2009 Season Retrospective

Hobart came off their fifth consecutive NCAA berth (including a first round victory over the Middle Atlantic Conference Champion Lycoming) another league championship and a program record-tying 9 wins in 2008. That said expectations (and the accompanying #15 pre-season national ranking) were very high to say the least.

It was clear out of the gate; however, that this year would be a “rebuilding” one for the Statesmen. Hobart would drop the season opener to a strong Dickinson team. Although the Statesmen kept it close at the half, the powerful offense of the Red Devils wore down the Hobart defense as the game wore on. Dickinson would go on to compete for the Centennial Conference title falling just short losing to eventual champion and NCAA participant John Hopkins (first round winners over Hampton-Sydney). A season ending 35-32 loss to Ursinus effectively ended the Red Devil’s NCAA hopes as an 8-2 overall record would not be enough for an at-large bid based on the NCAA’s criteria.

The 26-3 loss would be the lowest offensive point total for the Statesmen since 1993. Fortunately Hobart bounced back the following weekend with a well played 24-16 victory over Carnegie Mellon University (5-5, 1-2).

The Statesmen’s season turned for the worse against eventual league champion Susquehanna in a frustrating 20-10 loss in Selinsgrove, PA. The offense once again struggled to score points and questions arose over SO QB Doug Vella’s ability to run the Statesmen’s offense. Although considered an upset at the time, Susquehanna would end up having an 8-2 season, winning the league’s “Pool A” bid (and share of the LL championship) with a victory over Union College in the season finale.

The cure for the Statesmen’s ills would come the following week back at home in Geneva. Hobart won in resounding fashion 33-10 over Saint Lawrence behind four rushing and one passing touchdowns.

The next week was the highly anticipated show-down between Union and Hobart. The Dutchmen were the only blemish on the Statesmen’s 2008 regular season record and both teams came into the game vying for the 2009 LL title. For the first time since probably 1997 I was actually in attendance for the first half for a live Statesmen game (and had a great view from the press box thanks to my friend and “In the HuddLLe” co-host Frank Rossi who has been calling Union games for WABY since 1994).

Although Hobart controlled the line of scrimmage for most of the game and scored 21 points in the first half, the Statesmen failed to stop the deep ball and Union torched the Hobart defense on plays that covered 41 yards, 42 yards, 70 yards and 76 yards en route to a 31-21 victory. This loss would effectively end the Statesmen’s bid for a sixth consecutive NCAA bid and put Union in the driver’s seat for the LL title leading up to their season ending show down with Susquehanna. Although Union would lose their head-to-head clash with the Crusaders, the Dutchmen improved to 8-3, 6-1 on the season; including an ECAC bowl bid and victory over Hartwick, and captured a share of the LL title just a year after finishing 5-4, 4-3. With Susquehanna departing the LL for the Centennial Conference, expect Union to be a pre-season favorite to win the LL in 2010.

At the season’s midpoint the Statesmen caught fire and won their final four games by a combined 113-40, including shutting out the Merchant Marine Academy (4-6, 2-5) and RPI (5-4, 3-4). The shut out of RPI was the first over the Engineers since 2000, but was a relatively ugly offensive game. Both teams were a combined 2 for 33 on third downs and it was really the Hobart special teams (fumbled punt recovery) and defense (three interceptions) that won the game for the Statesmen.

The Hobart offense came out of its funk in the season finale rattling off 24 first half points to retain the Centennial Cup against their oldest rival, Rochester (4-6, 5-2). Although the 2009 regular season ended on a good note, there would be no post-season football for Hobart for the first time since the 2001 season. The Statesmen would have qualified were denied the opportunity to compete in an ECAC bowl game due to financial considerations cited by the HWS administration. This was an unfortunate sign of the times, but one the team and specifically the graduating 19 seniors seemed to take well given the circumstances.

Although Hobart had not lost two league games since 2001 (back when the LL was the UCAA), the Statesmen finished strong and have a lot of momentum heading into 2010. Based on my count the Statesmen will return 16 offensive, 11 defensive and 1 special teams (place kicker Conor Callahan) letter men (based on the two-deep roster at the time of the Rochester game).

QB Doug Vella now has a full season under his belt and all three of the Statesmen RB’s (Andrew Marlier, Kyle Tritton and Pat Julian) return as does the starting FB Matt Howard. The OL loses stalwarts such as Co-Captain Brian Monaco and Angelo Catalano to graduation, but Coach DeWall has a solid core group of starters in Kelvin Cruz, Brendan Hatlee and Kyle Sandy as well as Sean Kluber who was a starter until he was injured in the Susquehanna game.

The biggest gap that Hobart needs to fill is on the defensive line given the graduations of Kwame Lovell, Tony Guidetti, Mike Ardiuni, Mike Faracca and Anthony Shaw. There is also the loss of linebackers Orlando Patterson (29 tackles, 3.5 sacks, one interception and two fumble recoveries) and Co-Captain Ryan Robinson who was second on the team with 57 total tackles. No small task, but I trust Coach Cragg is hitting the recruiting trail hard this winter and we will likely see some role players such as FY DT Nick Auriemma and SO DT Dane Wilcoxen be the likely starters. Other key defensive returning letterman are leading tackler Kyle O’Laughlin (77 tackles) and third leading tackler Reggie Robinson (37). The Statesmen return most of their defensive secondary including first team all-league DB Drake Woodard (32 tackles).

Still, Hobart has a tough start to the 2010 with three out of conference games against Dickinson (8-2), @ Carnegie Mellon (5-5) and St John Fisher (7-3). Fortunately both the Dickinson and SJFC games are at the Boz (which will be upgraded to field turf among other stadium improvements prior to the 2010 season) where the Statesmen were 4-0 in 2009. For the Statesmen to make another run at the play-offs in 2009, Hobart will need to improve upon their 2-3 road record from 2009.

The LL schedule commences with Hobart traveling to Saint Lawrence, home against rival Union College, traveling to Kings Point, home against WPI, away at RPI before hosting Rochester in the season finale.

I am certainly looking forward to another year of Statesmen football. Until then, thanks for reading these posts and go ‘Bart!