Georgetown-Stonehill Discussion

[Admin]

1st quarter series:

GU: Five plays, punt to S10 12:11 1st
SC: Ten plays, nine yd. run for the TD. S 7-0 8:16 1st
GU: Five plays, punt to S27 5:03 1st
SC: Five plays, punt to G3 2:23 1st

End of 1, 7-0

[Admin]

2nd quarter series:

GU: 13 plays, 97 yards, 14 yd. pass from Knoop to Stakely. 7-7 10:28 2nd
SC: 11 plays, 64 yards, 6 yd. Corbett run. PAT blocked. S 13-7 6:00 2nd
GU: 10 plays, field goal attempt short and to the left. 1:59 4th
SC: Three and out, punt to midfield. 1:13 2nd
GU: Six plays, 54 yards, 4 yd pass Knoop to Dunneman. PAT fumbled. 13-13 0:30 2nd
SC: One play, half.

At the break, 13-13.

[Admin]

3rd quarter series:

SC: 15 plays, 71 yards, 9 yd, pass. DB Kenneth Borders ejected for targeting on the TD pass. S 20-13 6:51 3rd
GU: 11 pays, 70 yards, Knoop 9 yd. pass to Stakely. 20-20, 1:47 3rd
SC: Three and out, punt to G20 0:43 3rd

End of 3, 20-20.

[Admin]

4th quarter series:

GU: Three and out, punt to S19 14:43 4th
SC: 13 plays, 60 yards, 37 yd FG. S 23-20 5:57 4th
GU: Five plays, fumble at G46 3:31 4th
SC: Six plays 22 yards, missed FG 0:55 4th
GU: Eight plays to midfield, end with a penalty and a sack.

Final: 23-20. With a post-game fight, these teams may not play again for a while.

[dariantownesvanzandt]

Late game execution doesn't get much worse than that.

Rough loss.

[mchoya]

Holy moly. That was one of the most embarrassing end-of-game sequences you could possibly imagine.

[DFW HOYA]

Stonehill is in its second year in FCS football and they took it to a team in their 30th season.

What was the difference, besides a woeful Georgetown kicking game? Stonehill has aspirations for its program. It will be (or may already be) at 40 scholarships and is getting as good or better players than Georgetown. By contrast, Georgetown has to be the only school who considers getting better players in football as "unsportsmanlike".

After this game, the Hoyas may not be favored in a game for the rest of the season, perhaps except Bucknell. Is that sportsmanlike?

[prhoya]

Stonehill?! Sounds like a Bethesda high school.
😉

[Nevada Hoya]

Alma mater of Coach Cooley.

Stonehill College, a Catholic institution of higher learning founded and guided by the Congregation of Holy Cross. Same priests that are at Notre Dame and University of Portland.

[RusskyHoya]

Sept 16, 2023 16:32:06 GMT -5 DFW HOYA said:

Stonehill is in its second year in FCS football and they took it to a team in their 30th season.

What was the difference, besides a woeful Georgetown kicking game? Stonehill has aspirations for its program. It will be (or may already be) at 40 scholarships and is getting as good or better players than Georgetown. By contrast, Georgetown has to be the only school who considers getting better players in football as "unsportsmanlike".

After this game, the Hoyas may not be favored in a game for the rest of the season, perhaps except Bucknell. Is that sportsmanlike?

Not to rehash old arguments for the umpteenth time, but's not a sense that it is "unsportsmanlike" so much as it is a conscious desire to model our involvement in football after the Ivies.

Now, if some billionaire were to suddenly give Georgetown $120M for 60 football and 60 offsetting women's scholarships, would we turn that down? Probably not. We'd just pivot to modeling ourselves after William & Mary or whatever. But outside of that far-fetched scenario, the university community writ large is just not one that is supportive of making football an institutional priority, including making it a major fundraising focus.

[DFW HOYA]

Sept 17, 2023 13:08:40 GMT -5 RusskyHoya said:

Not to rehash old arguments for the umpteenth time, but's not a sense that it is "unsportsmanlike" so much as it is a conscious desire to model our involvement in football after the Ivies. Now, if some billionaire were to suddenly give Georgetown $120M for 60 football and 60 offsetting women's scholarships, would we turn that down? Probably not. We'd just pivot to modeling ourselves after William & Mary or whatever. But outside of that far-fetched scenario, the university community writ large is just not one that is supportive of making football an institutional priority, including making it a major fundraising focus.

With a tacit acknowledgement here, I'll ask it this way: why does it need to?

Georgetown doesn't model its involvement in any other sport like this after the Ivies, be it soccer, volleyball, baseball, etc. No one looked at the Georgetown track program and says, "we need to be more like Dartmouth."

