Recruiting 2014-- Tyler Murphy

Kim Klement image

Fifth year senior Florida QB  Tyler Murphy will transfer according to ESPN.

Murphy will be the sixth player to leave the Gators after the season. He started six games for Florida in 2013.

Monday ---December 16, 2013

The MAC conference companionship game outdrew the PAC-12, Mountain West and Conference USA title games in the Neilsen ratings.

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Jordan Lunch came in third in the Heisman contest.

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Dan Enos thinks Central Michigan will improve on 2013's 6-6 record.

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Bleacher Report has a story about highly rated recruits verbaling to mid-major schools.

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New Hampshire beat #7 Southeastern Louisiana 20-17 on a last minute drive in front of an announced crowd of 5,886 in Hammond, LA. I watched the game on ESPN3. The Wildcats clearly looked like the better team, but they missed two field goals, and extra point and threw an INT inside the Southeastern Louisiana five yard line to keep the Lions in the game.

Recruiting 2014-- Marcus Applefield III

I have blogged about Marcus Applefield, a 6-7 280 pound OT twice before.

He committed to Rutgers yesterday.

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Saturday--December 14, 2013

Wicked Local Carver has a story about UMMB member Andrew Lawzon.

Lauzon talks about the Band's performance at Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. He says:"This was our biggest event so far, but we’ll find a way to top it,” he promised."

How about performing in a bowl game before he graduates?

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Sports Illustrated says another MAC coach get on the job training at a bowl game.

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Forbes talks about NIU's $17.5 million dollar loss.

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More on UConn's new head coach.

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The Chicago Tribune says NIU" Jordan Lynch is going to NY "To Win".

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A sports website names Buffalo as one of the ten most surprising teams of 2013.

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I watched Towson beat Eastern Illinois 49-39 last night in front of an announced crowd of 3,850 fans.

Former Minuteman Daniel Delaire had a good night with 6 TT 1 SACK and a fumble recovery.

Brian Dowling had one catch for 23 yards.

Tiger running back Terrance West had 354 yards rushing to break the record held by Adrian Peterson who had 333 yards against UMass in 1999.

Recruiting 2015--Tommy Hatton

Image credit unknown

Several recruiting services indicate UMass has offered to Tommy Hatton, a 6-2 280 pound OG from Montvale, NJ.

Rivals three-star player.

ESPN four stars.

This capsule features Hatton.

From a Scout.com recruiting article on Hatton: " Seven schools have offered Tommy thus far. The list includes Rutgers, UConn, Boston College, UMass, Indiana, Duke, and Temple. Hatton is also receiving interest from other schools. “ Georgia Tech, Syracuse, Miami, Pittsburgh, Michigan State, and South Carolina are ones that I feel are very close to offering me.” Hatton is receiving a lot of major interest from those schools."

YouTube interview from four days ago.

Friday--December 13. 2013

UMass professor Max Page  offers some fuzzy math about the finances of the football program. Revenues will increase again next year and UMass would have made a profit this year if NIU had made the Fiesta Bowl.

MassLive has a report on assistant coaches salaries.

USA Today has a story on assistant coaches bonuses and perks.

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Jordan Lynch's Heisman Finalist season worth plenty Northern Illinois.

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Bowling Green's victory in the MAC Championship was a costly one for the league.

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NCAA audit shows every football conference made money on the 2012-2013 bowls.

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Recruiting 2014-- Troy Jones, Jr

247 Sports image

Several recruiting services report UMass has offered to Troy Jones, Jr. He's 6-2 210 pound dual threat QB JUCO from Nassau Community College.

Two recruiting article featuring Jones from NJ. com here and here (March 2013).

Jones' stats at Nassau.

247 Sports bio here.

Jones also has offers from Middle Tennessee State, Georgia State and New Mexico.

Recruiting sites such as JC Football Recruiting.com do not list any other UMass offers to QB's (which does not mean there aren't any), but UMass really needs a boost in QB play in 2014.

Thursday--December 12, 2013

Tim Heitman image

Baker Mayfield, the Big Twelve offensive freshman-of-the-year is looking to transfer. Mayfield received high school offers from Florida Atlantic, New Mexico, Rice and Washington State, which are not out of line with UMass.

Mayfield spurned the above offers to walk on at Texas Tech.

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Three MAC players made the USA Today All-American list.

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Eastern Michigan hires Chris Creighton from Drake as head coach.

Hustle Belt has an article on the hire.

