Friday, November 4, 2016

The Weekend Pregame: Is JMU-Richmond the best rivalry in Virginia? Plus N7 Day and other nonsense

Before we dive into #RichmondWeek, let's take a hot second to bask in the reflective glow of last year's JMU-Richmond circumstances.







That shit was the coolest thing I've ever been a part of. Certified.




FCS Championship Show


The FCS playoff committee has taken a page out of the FBS committee's playbook and started announcing each week's status quo. The first show was this week -- it had JMU in at No. 5 and Richmond in at No. 7, which means we've got a top 10 matchup with ginormous playoff implications at Bridgeforth East stadium on Saturday.

For the record, there is only one other Top 10 matchup in Division 1 college football this week. (It's Nebraska at Ohio State, and there might not be anyone in the world taking Nebraska.) So, for the 317 of us that Richmond's high school stadium can hold, we're about to see a pretty spectacular game. For more background on the game itself not written by yours truly, I'd recommend Dave Teel's quick write-up at the Daily Press.



It's important for JMU to win this game, not just for bragging rights, but for playoff positioning. The CAA is deep as hell this year, but it's an SEC type of deep -- lots of good teams throughout, but not many true national contenders at the top. It's unlikely that the CAA gets more than one team seeded in the top 8, which nearly makes this a Bye elimination game. If you win this game, you're probably getting the first week of the playoffs to yourself.

Meanwhile, whichever team loses... well, a national seed wouldn't completely be off the table -- particularly for JMU, who already has two ranked wins and has the opportunity to turn around and impress the committee next weekend at Villanova. (Also, because JMU has yet to lose an FCS game this year, unlike Richmond). For UR, the drop wouldn't be far, but it would certainly be at least 2-3 spots. Richmond would likely need help from other teams ahead of it losing to regain a spot in the top 8 over the final two weeks of the season.


Dukes v. Spiders


I can't guarantee a JMU win or anything, but I can guarantee this game will be different than how last year's played out. Will there be offense? Absolutely. Will there be defensive breakdowns? Yeah, probably. Will it be a fucking Big 12 game like last year? Ehh, probably not. (Miss you, Vad.)


Like JMU, Richmond runs a balanced type of offense where they can throw and pass effectively. Unlike JMU, the Ticks are suffering from some fairly serious injury concerns on offense. Those injuries are notable, compared to the relative health of the JMU offensive line, and the Abdullah + Johnson circus show, and Schor and the deepest stable of receivers in Division 1 college football.

Still, Richmond is likely going to remind us all why JMU's defense is a cause for concern. I expect JMU's game plan will be to play zone for much of the first half, forcing Richmond's quarterback to try and win the game himself. And, as we've seen time and time again, playing zone vs top-tier FCS teams does not generally end well for the guys in purple. Richmond quarterback Kyle Lauletta isn't Mitch Trubisky or anything, but it wouldn't surprise me if he passed for 200 yards in the first half.

Halftime adjustments are going to matter an awful lot in this game. That's good news if you're a fan of the team in Harrisonburg, because Mike Houston has been phenomenal in the adjustment department. 

This game falls on the shoulders of the defense. Reynolds and the secondary will need to hold their own in man coverage, from time to time, and Robinson needs to fire up the pass rush. If the defense has been holding onto some exotic blitzes -- I'm talking spur blitzes and delayed plays from the linebackers, some real kitchen sink-type stuff -- this week would be the time to reach into the bag of tricks. 

The home team hasn't won this game since 2013, when JMU dominated the Spiders in Bridgeforth, only to give up a bunch of points late in the fourth. The Dukes won 38-31 in a game that wasn't nearly as close as it looked. 

I don't see a reason to think this game would go any differently. Road team wins a competitive game.


Is JMU-UR the best rivalry in Virginia sports?


Fine, you're going to yell about the Commonwealth cup, and that's great. Please, tell me more about your allegiance to Thomas Jefferson, Skyler. 

I mean, first of all, Virginia hasn't won the damn thing in well over a decade. It doesn't have national implications; it barely has ACC coastal implications. Does anyone not connected to either program genuinely give a shit about UVA-Tech anymore? Does it actually decide anything, outside of which group of high schoolers gets to talk shit during the following week? 


The Cup might be on a path back to a meaningful game in the near future... but in the meantime, I submit that Richmond-JMU is easily the most impactful, most competitive, and most meaningful rivalry in Virginia collegiate football. Come at me, bro. 