This is the 20th anniversary of Georgetown's first Ivy opponent. Since then, two trends are apparent:

1. Georgetown is not competitive with these teams: a combined 6-32 (.157), or 4-8 versus Columbia and Cornell and 2-24 vs. everyone else, including an 0-fer vs Harvard and Yale (0-11). If Georgetown is "modeling" the Ivies they have largely failed to do so. After 2024, just one Ivy remains on published future schedules and a number Ivy schools simply don't want to play GU because the games are not competitive and Cooper Field is not a draw for their fans. No one considers Georgetown as a rival with any of these schools.

2. Nearly every Ivy school can now offer a no-loan, no-parent contribution offer to applicants with a household income under $100K. Georgetown cannot, and shows no institutional mandate to do so. In that sense, there is a disincentive for Ivy level athletes to attend Georgetown because it does not match offers received elsewhere (including six other PL schools), and I would suspect that Ivies lose comparatively few top athletes to Georgetown as a result.

I'm not arguing for 60 scholarships, and never really have. A Georgetown program with 60 scholarships is merely Bucknell without meaningful admissions reform by the Patriot League, and GU's place in the current PL may be a bigger hindrance to winning than being an Ivy League tagalong. But if Georgetown sees that it can aspire to be no more than Brown and Columbia for some sort of academic purity test in one sport (but curiously, no other), or that scheduling opponents outside three conferences are against the ethos and culture, it will not improve.

PS: I'm not sure the University community is as supportive of basketball as an institutional priority anymore, and that includes a lack of fundraising for men's basketball as identified for the current capital campaign.

[hoyaguy]

Sept 17, 2023 15:44:25 GMT -5 DFW HOYA said:

Sept 17, 2023 13:08:40 GMT -5 RusskyHoya said:

Not to rehash old arguments for the umpteenth time, but's not a sense that it is "unsportsmanlike" so much as it is a conscious desire to model our involvement in football after the Ivies. Now, if some billionaire were to suddenly give Georgetown $120M for 60 football and 60 offsetting women's scholarships, would we turn that down? Probably not. We'd just pivot to modeling ourselves after William & Mary or whatever. But outside of that far-fetched scenario, the university community writ large is just not one that is supportive of making football an institutional priority, including making it a major fundraising focus.

With a tacit acknowledgement here, I'll ask it this way: why does it need to?

Georgetown doesn't model its involvement in any other sport like this after the Ivies, be it soccer, volleyball, baseball, etc. No one looked at the Georgetown track program and says, "we need to be more like Dartmouth."

This is the 20th anniversary of Georgetown's first Ivy opponent. Since then, two trends are apparent:

1. Georgetown is not competitive with these teams: a combined 6-32 (.157), or 4-8 versus Columbia and Cornell and 2-24 vs. everyone else, including an 0-fer vs Harvard and Yale (0-11). If Georgetown is "modeling" the Ivies they have largely failed to do so. After 2024, just one Ivy remains on published future schedules and a number Ivy schools simply don't want to play GU because the games are not competitive and Cooper Field is not a draw for their fans. No one considers Georgetown as a rival with any of these schools.

2. Nearly every Ivy school can now offer a no-loan, no-parent contribution offer to applicants with a household income under $100K. Georgetown cannot, and shows no institutional mandate to do so. In that sense, there is a disincentive for Ivy level athletes to attend Georgetown because it does not match offers received elsewhere (including six other PL schools), and I would suspect that Ivies lose comparatively few top athletes to Georgetown as a result.

I'm not arguing for 60 scholarships, and never really have. A Georgetown program with 60 scholarships is merely Bucknell without meaningful admissions reform by the Patriot League, and GU's place in the current PL may be a bigger hindrance to winning than being an Ivy League tagalong. But if Georgetown sees that it can aspire to be no more than Brown and Columbia for some sort of academic purity test in one sport (but curiously, no other), or that scheduling opponents outside three conferences are against the ethos and culture, it will not improve.

PS: I'm not sure the University community is as supportive of basketball as an institutional priority anymore, and that includes a lack of fundraising for men's basketball as identified for the current capital campaign.

I think we see mostly eye to eye on this dfw. I’m not big into football but one of my close friends at gtown was a lineman and I was concerned for him at times since it seemed like he would beat himself up over an unwinnable situation they would be put in. What would you do if you had reasonable control of things like scholarship amounts within reasonable financial limits? Leave the patriot league if they don’t even want to consider admissions changes? Where would we go?

