spiderstudent17 said:

.500 record or below is fair enough to consider a down year. It’s frustrating knowing you’re going to be in a down year so early into the season. Still, if someone were to say in a 5 year stretch (‘19-20 - ‘23-24. Not counting this year because we won’t know officially what our final record will be) we would be 24-7 and likely at large, win A10 tourney/R32 NCAAs, and win A10 regular season champion 3 of those 5 years, but the other 2 years we are very bad, would you be okay with that?

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We have been over this a million times, you can't count the likely at large and the real at large - they are mutually exclusive.

Just like Tom can't throw the ball and catch the ball.

GKiller said:

.500 or below. He’s heading towards his 8th one. 8 out of 20.

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.500 record or below is fair enough to consider a down year. It’s frustrating knowing you’re going to be in a down year so early into the season. Still, if someone were to say in a 5 year stretch (‘19-20 - ‘23-24. Not counting this year because we don’t know officially what our final record will be) we would be 24-7 and likely at large, win A10 tourney/R32 NCAAs, and win A10 regular season champion 3 of those 5 years, but the other 2 years we are very bad, would you be okay with that?

Is everyone excited to see the first NET next week like I am? /s

If anyone is from AGS I'm Go Lehigh TU Owl from AGS. So I come in peace..

For what it is worth Herder picked Holy Cross AND Lafayette to beat Lehigh in recent weeks. Lehigh has shown a gear this season no one else in the PL had. I believe the Mountain Hawks out gained every FCS opponent except Holy Cross in Worcester. Turnovers were their downfall in their two FCS loses (at Yale and Bucknell). They statistically/physically dominated the Bison but weren't buttoned up. Lehigh held halftime leads of 42-0 vs Wagner, 21-7 vs Princeton, 31-3 vs Fordham, 24-0 vs Georgetown, 17-3 vs Colgate and 28-7 vs Lafayette. That's a strong reflection of a well-prepared team consistently instilling their will/dominance. If you want to question the schedule, that's what you like to see in terms of talent/potential. Cahill and the staff have done a great job recruiting so the talent level is nearly back to the level it was from 1998-2016; however they are young. Their line play is also legit for this level.

I know fans always have bias but I legitimately believe Lehigh is being undervalued this year. I know the Mountain Hawks went through a rough stretch following the Coen tragedy/hiring of Tom Gilmore, but this is a program that when good, is nationally good. If this was 2015 and Lehigh was 8-3 they would be Top 20 right now.- Drake and Duquesne have been ranked for example. But the psychological dynamics changed so they're a complete afterthought. Their OC is Dan Hunt who won 3 playoff games (JMU x2 and UNH) while the head coach of Colgate. Their DC is a former D3 head coach. That's a unique staff at this level and helps to explain the preparation/execution.

PL vs CAA this year. Not a lot of wins but the PL hung in.

Colgate (2-10)
Lost to Maine 17-14 and #11 Villanova 28-3

Fordham (2-10)
lost to Stony Brook 27-21 and Monmouth 63-21

Lafayette (6-6)
beat Monmouth 40-35

Holy Cross (6-6)
Lost to #10 Rhode Island 20-17 and to #16 New Hampshire 21-20

If Lehigh protects the ball and executes through their air in critical situations I expect a 60 minute game. Although, maybe this is the week where the "expert" is right.....

spiderstudent17 said:

What are you considering down years? I’ve been over this in the past, but I don’t consider not making the NCAA a down year. Down years are like this one, where we are very bad.

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.500 or below. He’s heading towards his 8th one. 8 out of 20.

spiderman said:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=5TwARXh_EIA

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Thanks for posting. For anyone wanting to see, forward to the 42:10 min of the video. Several observations/comments:

Looked like a clean block out from Beagle. His hand was holding the guy’s jersey but nothing egregious that warrants a foul. If anything could’ve been an over-the-back foul on LA Tech, but honestly a no call was likely the best.