Let's check in with the Mountaineers --


West Virginia is playing Kansas this week. For some reason, this genocide game was flexed into a 7pm kickoff. I personally do not agree with the network treating this Saturday's contest in Morgantown like it's the next episode in the series of "Purge" movies, where good people are murdered on camera for our entertainment. But hey, whatever gets your rocks off, Fox.



Tell me a new story: WVU disrespected in the polls


I'm not going to spend a whole lot of time on West Virginia this week. It's not because they lost last week -- I'm pretty sure I highlighted the game in Stillwater as the remaining game they were most likely to lose quite a few times, actually. No, it's just because, when you're playing Kansas there's really not a whole lot to talk about. (By the way, this is the same Kansas team that, when they beat Rhode Island earlier this year for their only win, they charged the field. Yeah, the same Rhode Island team that JMU just beat 84-7.)

I do want to briefly mention, though, that West Virginia was slotted at No. 20 in this week's inaugrual 2016 CFB playoff rankings. As in, the fourth-highest ranked team from the Big 12, despite having the best record and the best OOC resume. As in, eight spots behind Penn State. Yeah. 20. 

Anyway, you can draw your own conclusions, but I don't really see the logic in it. 


#MB20is20



Here's a picture of my sports page from this week's News and Courier. Yes, that's a cheerleading story running as my dominant. Yes, it's over 1100 words. And yes, the title is a reference to a Matchbox 20 single from 1996. I'm doin' big things, y'all. I'm doin' big things.


Grab your N7 armor!


I asked my mother for two things for Christmas last year. One was an N7 sweatshirt, because I want to act like I trained in Rio and save the damn galaxy like Commander Shepard. Her response, like yours right now, was, "What's N7? Is that some kind of new designer label?"

It is not some kind of new designer label.

N7 is the highest level of training available to human alliance operatives in Mass Effect. Every year, the Bioware community celebrates N7 day on November 7 as a sort of faux holiday, highlighting everything that's spectacular about the greatest space opera ever made. (Sorry, Star Wars).

With N7 day right around the corner, you can expect some pretty major announcements to be made about Mass Effect: Andromeda, Bioware's space western that's set to be released in March. They already dropped a brief teaser video in advance of Monday's big media day.






Yeahhhhhhhhhhhh. When can I preorder? Now? Cool.



Rolling Stone is officially Libelous 


So this came down literally as I was writing this blog post, but I wanted to include it, given my geographic and emotional distance to Charlottesville, as well as my profession.

Rolling Stone, which published the infamous A Rape On Campus story two years ago, has officially been found guilty of libel with malicious intent. You can read more about it here.

It's important to emphasize how crazy significant this result is. By now, it's well known that Sabrina Erdley's story was fictionalized and bent around a narrative that she wanted to tell. Even still, defamation cases are legally almost impossible to win. In studying libel for some of my own nonfiction writing (#drunkcouchconfessions), I've learned that, in order to prove defamation, you have to prove not only that the information was wrong, but that it was intentionally wrong, and that the author lied intentionally to damage someone. The standard is so high that it's almost never proven. And yet, here we are.

Damages haven't been announced yet, but hold your breath for some Matt Damon Rainmaker-esque levels of cash.



Debts and Diseases Double-Down


Two weeks ago was not a particularly great week for the Blog. I didn't have a post last week, but if you followed the twitter tips, you made the loss back a big 3-0 weekend. (We took Michigan State ATS, plus the Jets in Cleveland and the Cowboys over the Eagles.)


$: Arkansas +3.5/Florida

$$: Duke +10.5/Virginia Tech

$$$: Navy +7/Notre Dame


Chalk play of the week: Give me the Fightin' khakis of Michigan -30.5 over Maryland. Harbaugh and Co. have been absolutely slaughtering people, and Maryland, though better, is still not very good. It's a big number, but I feel better about it than, say, trying to lay 35 with West Virginia, or any of the other gigantic lines this week.


Bonus play: Over 54 on the App State/Texas State game. At the beginning of the season, I told people you'd make a killing this year if you followed around Withers and faded his defense. That advice still stands. Withers' freshman outing at Texas State has yielded some great stats -- for one thing, against Division 1 opponents, his defense is giving up 44.7 points per game. Enter (cr)App State, which is undefeated in Sun Belt games so far this season. The game is in Boone. Don't look at the spread -- four and a half touchdowns is way too big a number to ever lay on a team like App State -- but the total is fair game here. App State might score 54 on their own. Go nuts.
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