Thursday, June 19, 2025

Happy Valley Or Upper Valley?

It probably won’t surprise anyone who is a regular visitor to this electronic precinct that in addition to tracking Dartmouth football recruiting, how Penn State is doing in that realm gets a little attention in this three-generation PSU family. That being the case, it has been fun following the Nittany Lions’ pursuit of Massachusetts high school quarterback Peter Bourque, the son of none other than former Dartmouth tight end Rob Bourque ’96.

The younger Bourque was the subject of a 247sports story this week under the headline: Penn State Camp Highlights: Priority QB target Peter Bourque; Penn State welcomes a key recruiting target back to campus Wednesday. (LINK)

Peter Bourque, who will be a senior at Tabor Academy this fall, is widely regarded as Penn State’s top quarterback target in the 2027 high school class, and at least one recruiting service already has put in a Crystal Ball Prediction that he will end up Happy Valley. The 6-foot-4, 190-pound QB has a lengthy offer list that includes Michigan, Florida, Oregon, Texas A&M, Wisconsin, Syracuse, North Carolina and now another familiar school . . . 

No. 83 is Rob Bourque, listed as a 6-3, 225 tight end from Winchester High School in Winchester, Mass. 

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Again, if you are a regular BGA reader you learned a week ago that Dartmouth quarterback Grayson Saunier was headed to the Manning Passing Academy. (LINK) It will be a homecoming for Saunier, who comes from Lafayette, La., just a little more than 90 minutes west of Thibodaux, where the MPA is held at Nichols State University.

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Oriomolade ’17, was the Ivy League defensive player of the year as a senior. 

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EXTRA POINT

Ugh. For the second time this spring, I found a tick latched onto me a few days ago. The first one I was able to pull off without issue. This one, on the back of my thigh, required a little surgical work by Mrs. BGA, who as a former RN, MS, CDE, BC-ADM, I trusted to handle things carefully. The area is healing nicely, but I am keeping an eye out for the telltale bullseye rash as well as other Lyme disease symptoms.


Here’s the annoying thing. I have a special pair of pants treated specifically to repel ticks. And I have a spray bottle of tick repellent. I hadn’t been using either but trust me. I am now. I’m also going to do a thorough tick-check every time I mow or hike across a field. As I said, ugh.

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Wednesday, June 18, 2025

A Name Down The Road

From the go-figure department: A lineman who just finished his sophomore year of high school football has announced his commitment to Dartmouth:

Henry Reagan is a 6-foot-3, 275-pound rising sophomore at Connecticut’s New Canaan High School. He is the brother of Ben Reagan, a 6-2, 275 rising junior offensive lineman for the Big Green.

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The 2025 Ivy League football media poll will be released on Aug. 4, per OptaAnalyst. The same site reports that the Ivy League media day will be on Aug. 11.

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The Yankees appear ready to give hard-hitting Ben Rice ’22 an opportunity to get in the lineup as a catcher, the position he played at Dartmouth. From a story in The Athletic:

“I think this guy’s a major-league catcher,” catching coordinator Tanner Swanson said Tuesday before the Yankees lost to the Los Angeles Angels, 4-0, and extended their scoreless drought to 29 innings.

“I’ve said that many times. If he were to get regular reps, I think the rest of the world would see that as well.”

And . . .

The Dartmouth graduate has been a constant in the Yankees’ pregame starting pitcher meetings and in series advance meetings with relievers. He catches bullpens and often works on his blocking and throwing despite playing mostly DH (43 starts) and first base (11 starts).

And . . .

Offensively, Rice started the season hot. Through May 11, Rice was hitting .260 with nine home runs and a .937 OPS. Since then, his stats have taken a nosedive. In 27 games before Tuesday, he hit just .187 with three homers and a .534 OPS.

But there’s plenty of reason for optimism. Rice has been one of the most unlucky hitters in the majors this season regarding his quality of contact. His expected weighted on-base average was .401 compared to his actual on-base percentage of .336 — a 65 percentage point difference, the eighth-widest gap in the majors.

