Coming into the season I was pretty sure Fordham was the best team on Dartmouth's nonconference schedule. Better than Central Connecticut and better than Merrimack.
Oops.
Week One Dartmouth opponent Fordham visited Week Five opponent Central Connecticut yesterday and came up on the short end of an ugly 33-3 loss.
The Rams made just about every mistake imaginable. They suffered nine fumbles (losing five), a snap over the punter's head for a Central Connecticut touchdown, and a bad snap that went for a safety. They were credited (?) with 129 yards lost rushing, were just 3-of-18 on third down conversions and committed nine penalties. Advantage Central Connecticut.
While the Dartmouth's nonconference opponents were going head-to-head, the third was trying to prove last week's relatively strong defensive outing at Air Force (a 21-6 loss) was no fluke.
Hah.
Against a UConn team that crossed the goal line just one time in a 50-7 loss at Maryland a week earlier, Merrimack surrendered 35 points in the first quarter and 56 in the first half while enduring a 63-17 humbling by the Huskies.
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Elsewhere, former Dartmouth quarterback Nick Howard was up to his old tricks while leading Butler to a 19-17 win at Murray State. The grad transfer carried 20 times for 85 yards and two touchdowns and completed 5-of-8 passes for 90 yards for the Bulldogs (2-0).
Down in North Carolina, meanwhile, wide receiver Ivan Hoyt, one of the rare transfers out of Dartmouth before earning a degree, caught just one pass but it went for 43 yards in Davidson's 49-14 win at DII Catawba.
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Dartmouth's office of strategic content and brand management offers up a look at the second week of preseason practice HERE.
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And speaking of Dartmouth's sports information department office of strategic content and brand management, it posted a video taking a look at the defensive line. Find it HERE or just read this lightly edited transcript of the veteran D-line coach's remarks:
Defensive line coach Duane Brooks:
Things are going great. I mean, it's practice, so, you know, we try to get better every day, and so far we've been doing that.
In life, they say there's no hierarchy, but in my room there is.
I've got the three seniors who are doing a great job, the three juniors are doing a great job, and the three sophomores are doing a great job.
So, I have nine people who will probably help us win some games, but the three seniors, Josiah (Green), Derrell (Porter), and Ejike (Adele), those guys have by leaps and bounds come so far since they were little freshmen to now they're grown-ups.
We like to win every day, right?
So, if we don't get hurt, we could be outstanding (but) somebody might get banged up and then somebody's got to step their game up. Somebody asked me a question the other day and I said, "You know, you've got to ask me November 23rd how the season went."
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EXTRA POINT
I may have mentioned this before but Peacock is the only "extra" we subscribe to beyond the basic YouTubeTV package. No Netflix or Apple+ or HBO or any of the others. We subscribed to Peacock to get extra golf coverage, the Olympics and Big Ten and college football. And, frankly, because they had a heckuva deal. But I'm really, really frustrated with the (lack of) service.
I have no idea how many networks YouTubeTV has because I haven't watched very many of them but what I do know is the picture has been absolutely perfect for each and every game and sporting event I've watched on YouTubeTV.
I also know Peacock's picture is perfect – with one glaring exception.
When we tune in college football on Peacock the picture is so washed out as to be almost unwatchable. The only way to watch it without throwing the remote at the screen is to use Mac AirPlay to beam what is a totally perfect picture on a computer or iPad to the TV. Natively, Peacock sports are a disaster on our Sharp smart TV.
Granted, Peacock sports work just fine for some people. But a Google search shows the "washed out" picture is relatively widespread, and offers up recommendations for adjusting settings on the TV to make the picture watchable. I tried that and it didn't work, but that's beside the point.
When the only programming that has the issue is sports on Peacock, the problem isn't with our TV it's with the spinoff network. It's annoying enough the NBC blackmails us into a Peacock subscription by putting some NFL games and classics like last night's Oregon game against Boise State exclusively on the paid service, but to then not deliver the goods is unforgivable.
