Tuesday, August 22, 2023

They Were 'That' Close

A Tweet post that popped up this morning was a reminder of just how small the difference can be between a very tough season and a very good one. The post noted that Dartmouth was among the nation's leaders in close losses a year ago, dropping five games by seven or fewer points, something that I'd actually forgotten. Turn those games around and a 3-7 record becomes an 8-2 season. The Ivy League mark goes to 6-1.

The losses were by seven points (in overtime), six points (in two overtimes), four, three and three points.

In case you forgot, here are the scores from 2023:

Dartmouth  35, Valparaiso 13

at Sacred Heart 38, Dartmouth  31 (ot)

Penn  23, Dartmouth  17 (ot)

at Yale  24, Dartmouth  21

New Hampshire 14, Dartmouth  0

Dartmouth  27, at Columbia  24

Harvard  28, Dartmouth  13

at Princeton 17, Dartmouth 14

at Cornell  17, Dartmouth  13

Dartmouth  30, Brown  7 

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Dartmouth sports information, or sports publicity, or athletic communications, or whatever they are calling it these days, has a story about the start of preseason HERE.

Green Alert Take: It will always be sports information to me. ;-)

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Harvard has announced that the Oct. 28 football game against Dartmouth down in Cambridge will be carried on NESN and NESN+ as part of a package that also includes the Crimson squaring off against the Big Green in field hockey on Sept. 15, in women's soccer on Oct. 4 and in women's volleyball on Oct. 21. (LINK)

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A little video action from yesterday's practice courtesy of Dartmouth's social media:

Green Alert Take: It's nice not to have to warn you about the music. ;-)

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The Analyst takes a look at the Patriot League football race, picking Sept. 23 Dartmouth opponent Lehigh fifth in the seven-team conference and Oct. 14 opponent Colgate third. There's a decent capsule on each team HERE.

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A 247Sports story looking at Boston College's prospects offers this from BC coach Jeff Hadley (LINK):

Hafley was asked about players who have been standing out this summer so far, and "surprised" him. He listed a few. On the defensive side of the ball he mentioned safety John Pupel, a transfer from Dartmouth. His name has come up a lot this summer, but Hafley praised his on field play. 

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This is a frustrating story to wade through on a strange website, but given the headline in the screenshot posted below it's hard to ignore it, even if all the "information" is available elsewhere. Find the story HERE.

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EXTRA POINT
Mrs. BGA is not a climate change denier. Far from it. What she is, however, is a "summer is ending" denier.

For years we'd be driving somewhere right around this time in August and I'd point out a tree whose leaves had just started to turn and Mrs. BGA would say, "Poor, sick tree." She was probably right some of the time. Other times it would indeed be the first sign that fall was on the way.

I don't remember if it was yesterday or the day before when we were in the car and I spotted a few trees in a row that had started to turn. When it's a solitary tree, Mrs. BGA will protest that summer is still going strong. This time, given the number of trees starting to "orange-up," she remained silent. 

Unfortunately.
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