[RusskyHoya]

Sept 17, 2023 15:44:25 GMT -5 DFW HOYA said:

Sept 17, 2023 13:08:40 GMT -5 RusskyHoya said:

Not to rehash old arguments for the umpteenth time, but's not a sense that it is "unsportsmanlike" so much as it is a conscious desire to model our involvement in football after the Ivies. Now, if some billionaire were to suddenly give Georgetown $120M for 60 football and 60 offsetting women's scholarships, would we turn that down? Probably not. We'd just pivot to modeling ourselves after William & Mary or whatever. But outside of that far-fetched scenario, the university community writ large is just not one that is supportive of making football an institutional priority, including making it a major fundraising focus.

With a tacit acknowledgement here, I'll ask it this way: why does it need to?

Georgetown doesn't model its involvement in any other sport like this after the Ivies, be it soccer, volleyball, baseball, etc. No one looked at the Georgetown track program and says, "we need to be more like Dartmouth."

It 'needs' to be this way because big-time college football is understood to be uniquely problematic, both because of the greater physical risks associated with the sport (which are heighted at the 'win at any cost"' levels) and, more importantly, because of the ways in which the amounts of money and size of the team/staff/operation warp the institution in the same way that a high-gravity mass warps space. Plenty of shenanigans happen with revenue basketball too, but those rosters and staffs are a fraction of the size. Even as there is plenty of unease throughout academia about men's basketball, it's a significantly easier pill to swallow than for-profit-in-all-but-name football.

Sept 17, 2023 15:44:25 GMT -5 DFW HOYA said:

This is the 20th anniversary of Georgetown's first Ivy opponent. Since then, two trends are apparent:

1. Georgetown is not competitive with these teams: a combined 6-32 (.157), or 4-8 versus Columbia and Cornell and 2-24 vs. everyone else, including an 0-fer vs Harvard and Yale (0-11). If Georgetown is "modeling" the Ivies they have largely failed to do so. After 2024, just one Ivy remains on published future schedules and a number Ivy schools simply don't want to play GU because the games are not competitive and Cooper Field is not a draw for their fans. No one considers Georgetown as a rival with any of these schools.

2. Nearly every Ivy school can now offer a no-loan, no-parent contribution offer to applicants with a household income under $100K. Georgetown cannot, and shows no institutional mandate to do so. In that sense, there is a disincentive for Ivy level athletes to attend Georgetown because it does not match offers received elsewhere (including six other PL schools), and I would suspect that Ivies lose comparatively few top athletes to Georgetown as a result.

Name recognition between every Ivy and Georgetown is 100% and the fanbases do view one another as similar institutions in many ways. The problem is not lack of rivalry potential or even Cooper Field (although as the RFK game proved, a more prominent venue is certainly more enticing to alums), but that lack of competitiveness. Solving that would indeed require a significant increase in the financial aid tide lifting all undergraduate boats.

Sept 17, 2023 15:44:25 GMT -5 DFW HOYA said:

I'm not arguing for 60 scholarships, and never really have. A Georgetown program with 60 scholarships is merely Bucknell without meaningful admissions reform by the Patriot League, and GU's place in the current PL may be a bigger hindrance to winning than being an Ivy League tagalong. But if Georgetown sees that it can aspire to be no more than Brown and Columbia for some sort of academic purity test in one sport (but curiously, no other), or that scheduling opponents outside three conferences are against the ethos and culture, it will not improve.

Georgetown with 60 scholarships would be in a much stronger position than a Bucknell. Finding players that meet the Academic Index and are also competitive at the FCS level is challenging, but by no means impossible, and just as with lacrosse, there are plenty who would choose Georgetown and a schollie as opposed to going to an Ivy. In fact, there would likely be far more players making that choice, since going Ivy in football effectively eliminates you from competing on the national stage in a way that going to an Ivy for lacrosse does not.

[RusskyHoya]

Sept 17, 2023 15:44:25 GMT -5 DFW HOYA said:

PS: I'm not sure the University community is as supportive of basketball as an institutional priority anymore, and that includes a lack of fundraising for men's basketball as identified for the current capital campaign.

I got a Called to Be campaign co-branded Athletics Annual Fund pamphlet in the mail today in which Lee Reed's letter makes reference to "joining our new Vision Team for Men's Basketball." Interestingly, if you Google "Georgetown basketball 'Vision Team'" the first two hits are about Providence basketball - clearly this is a concept Cooley has brought over.

I flag it just to say that perhaps "a lack of fundraising for men's basketball as identified for the current capital campaign" is premature. There is wiggle room to redefine focus areas, goals, etc. throughout the campaign lifecycle.