The Bulldogs travel to the Big Apple on Friday to take on the Columbia Lions. Al Bagnoli has his troops fired up after a 9-7 win over Dartmouth last week. Interestingly enough, Columbia is 2-0 when they do not score a touchdown. Aside from the Penn and Princeton contests, Columbia’s defense has been rather stingy. Their special teams units have also played well all season, but it’s been the anemic Columbia offense that has plagued the Lions. Columbia’s offense has only averaged 11.6 points per game this season and in terms of total offense, Columbia is ranked 111th out of 122 FCS squads. RB Alan Watson ran for 74 yards last week on 17 carries, while QB Anders Hill ran for 30 yards on 15 carries. Hill only managed 123 yards threw the air against Dartmouth, but look for his numbers to improve against the Yale secondary especially if Oluokun is still injured.
The Bulldogs will have to establish the run game early on, while also taking deep shots down the field to keep defenders from keying on Lamar every play. We’d like to see Tre Moore target our talented tight ends more often and get into a rhythm early on. Coach Paul Rice will need to match Columbia’s intensity on special teams, while Coaches Steve Vashel and Sean McGowan need a great performance from the defense to keep the Yale faithful from pillaging their offices over the weekend.
Tune into the game on NBCSN at 7:00 PM ET this Friday.
13 replies on “Columbia Preview”
Why hasn’t Tre Moore targeted Sebastian Little much this season?
Vashel has taken all the heat, but people seem to forget that McGowan is co-defensive coordinator and LB coach. The LBs have been a huge disappointment given all the experience we returned at those positions.
Sebastian Little is recovering from a torn ACL. He’s not very talented any more. He seems to be a step slower and a few plates fatter than last year.
This could be Reno’s most important game of his Yale career. Last year he got out coached by Bagnoli and Yale lost to an inferior Columbia team. After what’s happened so far this year, if he loses again I think he’s toast. We might beat Brown, but Princeton and Harvard look pretty tough. This has been a hard Yale team to figure–where did the Dartmouth game come from?
At some point Reno has to be accountable for the team’s performance. The Penn game looked like a high school team facing a pretty good college team. If Yale doesn’t at least show up this weekend, it might be time to rethink where we are headed.
The Dartmouth game was won because Dartmouth played without their starting QB, RB and best WR as well as numerous other injuries.
Anything new on the recruiting front? Our opponents keep listing new names while we maintain radio silence.
I don’t know any recruits that interested in playing for a 1-5 team
YALE HAS APPROXIMATELY 17- 18 VERBAL COMMITMENTS TO DATE. HOWEVER, I HAVE NOT SEEN ANY OTHERS IN A FEW MONTHS. I AM SURE THAT THEY ARE ACTIVELY RECRUITING PLAYERS. THE BLOW OUT LOSS TO LEHIGH DID NOT HELP RECRUITTNG. A FEW DAYS LATER AFTER VISITING YALE A 3*** WR CHOOSE HARVARD OVER YALE. YALE HOPES THAT A DL WHO OBSERVED THE LEHIGH GAME WITH THE WR WILL COMMIT TO YALE.
Thank you, Ray. I assume the misguided WR is Sage Surratt.
I used to follow Yale’s recruiting with anticipation and felt rewarded with this year’s freshmen being rated #1 in the country for FCS colleges. But now I wonder. Harvard Magazine has an article revealing that Harvard lost 16 All-Ivy players with the Class of ’16, yet the team is picked No.1 in the Ivies again.
Tony lauded Penn for having “a veteran team.” Why doesn’t Yale have a veteran team after four years of supposedly strong recruited classes? My only guesses are that either the recruits are overrated, the coaches don’t know how to coach them or juniors and seniors are replaced each year by newly recruited freshmen. Could it be all three?
Yale football has never developed a player in the Reno era. Guys get progressively worse as their careers go on.
I really don’t want to pile on, but what would Reno’s record be without Varga and Roberts–two of the best at their positions in Yale’s history?
I agree with Vinny that Reno has a poor track record developing his players, but at the same time Yale’s defensive backfield has never been better, in my memory, than when Reno was the defensive back coach. Could it be that he is a good position coach but a poor head coach–he can’t pick good assistants?
“what would Reno’s record be without Varga and Roberts”
I researched this question last week.
Record with neither Roberts at QB nor Varga at RB:
3-11
Nowm 4-11 after the Columbia W.
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