Tag Archives: Macalester

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ATN Podcast 364: Sorting out the chaos

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No, we didn’t get a four-way tie for first in the MAC after this weekend, but we still have plenty of chaos across Division III football after seven weeks. Part of this is because eight more playoff bids means more teams are in contention for the playoffs, but mostly, we’re just talking about teams chasing conference automatic bids.

So in the Presidents’ Athletic Conference, that’s five teams in contention. In the WIAC, it’s really six. It’s four in the MAC and at least three in the ODAC. We’ll run those down and talk about which big games are left in each conference.

Our Fast Five guest is Western Connecticut (WestConn) coach Joe Loth, whose Wolves are laying waste to MASCAC teams in their final year in the league before they and Castleton get kicked to the curb.

Plus, should we let Greg throw in a bonus conference just to make sure he can play his random card? Does Patrick stick with his prepared material or abandon it to make sure he doesn’t get stuck holding a card? Which conference told its coaches that tiebreakers had changed after the season started? And we’ll get you a daily double of defense in game balls, give you more defensive prowess in Stat of the Week, run down the new NPI numbers — you know, the NCAA Power Index — and explain why they might be wrong, or at least, not the same as the numbers you see elsewhere. And we’ll tell you who’s having fun in the 1, who’s going for 2 in the 2, what’s the key to the 3, what’s the score in the 4, who’s looking alive in the 5 and who’s got a new bag of tricks in the 6. That plus the mailbag, games to watch, on the spot and more in this week’s podcast.

The D3football.com podcast is a weekly in-season podcast by Patrick Coleman and Greg Thomas, which was started in 2007. New episodes are published weekly during the season.

Hit play, or subscribe to get this podcast on your mobile device.

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You can subscribe to the Around the Nation Podcast in Apple Podcasts, and many other places. You can also get this and any of our future Around the Nation podcasts automatically by subscribing to this RSS feed: http://www.d3blogs.com/d3football/?feed=podcast

Here’s how to find us on some of the major podcasting apps:

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d3photograpy.com photos by Doug Sasse, Mike Atherton, Wade Gardner; D. Scherbenco, King’s athletics; Chris Ryan, W&L athletics; Jason Kapusta, Westminster (Pa.) athletics

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ATN Podcast 358: Did that really happen?

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Listen, this podcast is fun to put together and we think and hope that it is informative, but we are always trying to do more. So this week, since we’ve finally had some games played, we’re adding a couple of new wrinkles to the D3football.com Around the Nation podcast.

First of all, since this season the at-large bids and the seedings are basically all going to be done by computers, we figured we’d better get you all ready for that, so we’ve invited back our Math Correspondent, Logan Hansen. In his Football Analytics 3:01 segment, he’s going to spend exactly 3 minutes, 1 second of your time talking about who is key in the running for those top eight spots in the new NCAA Power Index, that thing we call NPI. We’ll tell you more about what that means. He’ll also spotlight some of the big games — key leverage games and games that will shape the playoff picture.

When you ask Patrick and Greg what the most shocking result was from Week 1 and they both say the same thing, that says a lot. It’s a quick run through the top games from this past week, plus the implications and some of the history.

We also hand out game balls to the top performers, pick out the stats of the week, and run through region by region to get some of the other stories you might have missed. And since that didn’t seem to be enough, Greg and Patrick have to pick one more region to tell one more story about on the fly. At a roll of the dice, you never know what they might end up talking about — even a JV game?

Plus we chat with Calvin head coach Trent Figg, just minutes after his team defeated Oberlin in dominating fashion in the program’s first-ever football game. There’s that and so much more in this week’s podcast, so give it a listen!

The D3football.com podcast is a weekly in-season podcast by Patrick Coleman and Greg Thomas, which was started in 2007. New episodes are published weekly during the season.

Hit play, or subscribe to get this podcast on your mobile device.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

You can subscribe to the Around the Nation Podcast in Apple Podcasts, and many other places. You can also get this and any of our future Around the Nation podcasts automatically by subscribing to this RSS feed: http://www.d3blogs.com/d3football/?feed=podcast

Here’s how to find us on some of the major podcasting apps:

Theme music: Power 2 by DJmentos.
Texas Lutheran athletics photo by Nick Trumble

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Quick Hits: Welcome to the season

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Thirty-one teams didn’t start their season with the rest of us last week, and while 10 of those are from the NESCAC and would just never play in Week 1 and one was Occidental, which played a game against a Mexican team, basically the rest are getting on the field this week for the first time.

Our regular crew is Keith McMillan, Ryan Tipps, Pat Coleman, Adam Turer and Frank Rossi. Our sixth spot goes to a guest each week, and this week’s is Ryan Carlson, former defensive end at Linfield, producer of any awesome Linfield football video you’ve seen in the past decade or so, and 2018 inductee into the school’s hall of fame.

— Pat Coleman

Which game is Week 2’s game of the week?

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Keith’s take: Concordia-Moorhead at No. 12 UW-Whitewater. Both are in the top 18 on my ballot.		 ryan-tipps-150x200
Ryan’s take: UW-La Crosse at No. 21 Illinois Wesleyan. I think a lot of people are curious about how good UW-L is.		 Pat Coleman
Pat’s take: No. 10 Hardin-Simmons at Trinity (Texas). Trinity pounded McMurry last week, but this is the much more difficult Abilene opponent.
Adam Turer
Adam’s take: Concordia-Moorhead at UWW. The Warhawks looked like the UWW of old in Week 1 and have a prove-it game in Week 2.		 Frank Rossi
Frank’s take: Concordia-Moorhead at UWW. The Cobbers have remained a consistent team over the last six years and can play UWW with a “nothing to lose” approach.		 Ryan Carlson
Ryan’s take: Concordia-Moorhead at UWW. I was going to pick Macalester at Hamline just to give my guy Adam Johnson a thrill but that might hurt my “tremendous” amount of credibility.

