Duquesne Starts Spring Drills

[TexasTerror]

Got to love mid-major football! Dusquene had a solid 7-3 season under then first-year head coach Jerry Schmitt. What are we going to see out of the Dukes who are going for their eighth consecutive MAAC title! Insane, eh?

Schmitt's Dukes Open Spring Practice Tomorrow

Annual spring game set for Saturday, April 22

March 22, 2006

Second-year head coach Jerry Schmitt will get his first look at the 2006 Duquesne football team when the Dukes open spring practice on Thursday, March 23 on Rooney Field. Duquesne, which is coming off a 7-3-0 season and seventh consecutive Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference Football League title, will practice 14 times over the next month culminating with the annual spring game on Saturday, April 22 at 12:30 p.m.

Schmitt, the 2005 MAAC Coach of the Year, welcomes back 14 starters from last year's team (eight offensive and six defensive in addition to the starting punter and placekicker) which finished the season ranked No. 3 in The Sports Network I-AA Mid-Major Top 10.

Among the priorities this spring is the retooling of a Duquesne defense which lost five veteran starters from a unit that ranked No. 1 in Division I-AA in total defense, rushing defense and pass efficiency defense last season. Gone are consensus All-Americans defensive end Antoine Bullock, defensive tackle Josh Antinopoulos and middle linebacker Harry Carter. In addition, Schmitt must find replacements for starting outside linebacker Javonn Bradley and starting cornerback Michael Ford.

A trio of senior defensive backs in safeties Todd Mills (South Bethlehem, Pa./Freedom) and Michael Hill (Largo, Md./Eleanor Roosevelt), along with cornerback Kyle Postell (Greenbelt, Md./Eleanor Roosevelt), will be joined by 2005 MAAC Defensive Rookie of the Year Aaron Strader (Pittsburgh, Pa./Westinghouse) to give the Dukes on of the top secondaries at the I-AA Mid-Major level.

http://goduquesne.collegesports.com/sports/m-footbl/spec-rel/032206aad.html

[colgate13]

Duquesne, which is coming off a 7-3-0 season and seventh consecutive Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference Football League title, will practice 14 times over the next month culminating with the annual spring game on Saturday, April 22 at 12:30 p.m

They are a PL team in mid-major clothing.

[Go...gate]

Well said, 13. Hope Colgate plays them one of these days.

[colgate13]

Well said, 13. Hope Colgate plays them one of these days.
As much as I agree, I don't see it happening. The NEC offers a better conference to compete against, and we'd rather have A-10 games if we're not playing the Ivy.

Now if the Dukes want to talk about an all-sport PL move, I'd listen. (but who am I? xlolx)

[Doo Cane 4 ever]

I would hold onto your thoughts until you see the Dukes schedule for this season. They have traditionally "scheduled up" and played some Ivy League and Patriot teams. However, this season the new AD is obsessed with the hiring of the new basketball coach and promoting the miserable basketball program. It seems that the main victim of this obsession is going to be the football schedule. So far 3 of the teams that Duquesne played last year have announced their schedules and seemingly dropped them off their schedule (Georgetown, Columbia, & Penn) so we are desperately searching around for a few good opponents while our wonderful AD is just concerned with one thing and one thing only and that is hiring a new basketball coach for a program that only won 3 games and averaged only 1,000 fans to each game. Rumor mills have the expected salary of the new coach to be anywhere between $400,000 and $600,000 a year. Me thinks the football program will become the sacrificial lamb on the almighty basketball altar !!!!!!
You read it here first and keep an eye out for that Duquesne schedule and get back to me with your thoughts.

[colgate13]

That's really too bad. Post the schedule when it comes out.

[LBPop]

I agree. I don't know what happened to the Georgetown/Duquesne game. By the way, there's a quality rising sophomore on the football team by the name of Jay Bluford. He is quite an athlete and a really fine young man. He played QB in high school, but is a DB or WR for Duquesne (a mini-Randle-El...you know, that former Steeler and current Redskin).

Please let me know what his prospects are. I think he will be a serious contributor within a year. Thanks.

[Go...gate]

Sorry to see that DU's BB program has slipped so badly. Seems to me that Nee (a Digger Phelps protege') was the wrong fit for the job. They ought to bring Gary Waters in, because Rutgers has just made a foolish move in letting Waters go. Waters is a great coach, tough but fair, and he graduates his players (Rutgers is not an easy school by any means).

As far as FB is concerned, I hope DU does not retrench. They seem to be doing very well from both a standpoint of team record and the quality of the kids in the program.