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EXTRA POINT

It is still another gloomy, overcast day here in Vermont and I’m at cross purposes. On the one hand, the lack of bright sunshine might just slow down how fast our six acres of lawn and field grow. That's a good thing given all the hours that I spend mowing.


On the other hand, our solar tracker keeps loyally turning and tilting to follow the location of the sun, but isn't generating much electricity. Given that we have two electric cars and an electric tractor, that's a bad thing.


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Tuesday, June 17, 2025

He Forged His Own Path

Football recruiting has brought great players to Dartmouth over the years. But it also is responsible for attracting players who go on to make their marks not on the playing field, but in other areas.

Meet Dimitri Gerakaris '69, profiled for graduation weekend in the local Valley News for creating a wall relief sculpture of John Kemeny, the Dartmouth president from 1970-81, at his forge/studio in Canaan, N.H. Written by former Sports Illustrated writer Robert Sullivan, a member of the Dartmouth Class of 1975 – the class that commissioned the sculpture – the VN story begins this way:

This is a tale of two fellows, a college student and his math professor. The kid in our story graduated from Dartmouth back in 1969 and still lives nearby with his wife. He’s 77 now — an older “kid” — and continues to toil in a home studio and out back at his forge. He is, in his seniority, an artist of considerable renown, a sculptor who for decades has specialized in heavy-metal fine art installations and smaller pieces. His work has graced private households and public spaces from Opryland to Oz.

And here's the kicker:

“I was recruited from a small town in Illinois by Dartmouth football and attracted by the school’s setting and approach, so I attended this college I’d never heard of,” he says.   

Gerakaris is listed as a 5-foot-11, 222-pound defensive tackle from Palatine, Ill., on the 1966 Dartmouth football roster. 

The Valley News story about him is behind a paywall, but if you haven't been a regular visitor to the newspaper's site you can read the story for free HERE. To learn a little more about Gerakaris, check out a Dartmouth Alumni in Design and Architecture  story HERE.

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The college has a release about planned improvements to venerable Thompson Arena HERE. The release notes that the work will include "new locker rooms, team lounges, sports medicine spaces, a weight room, a coaches' suite, as well as a new donor and fan hospitality space on the concourse level."

Green Alert Take: Watching the video that accompanies the release, I couldn't figure out where the "donor and fan hospitality space" could be situated on the concourse level. This still image from the video shows it will be tacked onto the back of the building:


Green Alert Take II: What I've long thought is Thompson needs an addition like that on the front end of the facility to relieve the congestion entering the building. The foyer, where tickets are sold and spectators queue up to get through the doors on cold winter nights, is simply too crowded.

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EXTRA POINT

Waking up particularly early this morning I decided rather than try to get back to sleep I'd pull on my hiking shoes and hit the trail. While I try not to think of my daily hike as being about exercise, it's nice to have it in the books, particularly when it's sprinkling, as it is right now.

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Monday, June 16, 2025

Congratulations

From Dartmouth social media:

From the college’s Commencement Day 2025 at Dartmouth Photos from a milestone day for graduates page (LINK):


And yes, those are what you think they are. ;-)
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EXTRA POINT

I’d have to say That Certain Dartmouth ’14 nailed it with this card. The inside said, “And Many Mower.”


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Sunday, June 15, 2025

Enjoy

It is graduation day at Dartmouth and that can mean only one thing here in the BGAverse, and that's another chance to share Conan O'Brien's rollicking 2011 commencement speech. With all due respect to Roger Federer's wonderful address last year (LINK), Harvard's Big Red set the standard. Enjoy one more time:


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Flo Oriomlade '17 won a championship ring with the 2015 Dartmouth football team. The current Calgary Stampeder defensive lineman has added to his jewelry collection with a Canadian Football League championship ring for his play last year with the Toronto Argonauts:

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EXTRA POINT

Attention DC Studios: To paraphrase Jim Croce, "You don't tug on Superman's shield."


Here's the classic:




And here's the abomination the Man of Steel will be wearing this summer:



I rest my case.

