aceinthehole
October 16th, 2011, 10:32 AM
Interesting article.
Wagner has lost five in a row to fall to 1-5 on the season and 1-2 in Northeast Conference play. It’s a stretch of futility that began with a competitive 21-6 defeat on the road at No. 9-ranked Richmond on Sept. 10, and picked up steam from there.
Clouds began to really gather with back-to-back conference losses to Central Connecticut and Bryant in games three and four, the two defeats coming by a total of six points. The skid continued with a 31-7 whipping at Cornell a couple of weeks back followed by a 24-10 loss to Georgetown on Grymes Hill last Saturday.
The string of defeats was caused at least in part by injuries to three key offensive players: Star receiver David Crawford, game-changing place-kicker David Lopez, and Mr. Everything junior quarterback Nick Doscher.
Crawford is out for the season, having undergone shoulder surgery.
...
The Seahawks are a collective 12-24 in the conference over the last five seasons. Why the so-so results from a program that was a regional power and, in 1987, a national champion, in its Division III heyday?
The answer to the question is pretty simple, really: Tough competition.
Take league powerhouses Albany and Central Connecticut, which have won or shared conference titles in four of the last five seasons. What makes them different from Wagner?
Both are state-funded schools with enrollments more than five times that of Wagner, for starters. And both have tuitions that top out at far less than half of the $47,000-annual price tag of the roughly 2,000-student private school on Grymes Hill.
That matters in a conference where 36 scholarships are available and where that money is parceled out to sometimes 70 or more student-athletes.
Then there’s the matter of academics.
By most measuring sticks the Island school has academic entrance requirements that surpass virtually all other NEC members, narrowing the field of available athletes.
“The league keeps improving, just like in basketball,” said Hameline, also the school’s athletic director.
In terms of its profile, the Seahawk program is probably more similar to that of other small private schools in the league, like Sacred Heart and St. Francis, Pa.
Football at those institutions has often been looked on not only as a sport to be played on fall Saturday afternoons during alumni visits, but also as a driver of male enrollment.
In a year when 50 students who aspire to play football enter Wagner, that number might typically account for something like 25 percent of the incoming male class.
http://www.silive.com/colleges/index.ssf/2011/10/hameline_keeps_even_keel_despi.html
Wagner has lost five in a row to fall to 1-5 on the season and 1-2 in Northeast Conference play. It’s a stretch of futility that began with a competitive 21-6 defeat on the road at No. 9-ranked Richmond on Sept. 10, and picked up steam from there.
Clouds began to really gather with back-to-back conference losses to Central Connecticut and Bryant in games three and four, the two defeats coming by a total of six points. The skid continued with a 31-7 whipping at Cornell a couple of weeks back followed by a 24-10 loss to Georgetown on Grymes Hill last Saturday.
The string of defeats was caused at least in part by injuries to three key offensive players: Star receiver David Crawford, game-changing place-kicker David Lopez, and Mr. Everything junior quarterback Nick Doscher.
Crawford is out for the season, having undergone shoulder surgery.
...
The Seahawks are a collective 12-24 in the conference over the last five seasons. Why the so-so results from a program that was a regional power and, in 1987, a national champion, in its Division III heyday?
The answer to the question is pretty simple, really: Tough competition.
Take league powerhouses Albany and Central Connecticut, which have won or shared conference titles in four of the last five seasons. What makes them different from Wagner?
Both are state-funded schools with enrollments more than five times that of Wagner, for starters. And both have tuitions that top out at far less than half of the $47,000-annual price tag of the roughly 2,000-student private school on Grymes Hill.
That matters in a conference where 36 scholarships are available and where that money is parceled out to sometimes 70 or more student-athletes.
Then there’s the matter of academics.
By most measuring sticks the Island school has academic entrance requirements that surpass virtually all other NEC members, narrowing the field of available athletes.
“The league keeps improving, just like in basketball,” said Hameline, also the school’s athletic director.
In terms of its profile, the Seahawk program is probably more similar to that of other small private schools in the league, like Sacred Heart and St. Francis, Pa.
Football at those institutions has often been looked on not only as a sport to be played on fall Saturday afternoons during alumni visits, but also as a driver of male enrollment.
In a year when 50 students who aspire to play football enter Wagner, that number might typically account for something like 25 percent of the incoming male class.
http://www.silive.com/colleges/index.ssf/2011/10/hameline_keeps_even_keel_despi.html