College Sports Journal Southland Conference Previews, How To Watch: Week of 11/16/2019
If you know what’s going to happen in the Southland Conference these last two weeks, head out to Vegas and make yourself a lot of money.
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If you know what’s going to happen in the Southland Conference these last two weeks, head out to Vegas and make yourself a lot of money.
We are down to the last two weeks and the Southern Conference has a clear picture of its outlook for the conference title and potential playoff bids. There are three teams in the mix – Furman, Wofford and The Citadel. With a win this week, Furman will clinch the conference title and automatic bid to the playoffs. A Wofford win sets up a week 13 showdown between Wofford and The Citadel – provided The Citadel takes care of business on the road this weekend.
Monmouth, currently ranked No. 15 in the nation, and Campbell square off in a huge conference tilt that could go a long way in determining how the long season eventually plays itself out. A Monmouth win will assure the Hawks of no worse than a tie for the BSC championship.
It’s highly unusual for Lehigh (4-5, 3-2) and Sacred Heart (6-4, 4-2)to be playing a non-conference game this late in the season, but for both teams, important milestones remain.
Austin Peay, whose win over UT Martin last week pushed the Skyhawks from atop the conference standings, and Southeast Missouri State must both avoid any sort of letdown this week if they are to keep their goal of an OVC championship and a berth in the FCS playoffs intact.
We are down to the last two weeks of the regular season. In the CAA, James Madison is a playoff lock and will claim the outright conference championship with another win. The Dukes should also slide into the seeds when the playoff bracket is released on November 24. Villanova is probably also solidly in the field. From there, its anybody’s guess what other CAA teams will be included on Selection Sunday
Two weeks to go, and how many autobids have been clinched? How about… none?
We are two weeks away from the end of the Patriot League regular season, and there is a very distinct possibility that the winner of the League is going to have a losing record.
While FAMU had a bye week, losses coupled with upsets caused shifts in both the BOXTOROW Coaches and Media Polls. The Rattlers are the unanimous No. 1 in both polls for the first time in the history of the polls.
While North Dakota State and James Madison continued to beat their opponents into submission, out west, Weber State and Sacramento State each used strong 4th quarter comebacks to maintain their place in the standings. Weber State at Montana looms large this week for the playoff seeding discussion.
San Diego has two games remaining during the regular season. The Toreros are scheduled to face Morehead State and Jacksonville in the final two games before the start of the FCS playoffs Nov. 30.
Monmouth entrenched itself into the driver’s seat in the race for the Big South Conference championship with a big win over North Alabama on Saturday to remain unbeaten in league play. The Hawks can secure at least a share of the conference title with a win next weekend at Campbell, which also remains alive for the conference title.
Why is 1977 significant? It’s been that long since Austin Peay found itself atop the Ohio Valley Conference standings this late in the season. It was also the last time the Governors claimed the conference title. They are hoping for a similar finish more than 40 years later.
It was, depending on your perspective, either the roughest Lehigh offensive performance of the season, or the greatest Bucknell defensive performance of the year.
It seems like nothing ever comes easy for Appalachian State when it is playing a Power-5 Conference football team. So why would Saturday night before 80,849 fans be any different for the Mountaineers in its 20-15 nail-biter over South Carolina at Williams-Brice Stadium?
It’s somewhat serendipitous, according to John Feinstein of The Washington Post, that this week’s battle of undefeated teams between Dartmouth and Princeton came to be.
Holy Cross will be trying to cement their hold on the top of the Patriot League standings when they host Lafayette this weekend. They could clinch at least a share of the title and FCS Playoff autobid if they win and Lehigh loses at Bucknell.
This week, the super spoiler FAMU has an bye week, and the conference has a lot of match ups that on paper should be easy wins for the top three teams in the title race. We do have an interesting batch up for a couple of teams looking to possibly go .500 on the season and as for the other lop sided games, and if we have learned anything from other conferences this year, it’s no to take any game for granted.
Most games between head coaches in their first years at a school are ones where the opponents need to feel themselves out, thanks to unfamiliarity. That will not be the case this weekend, as Cecchini and Gilmore have more than two decades of awareness of one another and their tendencies. It should have the feel of a brotherly fight.
While Central Arkansas seems to have control of the Southland at his point, the conference has shown that anything can happen on a weekly basis. There are three teams nipping at the Bears’ heels just one game back in the standings.
The SWAC is still battling it out to see who can challenge the teams atop the East and West divisions. While it might look like Southern and Alcorn State have all but wrapped it up according to the eye test, there are still a couple of teams that could play spoiler so long as they keep winning and have games against the top teams later in the season.
The Owls, who lost to Monmouth last weekend, have a chance at redemption and can climb back into the hunt for another Big South Conference title on Saturday when they travel to Campbell in a key BSC matchup.
The crème has started to rise to the top in the Southern Conference over the last few weeks. With three weeks left in the season, there are three teams left in the mix for the conference title, and those are likely the only three teams who have a shot to make the playoffs – Furman, Wofford and The Citadel.
The contenders will get a chance to distinguish themselves from the pretenders in the Ohio Valley Conference as a pair of games on Saturday will go a long way in determining who will represent the league in the upcoming FCS playoffs. The first round of the playoffs will begin on Nov. 30.
At this point the CAA could have five teams get into the FCS Playoffs, or they could have two. Its going to be a tense last three weeks.