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Vegas Insider has MAC teams the favorite in three of four games.

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UConn hires Notre Dame's defensive coordinator as head coach.

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CBS Sports has the 2013 FBS coaching changes. Three in the MAC.

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What a 64 team college football playoff bracket would look like.

Recruiting 2014-- Nick McBeath

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Dan Malone reports Nick McBeath, a 6-2 210 pound OLB from Christopher Columbus HS in Miami, FL has verbaled to UMass.

Malone's story here.

This capsule from South Florida Sports.com features McBeath.

Rivals two-star player.

Hudl.com has video.

247 Sports page here.

Had FBS offers from Air Force, Florida Atlantic and FIU.

Wednesday--December 11, 2013

Jimmy Kelly has a story about Mike Wegzyn and Derek Beck. Also RB Stacey Bedell is leaving.

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The Chicago Tribune says Jordan Lynch is excited for NIU, the MAC Conference and himself.

Bowling Green has named an interim Coach.

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The Sun Belt Conference had seven eligible teams, but only two were offered bowl bids.

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Speaking of bowls, UMass had 11 losses this year. Seven of the eleven were against bowl teams.

All three of the Minutemen's OOC FBS teams are going to bowls.

Kansas State will play Michigan in the Buffalo Wild Wings Bowl.

In one of the better Bowl matchups, Wisconsin will play South Carolina in the Capital One Bowl.

Vanderbilt plays Houston in the BBVA Compass Bowl.

Maine won its first CAA Championship and had its first home FCS playoff game.

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Tuesday--December 10, 2013

Mike Wegzyn

Matty V. says Mike Wegzyn and Derek Beck will transfer out. Walk on QB Matt Quinn will graduate instead of taking a fifth year with the team.

This will leave UMass very thin in both positions. Rob Blanchflower and Ricardo Miller have finished their eligibility. Freshman Sharif Custis 6-3 215 will be the only TE on the roster.

RS Freshman Todd Stafford will be the only other recruited QB available for Spring ball. 2014 recruit Randall West suffered a knee injury this fall. It's unknown if he will be available by August.

Walk-on Mark Johnson will be the only other QB on the roster. Johnson's Be Recruited page. MaxPreps has Johnson's 2013 stats.

It's been my feeling UMass badly needs a fifth year transfer QB or JUCO in order for the program to get its footing.

The Doyle/Wegzyn combination was last in the MAC, going a combined 237-444 2240 yards 19 INT 9 TD's 53.4 % 93.9 EFF. That's the fewest number of yards, the most INT's (by a lot) and the fewest number of TD's (again, by a lot) and the lowest efficiency.

Dan Malone has more.

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UMass Senior safety Devin Brown has received the Nil V. "Swede" Nelson Award from the Gridiron Club of Greater Boston for academics, athletics, sportsmanship and citizenship.

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The UMass team had its annual season banquet Sunday. Honored were:

UMASS FOOTBALL 2013 TEAM AWARDS
All Mid-American Conference Awards - Anthony Dima
Vern Smith Leadership Award - Rob Blanchflower
Offensive Scout Team Player of the Year - Todd Stafford
Defensive Scout Team Player of the Year - Jesse Monteiro
James Ihedigbo Walk-On of the Year - Shadrach Abrokwah
Bob Foote Offensive Lineman of the Year - David Osei
Vic Fusia Academic Achievement Award - Devin Brown
Coaches Award - Kevin Byrne
Marcel Shipp Iron Man Award - Brandon Potvin
Special Teams Most Valuable Player - Khary Bailey-Smith
Offensive Most Valuable Player - Tajae Sharpe
Defensive Most Valuable Player - Galen Clemons
Presentation of Game Balls - Dan Markowski, Khary Bailey-Smith, Rob Blanchflower

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Bowling Green's Dave Clawson has been hired by Wake Forest.

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NIU's Jordan Lynch is a Heisman finalist.

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Recruiting 2014--Jordan Rigg

Scout.com says Jordan Rigg, a 6-5 230 pound TE/DE from Springboro, Ohio has visited UMass.

Rigg's Scout.com bio here.

Partial quote by Rigg about his UMass visit:

“I went to Massachusetts for an official visit,” said Rigg. “Their coaches are nice and pretty much showed me everything they have.

“I liked their coaches and getting a chance to hang out with the team showed that I could fit in there.

“I got the full tour and hung out with a couple of the players and it was pretty fun.”