Interestingly, the technical didn’t come right after the foul call. Looks to have been when Mooney wanted to call the timeout. He was very visibly upset. Curious what was said.

No way there was 400 people in the crowd. Looked around 50.

What a boneheaded reaction for a 20-year head coach - DLo’s reaction said it all.

If you are down, feel free to visit Spider Football. It is much more cheerful over there. This is a friendly reminder. Although we are still waiting for Mojo to post his thoughts about the upcoming Lehigh game.

GKiller said:

Yes the cycles should be shorter. Many of us don’t think Mooney likes that tho & is fighting for the longer cycle narrative.

That’s also a lot of questions student17. Too many. A vt4700 tactic.

& I already deferred to Brownstoner on the cycle. Starting after golden Gilly graduated is fair.

If Mooney tenure is considered 1 macro cycle is having “inevitable” down years 40% of the time acceptable?

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Whatever Mooney would like the length of the cycle to be, is irrelevant in my opinion. Fact of the matter is that this is what the new era of college basketball will be. He should get used to it or retire like Bennett did. However, he has shown an ability to be able to recruit with transfers/NIL and have immediate success. I maintain this new transfer and NIL era benefits a school like us.

What are you considering down years? I’ve been over this in the past, but I don’t consider not making the NCAA a down year. Down years are like this one, where we are very bad.

Degennaro not on two deep that was released.

Does anyone know if it is accurate?

VT4700 said:

What frustrates me is we only have 2 freshmen, we have one of our worst looking teams in several years, and neither freshman is good enough to help? Same with GW3. Our guard play has not been good, yet he is not good enough to help? Why are these guys here if they can't help this year? Why are we (probably) spending NIL money on GW3 if he is not good enough to play?

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We all share the same frustration. I think the simple and candid answer is we just didn’t do good enough with recruiting this year. Whether it’s the fact the guys we got aren’t as talented as we thought or didn’t adjust and learn our system as well as we hoped for, or some combination of the two. GW3 was highly touted out of high school, but didn’t get much playing time at Michigan so there was a bit of a mystery factor there. I think we’re all surprised that he isn’t getting at least more playing time. Mooney has shown an ability to do well with transfer portal in this NIL area, which is why I believe he can do it again. It just stinks when we miss because it makes for a very long and frustrating season.

spiderstudent17 said:

I’m a little confused by your comments of the new cycle. What is your starting point? Is it the freshmen this year? Why not the freshmen next year? Seems like it’s rather arbitrary to pick a starting point. When we had guys like Golden, Gilly, Sherod all sticking it out and we had high expectations their last 1-2 years, then I could see how it could feel like when they graduated a new cycle started like Brooklyn said. Now, we’re getting a bunch of new players every year. Mooney can have a preference of high school guys staying 4-5 years, but how realistic is that? I posted in a thread a few months ago all the transfers we’ve had the last several years. And with transfers we’re bringing in who have 1-2 years of eligibility left, we can have an experienced team every year.

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Yes the cycles should be shorter. Many of us don’t think Mooney likes that tho & is fighting for the longer cycle narrative.

That’s also a lot of questions student17. Too many. A vt4700 tactic.

& I already deferred to Brownstoner on the cycle. Starting after golden Gilly graduated is fair.

If Mooney tenure is considered 1 macro cycle is having “inevitable” down years 40% of the time acceptable?

VT4700 said:

How is it a 4 or 5 year cycle when we had 24, 24, and 23 win teams in 2020, 2022, and 2024?

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Because the cycle refers to NCAA trips.

Not going to rehash the Covid impact.

SpiderRick said:

Ball St game on Nov17th....how'd we do?

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Section 9 has an aversion to the 20s for some reason. He did the same thing on the LA Tech initial post.

Maybe there is some Back to the Future II hopes going on here. I’ll be looking for the Delorean in the parking lot at the RC next month.

