The Dartmouth has a story about what the Big Green football program – which has about half of the squad on campus – is doing this fall HERE. From the story:
(Coach Buddy) Teevens said that the team will have a “socially distanced introduction” to practices after quarantine ends next Monday. Initially, the training staff will closely monitor conditioning, assessing players’ physiological and cardiovascular health.
And . . .
Following that initial phase, Teevens said that the team will gather in smaller “pods” of under 10 people to run through on-field work for the rest of the quarter.
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This used to happen back in the '80s. You know, when Dartmouth actually had a golf course.
After the club was shut down for the fall and before the first snow a few individuals associated with the course would head out one day and create their own layout, playing from one tee to the wrong hole, zig-zagging around like bumper cars at Old Orchard Beach. They called the event, "Red flag berzerko."
Welcome to college football in the fall of 2020, Red Flag Bezerko on the gridiron. Already, the following games have been canceled or postponed: NC State-Virginia Tech, Marshall-ECU, Lousiana-Troy, SMU-TCU, Tulsa-Oklahoma State, Temple-Navy, Louisiana Tech-Baylor, Rice-Marshall, UAB-Rice, Virginia-Virginia Tech, Houston-Memphis, BYU-Army, Central Arkansas-Arkansas State, Charlotte-North Carolina, Florida Atlantic-Georgia Southern, Houston-Baylor and more.
Despite that, the Big Ten has decided to play next month. Now UMass, an independent, is trying to scrape together a schedule. You blink your eyes and suddenly FCS member Southern Illinois has come off the mat with intention to schedule a game against Southeast Missouri. (LINK) And now the first Division III game has popped up like a mushroom overnight – Merchant Marine Academy against Coast Guard Academy. (LINK)
Some schools are planning to play in the spring. Some have said they'll play a game or two in the fall and then play in the spring. Some (read: the Ivy League) haven't officially decided what they are going to do.
Green Alert Take: And where, exactly is the governing body of college athletics while all the Red Flag Berzerko is taking place? Twiddling its thumbs? It certainly seems as if Football 2020 has exposed the NCAA as an organization that is not up to the task.
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Here's a strong candidate for a Sports Illustrated Sign of the Apocalypse: Sacred Heart University plans to add women's wresting as a varsity sport next fall.
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From the Valley News (LINK):
Despite a turbulent spring on Wall Street, Dartmouth College’s endowment rose to a record $5.98 billion as the college’s investments generated a return of 7.6% for fiscal year 2020, the college said Monday.
The announcement that the endowment had generated $399 million in returns and grew in total by more than $240 million since June 2019 came as Dartmouth has started to lay off and furlough some staff workers, citing both a projected $83 million shortfall for FY 2021 in the COVID-19 pandemic and a looming structural deficit.
Dartmouth president Phil Hanlon is quoted in the story and he . . .
". . . repeated what other top Dartmouth officials have said: that the endowment should not be regarded “as a checking account and used for whatever today’s needs are,” both because of restrictions on some gifts to the endowment and because of its role as “an ongoing, long-term source of support for the institution.”
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Since drought concentrates the sugars in leaves, our dry summer could actually lead to more intense foliage color, especially if it’s kick-started with an early cold spell. So the ideal scenario would be an active storm track from La Niña bringing cold fronts out of Canada early and often, leading to a vibrant display that makes up for in color what it might lack in longevity.
Dartmouth's next scheduled home game would have been Oct. 3 against Penn, and if this foliage forecast is right, the Upper Valley could be post-peak by then.
