

Drafted as a shortstop in the eighth round of the 2004 First-Year Player Draft, Lucas has spent most of his Minor League career proving to be versatile. He has played a majority of his games as a third baseman and shown the ability to play the outfield.

Said Lucas:

"I've just done whatever I could do to stay in the lineup. I pride myself on my ability to play everywhere and I'm comfortable everywhere."

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Cornell is bidding this week to become the first Eastern team to win the NCAA wrestling title since Penn State in 1953. The Cornell Sun has a story about the NCAA's, being held in Philadelphia. The top five teams in the nation in the latest rankings:

1. Cornell
2. Iowa
3. Oklahoma State
4. Penn State
5. Wisconsin

Iowa has won 23 national championships on the mat since 1975.

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Interesting quote from Oregon State football coach Mike Riley about the direction college football recruiting is taking. From The Oregonian:

“It’s almost turning into something like AAU basketball,’’ said Riley, who is fearful that a player’s high school coach could become less and less important in the recruiting process, just as HS basketball coaches have become almost irrelevant.

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Good luck with your brackets ;-)