How is it a 4 or 5 year cycle when we had 24, 24, and 23 win teams in 2020, 2022, and 2024?

spiderstudent17 said:

Yes what the staff felt. They’re the ones seeing him practice every day. And come on 23, are you really suggesting that Mooney is “gaming everyone” and intentionally not wanting to play our best players - even if they’re freshmen - because he wants to claim the “one more year” argument to keep his job? Like others have said in other threads, players transfer a lot more now than in the best. Mooney is not intentionally keeping his best players from playing to try and play the “long game” and preserve his contract.

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What frustrates me is we only have 2 freshmen, we have one of our worst looking teams in several years, and neither freshman is good enough to help? Same with GW3. Our guard play has not been good, yet he is not good enough to help? Why are these guys here if they can't help this year? Why are we (probably) spending NIL money on GW3 if he is not good enough to play?

End of game reminded me of Tarrant wisdom - ref should not determine outcome of game. No call appropriate. Other item with Mooney losing it: did his heart condition corrected by surgery make him more susceptible to future heart issues? Do not know the answer. If the answer is "yes" that kind of mental meltdown could be dangerous to his health.

The 4-5 year cycle was based on the pre-portal days and the “hope” was that UR would be able to shorten the cycle by being able to leverage seasoned players available in the portal.

What we have learned is that Mooney and staff are not equipped to handle building a “short cycle” team as the problem is the way Mooney coaches and develops players cannot be compressed. This is really no surprise to anyone who has followed the program. So we fans are in for a reset as Mooney tries to go back to the traditional route of building a seasoned team starting with freshmen.

Again, this is no surprise as there is plenty of history to review and expectations that have been set and maintained. Everyone should know what to expect.

As far as this year, I think the team will fall in the middle of the A10 standings because I don’t think the conference is very good. It is a 1-2 bid league. Games are competitive within the conference and that suits UR just fine. The dream of better competition in the A10 has essentially evaporated as the conference lost historically strong programs to other “better” conferences. Now with the additional burden of NIL (paid players), UR has another strike against it from being able to move up a level. The biggest schools win.

Personally I hate it, but the money has spoken and eventually the entire college landscape will change and there will be a split in the revenue making sports. UR is going to be in Tier 2. It will be interesting to see what other schools land there and it may well be that some public universities with academic leanings (ie UVA) land there too. Time will tell.

In the meantime, Spider fans will find out if Mooney can join Shaka Smart in the quest to train and retain players. It probably has a 55% chance at working and definitely will take 3-4 years to get there.

spider23 said:

I don't know. I think it is likely he did not think we are an NCAA team this year (which mid majors like VCU, St. Mary's, SDSU expect every year), or else it would be all hands on deck. Hell, Sec9 was so impressed in the NIL event he thought Jrob might challenge for a starter spot. He brings something to the team that the other guys do not, whereas guys like Tanner, Graham, Glou, Roche are all very one dimensional so far. Take SDSU for example, they have two true freshman - similar to our two - a bit raw and not expected to be polished - BUT they are able to defend and play physical - and they are getting time and also contributing in the areas of defense and rebounding. Mooney has proven time over time (THINK match up zone that started out good then got ABSOLUTELY smoke for 3-4 years before adapting) that he gets stuck on incorrect Mooney think basketball ideas. So yes, maybe not specifically trying to long game us, but he knows he's not going anywhere and he THINKS - incorrectly - that he has this new paradigm figured out - that is absolutely wrong.

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I think we all fall into the trap where we hype up transfers/high school recruits more quickly than they’re ready. He may have the skill set to bring something to the team, but my point is that I don’t think Mooney would intentionally not want to play all his best players because he’s already quit on the season or wants to preserve his contract long term. Our staff sees our players a lot more than we do. I’m sure they had the discussion with Robinson and McGlothin and believe that they will produce more in years to come. If that doesn’t end up being the case, then there could be a chance they transfer.