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Saturday, June 14, 2025

Well Done

Crowd-sourcing is good! Here are a couple of photos that showed up in my “in box" reminding us that Buddy Teevens was also a son of Deerfield Academy in Massachusetts:



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EXTRA POINT
I’ve written before that if I listened to Rosetta Stone or Babbel recordings instead of podcasts while I hike each day, I’d be fluent in a half dozen languages by now. Well, I also listen to podcasts with noise-canceling headphones when I mow our lawn and field. It occurred to me the grass is growing so fast that if I were to load up The Complete Works of Shakespeare I’d be able to run the category the next time Jeopardy Masters comes on . . . or maybe next week, whichever comes first.

For fun, I asked ChatGPT just now to write a sonnet in Shakespeare’s voice about the tragedy of time spent mowing, and here’s what appeared on my screen in about 30 seconds. Scary.

O verdant blades that sprout with hasty pride,

Thou green usurpers of my humble plot,

Each morn anew thy armies multiply’d,

As though the earth some secret war had sought.


Did I not shear thee but a moon ago?

With sweating brow and mower’s roaring might,

Yet here again thy wanton tendrils grow,

And mock my labor with relentless height.


Thy swiftness rivals time’s own wingèd pace,

While I, poor serf, must chase thee evermore,

With clattering blade and frown upon my face,

A prisoner to this lawn I once adored.


O grass, if thou would’st but a fortnight stay,

I’d grant thee peace—and throw my shears away.

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Friday, June 13, 2025

TV Talk

Eagle-eyed readers might have noticed yesterday a new date for Dartmouth's Week 6 game against Columbia over there to the right. Here’s the reason for the change:

That’s the ESPNU Ivy League broadcast schedule. The matchup with Columbia, pitting two of the three Ivy League champions from last fall, will be the Big Green’s only appearance on ESPNU. (All of Dartmouth’s Ivy League games will be carried on ESPN+.)

Here’s the full ESPNU Friday night schedule:

Friday, Oct. 3 – Columbia at Princeton – 7:30 p.m. 

Friday, Oct. 10 – Cornell at Harvard – 7 p.m.

Friday, Oct. 24 – Columbia at Dartmouth – 6 p.m.

Friday, Oct. 31 – Brown at Penn – 7 p.m.

Friday, Nov. 7 – Harvard at Columbia – 7 p.m.

Saturday, Nov. 22 – Harvard at Yale – 12 p.m.

Appearances per school:

3 - Harvard 

3 - Columbia 

1 - Princeton 

1 - Brown 

1 - Cornell  

1 - Dartmouth

1 - Penn 

1 - Yale 

Green Alert Take: If nothing else, having the Columbia game on Friday night gives the Big Green an extra day to get ready for the trip to Harvard the next Saturday, right?
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Headline out of the UFL:
The United Football League today announced that DC Defenders Head Coach Shannon Harris has been named the 2025 UFL Buddy Teevens Coach of the Year.

From the story (LINK):

The UFL Coach of the Year Award is named in honor of Buddy Teevens, a longtime head coach at Dartmouth College, who was celebrated for his forward-thinking approach, unwavering commitment to player safety and well-being and lasting impact on the game over a nearly 40-year coaching career. 

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Headline on one of the many SI.com pages:

Illinois Offers Four-Star Tight End From New Jersey Football Family; On Wednesday, the Illini offered Don Bosco Prep's JT Geraci, who would be the third brother in his family to play college football

From the story (LINK):

Geraci, a 6-foot-5, 230-pound tight end from the class of 2027, has already visited Pittsburgh and Syracuse, and the next step for Illinois would be to work on scheduling him for a trip to Champaign. Geraci comes from a football family – his brothers Mike (Michigan) and Alex (Dartmouth) have already been through the recruiting process, so he probably already knows how the whole thing works.

Geraci, who will be a junior this fall, could very well have north of 10 scholarship offers by the end of the new year. Being the first Big Ten team to offer him gives the Illini a bit of an advantage, but Rutgers and Maryland – "local" conference rivals – might very well come knocking on Geraci's door soon.

