The March-April Dartmouth Alumni Magazine has a column written by Spencer Brown under the heading, Ask the Expert: Find Your Mental Strength.
Dartmouth's director of strength and conditioning writes (LINK):
"Student athletes live in a stressful environment. When they walk in the doors of the weight room we want them to leave all that other stuff outside and just be here right now. …
"We had the football team do what we call crocodile breathing: just lying on your stomach with your head on your hands and focusing on belly breathing, taking deep breaths in and out as big as you possibly can. It usually goes for a minimum of about two minutes. Most of the guys fall asleep in that two minutes—which tells you a little bit about their fatigue levels."
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The Roar Lions Roar blog has a note about Columbia defensive coordinator Paul Ferraro retiring. (LINK)
Clearly one of the highlights of Ferraro's final season with the Lions came on Oct. 21 when Columbia defeated Dartmouth, 19-0, handing the Big Green its first shutout since 2011. Ironically, Ferraro's first season in the Ivy League was spent as a member of the first staff Buddy Teevens assembled at Dartmouth after moving over from the University of Maine.
Curious about that staff from 35 years ago? Teevens coached quarterbacks and called the plays. The rest of the staff (from the 1987 press guide):
Brud Bicknell – running backs
Steve Robichaud – offensive line
Glenn Pires – defensive line
Mike Hutchins – outside linebackers
Desmond Robinson – inside linebackers
Paul Ferraro – defensive backs
How have things changed? These days Teevens' coaching staff features nine position coaches along with two quality control assistants.
By the way, Ferraro moved on from Dartmouth after one year. His replacement was John Lyons, who after four season in Hanover would become head coach when Teevens left for Tulane.
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The Boston Globe has a story (LINK) about EJ Perry at the NFL Combine that begins with an anecdote about the video (LINK) of the former Brown quarterback picking up trash after his final session. The story speculates that he might be the first Ivy League quarterback chosen in the draft since Harvard's Ryan Fitzpatrick.
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While the FBS is stubbornly refusing to expand its playoff beyond four teams, there's a push for the FCS to add four teams to its postseason field and bring the total to 28. It would not require taking on any more weeks to the playoffs. (LINK)
Green Alert Take: Earth to Ivy League presidents. Earth to Ivy League presidents, the ship could be leaving without you.
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EXTRA POINT
Last night on Jeopardy there was a contestant who told host Ken Jennings during the chat session that he was qualified to work as a test tutor because, "I'm the only person that I'm aware of who has four perfect scores on the high school standardized tests. Two on the SATs, one on the ACT and one on the PSAT."
The fellow said it with a smile and he somehow managed not to come across as a braggart. Good thing because when Final Jeopardy rolled around the scoreboard on his podium read minus $2,400 in bright red numbers. Needless to say, he was nowhere to be seen when the other two contestants missed the final question.
