Midweek Notes
September 30, 2009 01:41 PM | General
(1:41 pm)
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| Major Harris |
Major Harris will be in town Thursday for a luncheon at the Waterfront Place Hotel honoring his selection to the College Football Hall of Fame. The luncheon is being put on by the Mountaineer Athletic Club.
Harris will also be recognized during Thursday night’s game against Colorado.
“I know Morgantown is excited and the whole West Virginia Nation should be excited,” said Coach Bill Stewart. “He is one of the great heroes of all time. He is very deserving, and I will be in New York City in early December to help represent WVU. We are very excited and happy to have Major – it’s going to be a neat sight.”
Earlier this week, Stewart recalled what an outstanding high school player Harris was when he was recruiting the city of Pittsburgh for North Carolina and Arizona State as an assistant coach.
Weekly Word
Also, Jock Sanders is presently averaging 9.6 receptions per game. If Sanders can keep up his current clip he will finish the regular season with 115 catches. The school record for receptions in a season is 77 performed by Shawn Foreman in 1997 and David Saunders in 1998.
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| Avon Cobourne |
Cobourne is leading the CFL in rushing (1,043), yards from scrimmage (1,423) and touchdowns (13) through 13 games.
He has had four 100-yard rushing games this season.
Last year, Cobourne ran for 950 yards and scored six touchdowns as a first time regular for the Alouettes.
Cobourne owns the WVU career rushing record with 5,164 career yards from 1999-2002.
Mitch is also scheduled to appear in the 2011 release of the Eddie Murphy movie A Thousand Words.
Fink will play a male agent in the movie.
New coach Doug Morrone has Syracuse 2-2 with back-to-back wins over Northwestern and Maine heading into this weekend’s game against USF.
Last year’s WVU-Syracuse game played in Morgantown aired on ESPNU. The last time the two teams played on ABC was 2005 in Syracuse.
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| Chuck Howley |
Howley was a standout performer at West Virginia University who later when on to star for the Dallas Cowboys’ Doomsday Defense. Howley was a six-time all-pro and the only player in NFL history to be named MVP of the Super Bowl from a losing team.
Induction ceremonies will take place on Monday, Feb. 8, 2010 at Baylor University’s Ferrell Center in Waco, Texas.
Howley was part of the inaugural WVU Sports Hall of Fame class in 1991, and he is also a member of the Dallas Cowboys’ ring of honor.
Congratulations, Chuck!
The dinner will begin at 6 pm. There will be an all-you-can-eat barbeque, live entertainment and a silent auction.
The game will pit Big East No. 4 against Big 12 No. 7. Newsday reported this morning that the Yankees will commit more than $16 million over a four-year period to the game with the estimated payout to each team being $2 million.
Notre Dame could also be in the mix if the Big 12 cannot fill its bowl commitment. That means the Big East’s bowl lineup for 2010 will probably look like this:
The Northeast has gotten back into the bowl business with last year’s EagleBank Bowl in Washington, D.C. featuring Wake Forest and Navy. Also, Toronto has been the host site for the International Bowl.
Years ago, the Liberty Bowl was once played in Philadelphia before bad weather and declining attendance forced creator Bud Dudley to move the game to a warmer climate in Memphis, Tenn.
Notre Dame owns a 55-match unbeaten streak in Big East play to tie the NCAA record established by North Carolina in ACC play from 1994-2000. Overall, the Irish are 53-0-2 during that stretch with one of the two ties coming against West Virginia in the 2007 Big East championship which the Mountaineers won on penalty kicks.
Friday night’s match is Dollar Night with tickets and selected concessions $1 each.
You can watch this promo for Friday’s game performed by Mountaineers Sydney Metheny and Carolyn Blank:
Pat is a resident of Fort Washington, Md.
Congratulations, Pat!
http://www.sportingnews.com/college-basketball/article/2009-09-24/college-basketballs-top-10-power-forwards
DeCourcy and Jeff D’Alessio also came out with their preseason top 50 and they have West Virginia fifth behind Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan State and North Carolina. Here is what others are saying about their rankings:
http://www.sportingnews.com/college-basketball/article/2009-09-30/sns-college-basketball-top-50-has-people-talking
Many other schools have jumped in as well. Now, some are starting to pull back.
Last month, USF coach Jim Leavitt stopped his twitter account and issued a team ban on twitter when he found out that at least three of his players were tweeting messages during a team meeting in the locker room 15 minutes before the Wofford game.
And two days ago, Texas Tech coach Mike Leach ended twittering for his football team after one of his players tweeted that Leach was late for a team meeting. Leach said players’ Facebook pages would also be monitored.
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| Jim Leavitt |
South Florida is also 4-0 after its 17-7 victory over Florida State last Saturday in Tallahassee. USF’s other wins have come against Wofford, Western Kentucky and Charleston Southern.
South Florida coach Jim Leavitt has one of the best front fours in the country with bookends George Selvie and Jason Pierre-Paul. NFL draft expert Mel Kiper Jr. is impressed with both players.
Two years ago, USF started the year 6-0 and reached No. 2 in the national rankings before fading. Last year, the Bulls were 5-0 before taking a dive. USF will get a tough test this weekend against an improving Syracuse in the Carrier Dome.
I like both Cincinnati and South Florida a lot but there are still questions that remain with both teams. Can Cincinnati run the football when it has to and can it stop good offenses?
Can USF overcome the loss of four-year starting quarterback Matt Grothe and consistently score points to help out a dominant defense?
Stay tuned.
Rutgers has rebounded from its disappointing season-opening loss to Cincinnati by winning consecutive games against Howard, Florida International and Maryland. The Scarlet Knights can make it four in a row on Saturday against Texas Southern.
Rutgers defeated Maryland in College Park last weekend without touted true freshman quarterback Tom Savage, who was knocked out of the Florida International game with a concussion. Savage is questionable for this weekend’s game against Texas Southern.
UConn’s win two weeks ago at Baylor did not get a lot of attention, but it was an outstanding win for the Huskies nonetheless. Connecticut was able to go on the road and beat a Big 12 team without starting quarterback Zach Frazer. Don’t forget, Baylor opened the season with a 24-21 win at Wake Forest.
UConn expects to have Frazer back for its next game at Pitt on Oct. 10.
Speaking of Pitt, I still don’t know what to make of the Panthers. I watched a good portion of the NC State game last Saturday and there were times when I thought Pitt looked impressive, and there were other times when the Panthers didn’t look so impressive.
State rebounded from a season-opening 7-3 loss to South Carolina by whipping Murray State and Gardner-Webb before beating Pitt 38-31 in come-from-behind fashion.
How good is NC State? I don’t know.
What has to be most concerning for the Panthers is a defense that has allowed more than 500 yards of total offense in consecutive weeks to Buffalo and NC State. Defense was supposed to be Pitt’s strong suit in 2009.
Enjoy Thursday night’s game.
