Statesmen Shooting for August 11th to Report to Preseason Camp (Hopefully)

Word has been shared that Hobart College Statesmen Football HC Kevin DeWall '00 has notified players in an email that "As of now, we are preparing for the August 11 arrival date" to open the 2020 season.

This news is couched by the fact that things could change, pending input from the NCAA and college itself. HWS previously announced they plan to open for in person classes on August 24th, so it makes sense - barring any changes - that camp would open on time as well.

Instances of COVID-19 in Central NY remain very low, so hopefully that will continue and the fall athletic season - at least for the Statesmen (and Herons) - continues as scheduled.

Today, Week 1 opponent Alfred University announced they are also reopening on August 24th, so it stands that the season opener scheduled for Friday night, September 4th at 7 PM does as well.

I will provide updates as they come in, but this is welcome news.

(Update as of 6/11 - the NCAA has approved fall preseasons to start as early as 8/10 based on a press release from earlier today.)

Thanks for reading and go 'Bart!

Forde Earns Preseason All American Honors from Street & Smith

You know football season is getting close when magazines like Street & Smith start to publish (way too early) Top 25 lists.

Keith McMillan of D3football.com once again was tapped to write the preseason preview article  and has (not surprisingly) picked defending national champions North Central College (NCC) as his preseason #1.

Delaware Valley University was the highest ranked East Region team and Liberty League rivals Union College came in at #14 on his poll.

A shot of the article / preseason poll can be seen below (via twitter @IWUHoopscom):

Part of the article included preseason All American teams for offense, defense and ST. Earning a spot on that list was SR OLB and Co-Captain Emmett Forde.

Congratulations to Emmett on the first of what will likely be several more preseason accolades!

HWS Hoping to Reopen For Fall Semester

And just like that, it's June 1st. 

The events of the past several days have given us as a nation some pause, to say the least. I know our family has had a lot of discussions about over the weekend. Seeing the Los Angeles neighborhood I lived in back in 1999-2006 literally on fire and being destroyed in riots was certainly disappointing, but I also understand why this is happening [an op-ed in today's LA Times by former UCLA and Lakers great Kareem Adbul-Jabbar is worth reading if you haven't seen it]. Unfortunately one of my long-time sayings (which I may have picked up from someone or somewhere else is), "the problem with the news is it's rarely ever good...."

Speaking of good news, however, this is a big month for CFB / D3FB fans as we should begin to hear about potential plans and next steps towards getting back to sports in the fall. Last Friday, the NCAA released some initial guidelines in anticipation of states reopening and athletic teams resuming activities, starting with voluntary workouts, as early as June 8.

D3 took things a step further allowing "the minimum number of contests required for sports sponsorship and championship selection in Division III [to be] reduced by 33% in all sports for the 2020-21 academic year." This does not mean that schedules will be cut, it just allows teams in states that could have more challenging requirements/issues to qualify for the postseason without having to play a complete schedule, in the event that's not possible.

Last Thursday morning, HWS President Joyce Jacobsen notified the Statesmen and Herons community that:

"We hope to resume faculty laboratory research as early as mid-June and to begin bringing some staff back to campus in July, with the remainder of faculty, staff and students arriving in August. We intend to follow a schedule for the fall that tightens the semester without decreasing intellectual contact between faculty and students. The goal is to limit travel to and from campus once students have returned, and to have most students back home by Thanksgiving in case there is a late-fall resurgence of COVID-19. We therefore expect Fall 2020 semester classes to begin as scheduled on Monday Aug. 24 and residential instruction to occur through Tuesday Nov. 24, after which Thanksgiving break will begin."

Things are looking better for the 2020 season.

This is similar, if not identical, to the approach (as I mentioned in my last post) that Syracuse University plans to take as well.

For the Hobart College Football family the obvious question this announcement begs is "does this mean preseason camp starts on time?" There are a number of hurdles to overcome to determine that, including the NYS government, NCAA and Liberty League. With less than 100 days until the 9/4/20 season opener at Alfred, the Statesmen would normally be planning on opening camp in mid-August (checking in around 8/12 or 13 with first practices starting around 8/14).

Obviously with a pandemic underway, we are looking at a "new normal" that will be predicated on CDC and related data. Fortunately Central New York has been barely impacted by the virus, and as luck or circumstance would have it, this year's football schedule is really regional in nature. The Statesmen will play 9 of their 10 games in NYS, basically within about an 180 mile radius of Geneva. The longest road trip will be down to Rowan in Week 3, which is about a 300 mile ride.

While the Profs campus isn't that far away from NYC (a little over 100 miles) - one of the worst areas of virus infections in the nation - only 15 confirmed cases of COVID-19 have been identified in their community as of 5/26/20, so Rowan President Dr. Houshmand has confirmed they also plan to reopen in the fall. 

That said, Dr. Jacobsen did couch the above with the following:

"This plan remains just that – a plan – until we submit our full reopening document to the State of New York in mid-June. Once we have State approval, we will share full details on everything from academic and residential life to screening, testing, isolating and tracing protocols."

So while this message is a reason for optimism, we still need to wait and see how things unfold over the coming weeks. At the end of the day, the fact that cases of COVID seem to be stabilizing across most states, and that the fatality rate (as calculated by the CDC) is approximately .05% for individuals under 49 years old (meaning the rate for people in the 18-22 yo range is probably like .01% - and likely better for college athletes), we should be in good shape.