Hudl.com has some stats and video.

Rigg will take a official visit to Buffalo. Also has offers from Ball State and Ohio.  With only two TE's on the roster after 2013's graduation, Rigg would probably see more PT from UMass.

Monday--December 9, 2013

Professor Max Page and MassLive writer Ron Chimelis are at it again.

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Northern Illinois dropped to #23 in the BCS poll. Besides the $18,000,000 payout the Huskies cost the league, the MAC will probably lose a bowl bid as the league teams gets pushed down a notch.

The Huskies ended up in the Poinsettia Bowl, which has a $500,000 payout...

Bowling Green gets the Little Ceasars bowl.

Ball State to the GoDaddy.com Bowl.

Buffalo gets San Diego State in the Idaho Famous Potato Bowl.

The MAC Report Online has five MAC teams headed to bowls.

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Two MAC coaches could be in the running for the HC job at Wake Forest.

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Sunday--December 6, 2013

Hi everyone. I've done a blog post seven days a week all through the summer and fall. With news slowing down in the off season, I'm going to take Sundays off for a while.

I'll be back tomorrow with some recruiting news about a 6-5 230 pound TE who took a visit to Amherst.

Saturday-- December 7, 2013

UMass football will miss out on a $500,000 payment from MAC after Bowling Green crushed Northern Illinois in the the league championship game last night.

CBS Sports reports NIU knocked out of BCS bowl.

Sports Illustrated says Bowling Green thrashed NIU and talks about Dave Clawson building a program.

I watched all the game and the Falcons were bigger, stronger and faster than NIU. They flat dominated the game from start to stop. The loss not only knocked NIU out of a bowl game, it ended any buzz about Jordan Lynch deserving the Heisman.

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Buffalo's Khalil Mack won the Jack Lambert Award as college football's best linebacker. He's the first MAC player to have won the award.

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SB Nation delves into comments by college football fans during game threads. WARNING VERY, VERY, NOT SAFE FOR WORK. Also very funny.

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Recruiting 2014 -- Jason Sylva V

Rivals.com image

I've blogged about Jason Sylva, a 6-3 250 pound LB from Dean College four times before.

Sylva is listed as a "soft verbal" to the Minutemen.

According to Rivals.com Sylva will visit UMass today.

Sylva was NFC 2013 Defensive player-of-the-year. He had 72 TT and 8 TFL.

He'll also be visiting Western Michigan on January 17th.

Sylva holds offers from UMass, Florida Atlantic, Old Dominion, UConn and Temple.

Friday--December 6, 2013

NIU and Bowling Green meet for the MAC Championship tonight at 8:00 pm on ESPN2. UMass has a substantial rooting interest in the game. If the NIU Huskies win, there's a good chance they'll receive a BCS bowl bid. Last year, UMass as a provision MAC team, was not eligible to receive a member's share of MAC bowl proceeds. This year we are. The Fiesta Bowl has a $17,000,000 payout.

Go Huskies :)

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MAC Championship capsule.

SI.com says NIU's on the brink of another BCS bid.

NIU tries to focus only on the MAC Championship game.

NIU is wary of Bowling Green's defense.

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College sport most likely to generate head concussions--------- Field Hockey.

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Boston College may be feeling pinstripe-y.

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Cortavious Givens III

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Back in February and April I blogged about Cortavious Givens, a 5-11 200 pound athlete from Saint Petersburg, FL.

This article from this summer features Givens.

MaxPreps has his stats from 2013.

Givens suffered a torn ACL in his sophomore season. Most recruiting services see him as a fullback or OLB.

Besides UMass, givens has offers from Florida Atlantic and Virginia.

Thursday--December 5, 2013

Anthony Dima was the lone Minuteman to be chosen to any All-MAC team. The complete All-MAC selections are here.

UMass' one honoree is, I believe the lowest in the MAC. Winless Miami had three.

In 2012, Perry McIntyre, Darren Thellen and Colter Johnson were named to All-MAC teams.

Dan Malone has a story about Dima here.

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Success equals selling a lot of merchandise for NIU.

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Recruiting 2014--Adonis Jennings III

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I've blogged about Adonis Jennings before. Jennings is a 6-3 190 pound WR from Timber Creek HS in NJ. He's the second highest player on ESPN's UMass considering list.

In the middle of November Jennings decommitted from Rutgers.

Jennings is a consensus four-star receiver who has offers from 20+ FBS schools.