Alex Geraci will play this fall at UMass as a grad transfer after collecting his Dartmouth diploma.

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While Dartmouth’s three nonconference opponents kick off the 2025 season in 79 days, the Big Green and Ivy League are 100 days away from starting their seasons:

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Speaking of countdowns, the Ivy League added its third offensive lineman in the HERO Sports uniform countdown for the best FCS player wearing each number. The latest to be honored is Penn’s William Bergin, who wears number 72. The Ivy honorees to date (LINK):

81 - TE Seamus Gilmartin, Harvard

77 - OL Noah Jordan, Columbia

75 - OL Delby Lemieux, Dartmouth 

72 OL William Bergin, Penn

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EXTRA POINT

Gotta admit something. While I’m so happy That Certain Dartmouth ’14 found her life partner, it’s still a little jarring to get emails or letters from her with his last name on them. I know what you are thinking. It’s also her last name now, and it’s nothing our parents didn’t go through, but it still takes a little getting used to. ;-)

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Thursday, June 12, 2025

Another HERO

For the second time this season, a Dartmouth player has been selected as the best in the FCS at his position by HERO Sports, and it shouldn’t be a surprise who it is:

From the HERO writeup (LINK):

After tallying nine receptions for 81 yards and two touchdowns in 2023, Corbo became a star last fall. He grabbed 32 passes for 315 yards and seven touchdowns. The 6-foot-5 and 245-pounder was named to the All-Ivy League First Team and earned four All-American honors. Corbo was graded as PFF’s No. 10 FCS tight end, registering 16 first-down receptions, five contested catches, and just one drop.

In total, three Ivy League tight ends were listed in the top-10 nationally. Cornell’s Ryder Kurtz was ranked third and Harvard’s Seamus Gilmartin was eighth.

Chosen the top offensive lineman in the country earlier this spring was Dartmouth tackle Delby Lemieux. (LINK)

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A list of quarterbacks headed to the Manning Passing Academy has gone public and among those selected is Dartmouth’s Grayson Saunier. Here’s the latest available list:

Drew Allar, Penn State

Luke Altmeyer, Illinois

Rocco Becht, Iowa State

Kevin Jennings, SMU

LaNorris Sellers, South Carolina

Mark Gronowski, Iowa

Gio Lopez, North Carolina

Fernando Mendoza, Indiana

Garrett Nussmeier, LSU

Beau Pribula, Missouri

Blake Shapen, Mississippi State

Austin Simmons, Ole Miss

Chandler Morris, Virginia

Demond Williams Jr., Washington

Darian Mensah, Duke

John Mateer, Oklahoma

Miller Moss, Louisville

Behren Morton, Texas Tech

Austin Novasad, Oregon

Taylen Green, Arkansas

Arch Manning, Texas

Cade Klubnik, Clemson

Sawyer Robertson, Baylor

Ty Simpson, Alabama

Sam Leavitt, Arizona State

Gunner Stockton, Georgia

Walker Howard, Louisiana

Avery Johnson, Kansas State

Marcel Reed, Texas A&M

Jalon Daniels, Kansas

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From Dartmouth’s social media accounts:

Bengals owner Mike Brown was the Big Green’s leading passer and scorer in 1956.

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EXTRA POINT

I don’t know what kind of bush it is, and I rarely come across one. But whenever I do, and I catch its fleeting scent, I can close my eyes and be transported back to my elementary school days when we had one of these bushes in our back yard. I couldn’t begin to tell you what the smell is like or what kind of bush it is – but maybe the fact I come across it so rarely makes my imagined trip back to childhood that much more special.


I found myself smiling as I thought about that this morning. No, I didn’t stumble across the mystery bush – but again, it was a sweet smell that carried me back. This time, it was the smell of the beach roses that are especially plentiful alongside our house this spring. Their scent reminded me of the happy days when Mrs. BGA’s parents still owned their house in a tiny town on the Maine coast. There the roses bloomed between the road and the rocky beach, their fragrance dancing in the salty ocean air and hinting at all the wonders of the world awaiting our two young children.

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