Which Top 25 team is most likely to be upset?

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Keith’s take: No. 18 Johns Hopkins. Susquehanna led by 10 at the start of the fourth last year, and is at home this time.		 ryan-tipps-150x200
Ryan’s take: No. 18 Johns Hopkins. Susquehanna looked too good last week to gloss over them.		 Pat Coleman
Pat’s take: No. 21 Illinois Wesleyan. This is one spot where the preseason poll and my ballot diverge fairly significantly.
Adam Turer
Adam’s take: No. 21 Illinois Wesleyan. UW-La Crosse is determined to keep its momentum from 2017 going, and a non-conference win over a ranked opponent on the road would be the next step.		 Frank Rossi
Frank’s take: No. 24 RPI. RPI struggled early against Allegheny, and with the Transit Trophy on the line, WPI could surprise some folks.		 Ryan Carlson
Ryan’s take: No. 21 Illinois Wesleyan. However, UWO is playing a second year D-II and had some struggles last weekend but would losing to a D-II really be called an upset?

Which team making its debut in Week 2 will wish it had a game under its belt?

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Keith’s take: Kean. Springfield rushed for 445 yards last week, although maybe the Cougars have had an extra week to drill triple option.		 ryan-tipps-150x200
Ryan’s take: DePauw. At least they don’t have to go on the road to play Central.		 Pat Coleman
Pat’s take: William Paterson. What might have seemed like an achievable game in Dustin Johnson’s coaching debut changed when FDU beat TCNJ.
Adam Turer
Adam’s take: Texas Lutheran. Opening the season against Hendrix QB Miles Thompson is no easy task. Last year, Thompson carved up the Bulldogs for 433 yards and four TDs.		 Frank Rossi
Frank’s take: Kean. Springfield got its offense humming in Week 1, meaning the Kean defense will have a tough task right of the bat.		 Ryan Carlson
Ryan’s take: Linfield. I fully believe that Linfield is going to go out to Carroll College and win, but the Saints already have two games in. That just makes the challenge that much greater.

Which game are you following that nobody else on this panel is following?

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Keith’s take: Hope at Defiance. In this dictionary-words matchup, eager to see step Matsakis’ (hired July 26) Yellow Jackets take after rough first week.		 ryan-tipps-150x200
Ryan’s take: Hendrix at Texas Lutheran. A good one between teams legitimately eyeing conference titles.		 Pat Coleman
Pat’s take: Lawrence at Carleton. I’ll be spending another Saturday off the beaten path, but I love all of D-III.
Adam Turer
Adam’s take: No. 7 North Central at Lake Forest. Because I’ll be there in person to see how these two teams are replacing production of their respective 2017 all-conference running backs.		 Frank Rossi
Frank’s take: Union at Coast Guard. Both teams were supposed to beat their Maine opponents last week. We’ll learn a lot about both as this game could go either way.		 Ryan Carlson
Ryan’s take: Macalester … naw, Pacific Lutheran at Cal Lutheran. This the Lutes’ first game without a Westering as head coach since 1971. I just want to know if PLU is still going to do their ridiculous pregame warmup.

Who will bounce back from a Week 1 blowout and win?

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Keith’s take: Guilford. I like the Quakers hosting Methodist; oh wait, that Week 1 game never happened. 😉		 ryan-tipps-150x200
Ryan’s take: Allegheny. The Gators’ turnaround begins Saturday.		 Pat Coleman
Pat’s take: Stevenson. I’m not sure that the Mustangs are MAC contenders but I like their chances vs. Bridgewater.
Adam Turer
Adam’s take: Rose-Hulman. The Fightin’ Engineers took a 54-0 beating from the defending champs. A home game against Rhodes is a lot different than a road game against Mount Union.		 Frank Rossi
Frank’s take: Hobart. Hobart didn’t quit against Brockport in a lopsided affair. I think that spirit will lend to a victory vs. a decent Morrisville State team.		 Ryan Carlson
Ryan’s take: Delaware Valley.The Aggies should take care of business against Mass-Dartmouth but the Corsairs have a linebacker named Tony Slaughter and that is outstanding.

Which team will surprisingly be 2-0 after Saturday?

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Keith’s take: Lawrence. Rekindling a rivalry with Carleton, Vikings have a chance for first 2-0 start since, well, farther than our site goes back (1998).		 ryan-tipps-150x200
Ryan’s take: N.C. Wesleyan. Poised for another after already taking down Thomas More.		 Pat Coleman
Pat’s take: Sewanee. Yes, this means this is a bit of an upset pick as well.
Adam Turer
Adam’s take: SUNY-Maritime. The Privateers had a very late coaching change this summer, but appear to be picking up where they left off after a nine-win 2017 season.		 Frank Rossi
Frank’s take: FDU-Florham. The Devils won 12 games in the prior seven seasons.  A 2-0 start will be a unique position for them.		 Ryan Carlson
Ryan’s take: Macalester. 

We invite you to add your predictions in the comments below. Download the Around the Nation podcast on Fridays, where Pat and Keith review the Quick Hits that were prescient, and the Quick Misses that were terribly off base.