For the players of both programs, it was more about demonstrating how much they had improved over that battle of 1-6 teams on a wet, rainy, homecoming game a year ago in Worcester. Both teams showed exactly how much more they were than those teams with losing records last year, and in the end, Holy Cross showed that they were one play better than the Mountain Hawks on this afternoon.
The North Carolina A&T Aggies win over South Carolina State in the marquee game of the weekend caused slight shifts in both the BOXTOROW Coaches and Media Polls. Florida A&M defeated Delaware State and remained No. 1.
Weber State showed it’s the best team in the Big Sky, and may be the best team in the country with its 19 point win over Sacramento State.
There are three more football weekends to go before FCS Playoff Selection Sunday, where FCS Nation hopes ESPN pronounces all the schools’ names correctly and don’t forget to specify who is home, and who is away in the first round.
BOONE, N.C. — In the wind, the cold and the snow of Kidd Brewer Stadium on Thursday, 20th-ranked Appalachian State seemingly watched the cotton boll of its Cotton Bowl hopes wither and die on the vine as arch-rival Georgia Southern held on for a 24-21 victory before 18,796 brave spectators and the national-television, Halloween-night audience.
The shockwaves are sure to be felt across the FCS landscape when the national rankings are released later this week after Monmouth handled Kennesaw State in surprising fashion 45-21 on Saturday in Kennesaw, Ga.
The race for the Ohio Valley Conference became a tad bit clearer as league leader UT Martin won for fourth time in five league encounters while Southeast Missouri and Austin Peay both posted important wins to keep their title hopes alive. UT Martin defeated five-time defending conference champion Jacksonville State 22-17. The Skyhawks improved to.
In the final minute, Holy Cross made one more play than Lehigh.
Undefeated Princeton and Dartmouth look to not slip up going into a potentially enormous matchup of undefeated teams in the Bronx.
Drama promises to be the operative word as the race toward the Big South championship kicks into high gear. But even the drama will not bring things into much clearer focus as two teams will be undefeated in conference play when all the dust settles late Saturday afternoon. Campbell enters the weekend a 3-0 record.
The Southland continues to be one of the most confusing conferences to figure out. As soon as we think a team has taken a step forward to enhance their profile, they perplex us all by losing a game you would never expect them to lose.
Whoever drew up the 2019 Ohio Valley Conference football schedule is probably thinking rather highly of themselves right about now. It’s been a masterful schedule and one that dreams are made of – or nightmares, depending on your outlook.
November in the Lehigh Valley is known for potentially frosty temperatures, blazing red and yellow fall colors, and apple picking season.
Don’t expect anything chill at Murray Goodman Stadium this Saturday, where the combined heat of the Holy Cross Crusaders (4-4, 2-0) and Lehigh Mountain Hawks (4-3, 3-0) should be radiating from both teams.
The SoCon race is still a wide open, with three teams with one conference loss and another three with two conference losses. There is a lot of football to be played and the Southern conference has been wildly unpredictable this year.
One of the wildest endings to a game this year happened last week between Stony Brook and Villanova. Villanova held a 35-20 lead with five minutes remaining only to see Stony Brook roar back with 16 points to win on a Nick Courtney field goal as time expired. As a result, the CAA is a huge jumble, as it seems to be every year.
Remember when I had Villanova as a seed? Good times. Harken back to when I had Delaware in my field? Yes, way back when – last week. Do you recall the time that I had more than two Southland teams in my bracket? It’s so long ago, why, when it happened, North Dakota State and.
After their 27-24 win over Georgetown – their third conference game won on very memorable final plays – what is the Mountain Hawks’ secret for pulling out these conference wins?
As Florida A&M handled Morgan State to win its second straight game and stay atop both the BOXTOROW Coaches and Media Polls, it was South Carolina State’s victory over Bethune-Cookman in Daytona Beach that caused movements in the polls.
The Dakota Marker is staying Fargo after an exciting finish that saw Matt Entz gamble on 4th down in his own territory. Adam Cofield took the carry 71 yards for the game winning points. Elsewhere, James Madison, Weber State and Sacramento State affirmed themselves as the rest of the top five. The rest of the FCS seems to be in flux with different teams elevating and dropping week over week.
The big boys of the Big South did all they were supposed to do as the race for the conference championship prepares to shift into high gear.
After nine weeks of the 2019 college football season many of the conference races are beginning to become clearer. The Ohio Valley Conference simply is setting itself up for a dramatic finish over the final four weeks of the regular season. Southeast Missouri State put itself in nice position for a potential conference championship and.
Another week, another nail-biting game with the game in doubt in the closing seconds. Fans of of the Mountain Hawks might have been standing, perhaps cheering, perhaps looking away, unable to watch whether the 27 yard FG goes through the uprights.
The Patriot League sees Fordham with a week off and features six conference members in action. Lehigh looks to get their conference record to 3-0, Holy Cross looks to keep pace and remain undefeated in league play, and Lafayette and Bucknell will do battle to see who can remain in the title race.
If the playoffs started today, the Southland would easily have four teams in the playoffs, and would still have at least one team that would feel snubbed. The Southland has taken a big step forward to become that fourth conference just behind the big three. There is still a lot of football to be played, but this is one of the more intriguing races as we head down the stretch.
As the 2019 regular season continues to wind down and the hunt for a playoff spot heats up two of the Ohio Valley Conference’s best teams take to the gridiron Saturday in the Show-Me State. League-leader UT Martin, undefeated in four conference games, hits the road to take on No. 24-ranked Southeast Missouri State at Houck Stadium in Cape Girardeau. It is the best conference start since 2006, when the Skyhawks won their only OVC championship.