Recruiting 2014-- Mark Ellis II

I've blogged about Mark Ellis, a 5-8 170 pound DB before.

This post from a Villanova blog has video of Ellis performing DB drills at a Wildcat summer camp. Ellis attended a camp at UMass back in June.

Ellis is drawing interest from Temple, Rugers, Maryland, Boston College and West Virginia in FBS.

Recruiting 2014--Mark Ellis

247 Sports image

This Villanova blog post reports that Mark Ellis, a 5-8 170 pound CB from Williamstown, NJ has visited UMass.

Hudl.com page here.

Visited Temple in March.

Ellis is receiving interest from Temple, BC, West Virginia and Rutgers in FBS. Richmond, Villanova and JMU are interested in FCS.

Notes on the 2008 UMass Football Season Preview

The official UMass Athletic Web site has a six-page 2008 Football Season Preview up.

Notes & comments:

Offense

"Liam Coen is the best quarterback in UMass football history" said coach Brown. That's quite a statement...

A big cog in the offense seems to be backup QB Scott Woodward. Besides backing up Liam he's the holder on kicks and the backup punter.

At RB it looks like we will have the "lighting & thunder" combo of 5-10 210 pd Tony Nelson and 6-2 245 pd Brandon White.

Good to hear 6-1 230 pd FB Chris Zardas will be ready to go. 6-1 215 pd Emil Iqwenagu will back him up.

Bigger news is that 6-0 200 pd Victor Cruz is expected to start at WR. Cruz was a highly touted recruit who will be in his fourth season with the Minutemen. In 2007, Cruz played in eight games and had one catch for 26 yards.

Take a bow anonymous commenter, who told us 6-2 230 pd Ryan Logan would move to H-Back.
It's true.

But you didn't say All-conference RT Tackle Sean Calicchio is moving to center. Taking his place at RT will be 6-6 260 pd Rob Getek. Left Guard will be 6-8 296 pd Ben Coblyn. Reading between the lines, it looks like RG is still open.

Defense:

Brian Ellis will start at SS. At 6-0 210 he's a former LB who played in 11 games in '07 and had 25 tackles. His backup will me 6-0 205 pd Shane Viveiros. Another new face in the two-deep is backup FS Eric Dickson. He played in nine games in 2007 and had five tackles.

A new name in the defense is true freshman Nichlas Haag, who is DB from Bridgton Academy. I don't remember seeing him on previous recruiting lists.

There has always been a lot of comment on the size of our defensive line. Looks like we bulked up for 2007. DE Michael Hansen is 6-2 260 (he was listed as 235 last year). Captain Brandon Collier is now 6-1 280 . Kyle C. Harrington is the NG and is 6-3 280 (up from 256 last year).

Another new recruit is Nicholas Collilouri. He's a 5-11 260 pd DL from Holliston MA. He's apparently a recruited walk-on. Image of him here (sixth image down). Looks like quite a bit of depth on the DL with Shaun Allen, Anthony Monette, JUCO Theluxon Pierre, Bob McLaughlin, Delaware transfer Raymond Jones and RFr Courtney Jackson.

One interesting fact is that Travis Tripucka a defender on the UMass Lax team will contend for the long snapper position. His uncle Mark Tripucka played QB for the Minutemen in the early 70's. Mark was the starting QB in 1974. He went 60-145 817 yards and 6 TD in the old Yankee Conference.

I think this is a good and deep squad. Fall camp opens on August 5th!

UMass Football News--August 9th, 2023

 The UMass athletic dept has a nine minute video of the offense's status in Fall camp.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

BTW, at Saturday's practice, Brady Olsen was wearing #2 instead of 12.

On offense Stony Brook transfer Shawn Harris, Jr was wearing #12.

PWO QB Conner Whitson was wearing # 18.

Greg Desrosiers. Jr.

Greg Desrosiers, Jr was wearing #3, now #20. 

Arizona transfer RB Jalen John was wearing #21.

