Old friend Jake Novak has been a big believer in the Dartmouth football program the past few years. But the popular Roar Lions Columbia blogger is on a bit of an island in the Ivy League predictions he posted this week. Here's how he sees the Ancient Eight playing out:
1. Harvard
2. Columbia
3. Yale
4. Princeton
5. Dartmouth
6. Penn
7. Cornell
8. Brown
I haven't seen anyone picking Dartmouth that low and the Ivy League media poll, in fact, has the Big Green as co-favorite with Harvard.
Three things to keep in mind.
1. Jake follows this stuff closer than any of the national media, and that includes The Analyst, HERO Sports, Lindy's and the rest. He's seen these teams and doesn't base his opinions on things he's read.
2. Although he's an unabashed Columbia fan, he's generally much more realistic about the team he covers than most bloggers.
3. While that fifth-place selection for Dartmouth is a stunner, Jake does qualify his rankings this way:
Make no mistake, Princeton and Dartmouth will be good teams this season. But the graduation losses for each team are just too steep to predict a championship for either squad. Both still COULD win the title, it's just a bad move to pencil them in at this point.
This says good things about the Ivies overall; it's a league with its talent spread out better than almost any other conference in the BCS or FBS.
That's why I believe any one of the top 5 teams in my preseason predicted finish could win the championship this season.
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Kudos to William & Mary Athletic directory Brian Mann ’02 on a great last month or so. During camp the former Dartmouth quarterback welcomed his second son, and last night he watched as the Tribe piled up 560 yards in a 41-24 win at Charlotte. That marked William & Mary’s first win over an FBS opponent since it defeated Virginia in 2009.
As an aside, W&M reportedly earned $300,000 of the privilege of beating Charlotte. (LINK)
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In a couple other games perhaps of some local interest, Holy Cross knocked off Merrimack, 31-17, and Villanova overpowered Lehigh, led by onetime Dartmouth defensive coordinator and Holy Cross coach Tom Gilmore, 45-17.
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The media around the UConn football program have discovered what we around the Dartmouth football program learned over the past few years. Dartmouth grad transfer offensive lineman Jake Guidone is a go-to guy for a quote. This is from a story about the Huskies having to turn to a freshman quarterback (LINK):
Center Jake Guidone, a graduate student who played the past four years at Dartmouth, vividly remembers the emotions he experienced during his college football debut, which came as a substitute in the Big Green’s game against Brown at Fenway Park on Nov. 10, 2017.
“There’s a mixture of nervousness and anticipation and excitement,” Guidone said Tuesday. “I think you’ve got to handle those three, because they all work together. If you can turn that nervous feeling into excitement and energy, anyone can really excel. … He’s a very mature kid for his age. I’m expecting greatness out of him. And again, if we can give him the time and he’s able to make the necessary reads, he will succeed in this offense.”
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The first Dartmouth intrasquad scrimmage is this morning at 10. Be sure to stop by BGA Premium tonight for a recap. The Big Green will have another scrimmage Thursday before beginning preparation for the Sept. 17 opener against Valparaiso.
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EXTRA POINT
Maybe I've done it before. I don't recall.
On the way to practice yesterday I reset the odometer on my car to check the mileage from here to Memorial Field. It's exactly, and I mean exactly 30 miles. While that's a fair bit more than the seven miles it was from our old house on the shoulder of Moose Mountain in rural Hanover to Memorial Field, the drive down lightly traveled I-91 is relaxing, incredibly beautiful and a welcome chance to decompress.
I've always been pretty guarded about putting mileage on my cars. I don't know, maybe it's about being able to put "low miles" in the classifies when I sell them, or maybe being able to justify to myself driving a 12-year-old car because it has just 75,000 or so miles on it.
That likely won't be the case when we eventually sell our EV because in addition to my drives back-and-forth to Hanover, every last time Mrs. BGA and I are going anywhere these days we use my car instead of her car. When electricity is free because of your solar tracker and you have an electric car, only a fool would pay for gas.
If the mileage is relatively high when we do decide to sell the EV we'll still have an ace in the hole. B
ecause of a recall, our car will be receiving a brand new battery "pack" for free. We were initially disappointed when we learned it could take upwards of two years (or more) before our model year has the new battery installed, but in thinking about it that's not such a bad thing. Think about it. When we get around to advertising the car for sale we will be able to point to "low miles on the battery," instead of high miles on the motor. ;-)