To your last point, I agree that I would like to see Mooney adapt our offense/defense more to the players we have. I’m sure his goal is to ideally recruit players who fit the system he wants to implement. We’ve seen the success when we find talented players who fit his system fell. It worked last year and can be done again if we find the right guys. However, given the nature of recruiting - especially nowadays - it isn’t always the case. But yes, we should try and work with who we have and come up with schemes to bring out their talents as much as possible, even if that means modifying our existing paradigm. Can’t try to put a square peg in a round hole and expect it to fit.

GKiller said:

Not preservation of contract he doesn’t need that here at UR not when we have our admin, and u fall into same category, that believe we had to reward Mooney performance with yet another extension when he already had 3 years left & was coming off a losing season followed by a NIT season where we crapped the bed with a 3 game losing streak.

But Moon comments preseason about guys will now be staying 4 & 5 years at 1 place - without evidence just his feeling - was a way to say we r restarting the build phase that he needs time for guys to get old & be in his system a long time. Think that is part of what 23 is getting at. New cycle for Moon that Brooklyn has mentioned too. Always new cycles that r not very prevalent in mindsets elsewhere. For a 20 year coach some of us thought we’d be past that. And not expect season 8 out of 20 being a down year. The 40% down to catch lightning in a bottle years out. And many think it’s great being a leafy campus and all.

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I’m a little confused by your comments of the new cycle. What is your starting point? Is it the freshmen this year? Why not the freshmen next year? Seems like it’s rather arbitrary to pick a starting point. When we had guys like Golden, Gilly, Sherod all sticking it out and we had high expectations their last 1-2 years, then I could see how it could feel like when they graduated a new cycle started like Brooklyn said. Now, we’re getting a bunch of new players every year. Mooney can have a preference of high school guys staying 4-5 years, but how realistic is that? I posted in a thread a few months ago all the transfers we’ve had the last several years. And with transfers we’re bringing in who have 1-2 years of eligibility left, we can have an experienced team every year.

Lehigh at #9 Richmond

Richmond is rolling into the playoffs, winning 10 straight after an 0-2 start and a questionable FCS loss to Wofford. The Spiders had a strong argument for a first-round bye. Despite not owning any currently-ranked wins, Richmond gave Delaware its first loss of the season (28-9) in mid-October, and it beat playoff-hopeful William & Mary 27-0 last week.

Lehigh earned the Patriot League auto-bid, finishing 8-3 overall and 5-1 in conference play, winning five consecutive games entering postseason play. Mike DeNucci continues to be a standout on the defense and looks to be a three-time All-Conference player. He has 80 tackles, 10 TFLs, and 5.5 sacks this season. Offensively, Lehigh likes to get things rolling on the ground. The Mountain Hawks are enjoying the two-headed youngster monster of Luke Yoder (sophomore, 888 yards, 10 TDs) and Jaden Green (freshman, 693 yards, 9 TDs).

It’ll be tough sledding against this Richmond defense, though. The Spiders allow just 127.4 rushing yards per game, and they rank No. 21 in FCS rush defense on PFF. Jeremiah Grant is as good as it gets on the d-line in the FCS, totaling 45 tackles, 16.5 TFLs, 12.5 sacks, and six quarterback hurries.

On offense, the Spiders aren’t lighting up the scoreboard, scoring an OK 28.1 points per game. But the balance and talent are there. Zach Palmer-Smith has rushed for 1,275 yards and 13 touchdowns. Camden Coleman has 1,832 yards, 12 touchdowns, and five interceptions. Nick DeGennaro is one of the top FCS wide receivers beyond his number (40 catches, 576 yards, 4 TDs), but he has missed the last couple of games.

Richmond could be a dangerous squad in the bracket, and it starts with a convincing first-round win.

Prediction: Richmond 31-14

Ball St game on Nov17th....how'd we do?