Arizona transfer LB Tyler Martin was wearing #5.

Miami transfer Mark Pope was wearing Ellis Merriweather's old #7.

Arizona transfer Mark Simpson was wearing #8.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The UConn Blog (good name) looks at the Huskies QB battle.

Connecticut governor Ned Lamont visits the Huskies camp and weighs in on conference realignment and UConn's prospects. 

Can you imagine the Massachusetts governor visiting UMass football? I can't either..

Update: Dennis Hernandez, brother of Aaron Hernandez threatens UConn football.

"I've got a bullet for everybody", he said.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Auburn's Toomer Oaks can be rolled this year returning one of the War Eagles cherished traditions.

Notes from Auburn's training camp.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

UMass Football News--March 29th, 2023

 

UMass athletic dept image

 

Yeah! 2023 is officially under way as UMass has its first spring practice. Images and video on the UMass Twitter feed.

Also, the 2023 spring roster is up.

The Greenfield Recorder has a post on the first practice. 

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 

Gino Campiotti moves to #13 from #5 (and from QB to TE)

Brady Olsen moves from #12 to #2.

Incoming transfer Mark Pope gets Ellis Merriweather's offense #7.

Transfer QB Carlos Davis is #5.

Transfer Viper Jalen Harrell gets Marchs Cushie's defensive #5.

Transfer DL Shambre Jackson gets #43.

Transfer Safety Dashaun Jerkins gets #14. 

Transfer RB Jalen John get #21.

Transfer OL Brandon MacKinnon gets #66.

Transfer LB Tyler Martin gets #5.

Transfer DB Steven Ortiz gets #3.

Transfer RB Jackson Paradis gets #32.

Transfer QB Taisun Phommachanh gets #3

Transfer WR Anthony Simpson gets #12.

Transfer DL Jermaine Wiggins get #47.

Transfer LB Jerry Roberts Jr (and probable starter) gets #28.

Transfer DL JB Brown gets #4.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

UMass Football News--May 4th 2021 -The Spring game part II

 I'm going up to Maine for a couple of days. As usual, I'll try to keep the blog going. If I can't, the Blog will be back Saturday.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

One position UMass hopes improves is RB. The UMass rushing game was virtually nonexistent in 2020. Since our move to FBS the Minutemen have never finished above #100 in rushing offense and most years were in the bottom five. There may be light at the end of the tunnel.

Ellis Merriweather.

Merriweather came in and was elected captain. He's a good straight-ahead runner and should develop better stats this year.

Rutgers transfer Kay'Ron Adams may have been the most impressive runner at the Spring game. I did not get a good image of him, but check out this run on the UMass Football Twitter feed.

Jared Chisari

Chisari, a 5-11 200 pound transfer from Bowdoin did not look out of place. He scored on a nifty run up the middle. He should add some depth to the position.

Jonathon White, a 5-10 205 pound transfer from Hutchinson C.C. DNP due to a rib injury per Mark Grabowski. 

The last four years or so it always seemed UMass was one-deep at RB. This year it looks as if we have made some strides in talent and depth.

UMass image

 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Two of the four teams in the FCS semi-finals are from the CAA.

Delaware beat Jacksonville State 20-14.

James Madison beat North Dakota 34-21.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Monday Morning Mulling

Matty Vautour says mistakes doom UMass in painful defeat .

Lost in the defeat were a number of UMass records. Courtney Robinson set the All-Time UMass return yardage record.

Tony Nelson went over the 1,000 yard mark rushing.

Victor Cruz went over 1,000 yards receiving. The UMass season stats page for everybody is here.

Also lost for season is Senior Brian Ellis, who broke his leg against Maine.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

All the FCS score from Saturday are here . The CAA site has a review of all the league games here .

Keepers FCS power rankings are here . His predictions page is here (he has UMass by 10+ over Hofstra).

The week# 12 Bracketology page is here .

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I'll be back this evening with a Web album from the New Hampshire game.