I remain confident that the 2020 season will kick off as planned, but time will tell.

Thanks to all you readers / fans / friends out there for taking the blog over 275,000 views.

Go 'Bart!

COVID Causes Cuts at the Colleges (and Elsewhere)

Wishing everyone a happy and healthy Memorial Day. Thanks to the brave soldiers and all who've made the ultimate sacrifice to ensure our safety and lives of liberty.

Back on May 19 Hobart Football HC Kevin DeWall '00 notified the extended Statesmen family of some staff changes, which we learned from last week's Finger Lakes Times article, is because HWS is facing a significant budget deficit due to impacts from the COVID-19 epidemic.

The end result is that "Aaron Backhaus ’00 and Art Garvey ’13 will no longer be serving as full-time coaches for our program. John Manley and Walt Bennett ’05 will not be returning as part-time assistants."

In his address, Coach DeWall further stated:

"We are very grateful for the service and commitment of these four men. Words cannot accurately describe my appreciation for their years of investment into our football family. All are great men who deeply care for our student-athletes, their development, and overall well-being. Aaron, Walt, and Art were all great student-athletes during their careers at Hobart, serving as captains and important members of past championship teams. Coach Manley brought significant perspective as our most experienced coach on staff. Their impact has been substantial, and their departures will leave large voids. As I work trying to fill these positions, we will plan to assemble the best staff we can moving forward."

HWS is certainly not the only college or university having to make cuts. Liberty League foes RPI and Rochester have taken similar measures over the past several weeks. While HWS has not yet released any plans regarding the fall semester, neighbors such as Syracuse University do intend to have students back on campus. All of this is preliminary, however, as plans could change depending on how things progress (or regress).

I remain hopeful that HWS will determine a plan and communicate the same in the near future. In the meantime, we just have to wait and see.

Ithaca Plants Their Reopening Flag (and the Elephant in the Room)

The questions surrounding the 2020 D3FB season continue to swirl about and unfortunately there are no concrete answers. Ultimately the Statesmen Football coaching staff are likely not going to worry about things out of their control, and will remain focused on preparation for the upcoming season, especially once they receive direction from the NCAA and the HWS administration.

Conference rival and nearby Ithaca College announced today that they plan to reopen on Monday, October 5 for in-person, on campus classes. While I do believe this to be very premature by the IC administration, I also wouldn't be surprised if more colleges, HWS included, follow suit. HWS has formed it's own "reopening committee" and will likely take factors such as Ithaca's approach into consideration. 

Regardless, the NCAA will be making key decisions in the next 6-8 weeks, starting with the Board of Governors and D1 providing guidance in the next few weeks. From what we can gather, the confidence in there being a D3FB season is high, but the powers that be feel it's too early to make any final decisions. There are a multitude of variables at play, ranging from what the wide variety of school and conference decisions will be, different parts of the country being on different reopening time tables and criteria, are fans (and how many would be) allowed, etc. among many other scenarios.

So before the end of June, if not sooner, the NCAA is going to have to decide if they'll mandate a shorter or modified season (e.g., starting in October, with preseason practice in September) in D3; and/or if they'll just determine what playoff criteria will look like and when they'd aim to start the playoffs (e.g., if the regular season goes into December with the playoffs and Stagg Bowl occurring after and into January or a shortened / modified season would require updated playoff selection criteria - the latter is the more interesting scenario to me based on the question how would the Committee look at a conference champion that's played 7-9 games vs. ones that only play 5 or 6?).

Anyway, for the short term, all we can do is speculate. Hopefully we'll have some information on the remaining commits to the Class of 2024 (I captured about 14-15 of them so far this off-season) in the near future.

Thanks as always for reading and go 'Bart!

Chatham's Cunco Signs with Statesmen

Tap Into Chatham, an online local news source, reported yesterday that Chatham HS (NJ) SR DB/KR Charles Cunco has decided to attend Hobart College and play football. May 1st was decision day for seniors across the nation to officially decide (and place a deposit) on where they plan to go to college.

Cunco's highlight reel shows he has solid coverage skills and closing speed. He is also a sound tackler. At 5'10" 167 lbs. Cunco is on the smaller side, but he plays much bigger from the film I saw. I trust Coach Gray will bulk him up in no time while maintaining his impressive 4.6 speed.

Please join me in welcoming Charles and the extended Cunco family to the Hobart Football one!

Thanks as always for reading the blog and go 'Bart!

Former Hobart OC Loving Life in NEPA

Longtime former Hobart QB coach and Offensive Coordinator Jon Drach and his wife Janelle were recently interviewed by DiscoverNEPA.com - an online magazine covering Northeastern Pennsylvania.

Coach Drach is going into his third season of the HC of the Wilkes University Colonels, turning around an 0-10 program to one that earned an 8-3 record in 2019. Former Statesmen Tom Elder '13 and Kelvin Cruz '12 are also on staff as the DC/LBs and TE/FB coaches, respectively. Jack Phohl '17 worked as a WR coach for a couple of seasons before heading back home to the Syracuse area to pursue a career outside of coaching (anyone that has any sports mgmt/business/operations contacts please let Jack know).

Just like every other program in the nation, the Colonels (and their cross-town rivals Kings College), are managing the off-season in the COVID-19 pandemic the best they can. 

While I'll get back to featuring Hobart-related news in the near future, it's always good to see former Genevans and extended Statesmen families doing well, especially during these times.

Thanks as always for reading and go 'Bart!