Category: Holy Cross Crusaders
HC Has Home Work Ahead
Holy Cross coach Tom Gilmore stood on Fitton Field after Saturday’s win over Lafayette and just sort of took in the whole scene as players took turns hoisting the Patriot League championship trophy. Defensive coordinator Richard Rodgers led the team in its victory song, senior quarterback Dominic Randolph hugged his parents and took photos with his “Little Brother,” Franky, and a bunch of former Crusaders joined in the celebration, giving handshakes and high-fives.
Holliston's Bellomo Having a Ball at Holy Cross
WORCESTER - It wasn’t one of the busiest afternoons for Matt Bellomo, but it was one of the happiest.
“Probably one of the best wins in Holy Cross history, at least for a while,” said the Crusaders’ sophomore tailback from Holliston.
Holy Cross bumped off unbeaten Colgate 42-28 at damp but delirious Fitton Field yesterday, putting the Crusaders in a position to control their own destiny regarding the Patriot League title.
“We’re in the driver’s seat,” said Bellomo as Holy Cross climbed to 6-1 and 2-0 in league play. Colgate slipped to 7-1 and 2-1 in the league.
Randolph Weathers Patriot Storms
WORCESTER — That one-point loss in the snow last November gnawed at Dominic Randolph.
He had done everything in his four years at Holy Cross — everything except win a Patriot League championship — and now he and his teammates had to take that long ride home from Hamilton, N.Y., the disappointment of that season-ending loss to Colgate seared in their memories.
This isn’t how Randolph wanted his college career to end.
Purple Bursts Colgate Balloon
Holy Cross Avenges Heartbreaker.
WORCESTER — It had been 343 days since Holy Cross’ heartbreaking loss to Colgate in the 2008 season finale, but time did little to wipe that painful memory from the minds of the Crusaders.
“That was probably the worst feeling I ever had in my life,” senior wide receiver Bill Edger said. “We couldn’t let it happen again.”
Colgate beat Holy Cross by a point for last year’s Patriot League title, and while the Crusaders did not win a championship yesterday, they took a giant step in that direction while getting revenge on the Raiders.
Behind senior quarterback Dominic Randolph, who had a hand in all six touchdowns, and an inspired effort by the defense, 22nd-ranked Holy Cross beat No. 17 Colgate, 42-28, before a soggy but delighted crowd at Fitton Field.
’Saders Ready to Exact Revenge
The chance to play another year of college football, to hone his skills and polish his game were all reasons Holy Cross quarterback Dominic Randolph came back for a fifth season. One last crack at a Patriot League championship was another.
“Definitely,” Randolph said this week. “That’s the goal of every team and not winning it last year pushed me to try again.”
Colgate beat Holy Cross, 28-27, in the last game of 2008 to claim the Patriot League crown. The longtime foes will clash again at 1 p.m. tomorrow at Fitton Field, and the top-25 matchup should certainly have PL title implications. It is the first of five straight league games for HC.
Crossed-Out Season
In 1969, hepatitis was a foe too tough for the Crusaders.
What they remember most 40 years later is how quickly it all ended. One day, the Holy Cross football team was preparing for a road game with Colgate. The next day, the season was over and the players were quarantined.
“The abruptness of it,’’ says Steve Jutras, the star tailback for the Crusader varsity that played only two games in 1969.
None of the players would have dreamed when they thirstily slurped water drawn from a nearby faucet that they were contracting hepatitis, wrecking not only that season but also the next one, when the Cross went winless for the first time in its history.
Patriot Games: Scholarships Pose Threat to the Ivy Way
Imagine, for a second, that instead of traveling to Holy Cross tomorrow to watch Harvard take on the Crusaders, you were one of over 30,000 fans packing into a maximum-capacity Harvard Stadium as the Crimson kicked off its season against a major-conference team, say, Boston College. It’s a pleasant thought, but the reality is far more complex.
Fordham’s decision in June to begin awarding football scholarships starting with this year’s recruiting class piqued the interest of a lot of people in the Ivy League football community. The move shows a changing mentality in the Football Championship Subdivision (FCS, formerly Division 1-AA), which includes the Ancient Eight.
“It’s something we’re definitely keeping an eye on because if they go scholarships—we’re talking about the league now—it will change dramatically,” Harvard coach Tim Murphy says. “The last time any Patriot League school had scholarships in that league was Holy Cross in the ’80s and ’90s. They dominated Eastern football at this level in a way that wasn’t seen before and hasn’t been seen since.”
Purple on First Mission vs. Georgetown
Holy Cross is the favorite to win the Patriot League this season, and Georgetown coach Kevin Kelly is among those who believe that, yes, the Crusaders are the team to beat in 2009.
“They have the best league record (13-5) the last three seasons,” Kelly said, “and you look at what they have coming back on offense and defense, as well as the (league) MVP at quarterback. I’d have to say they get the nod at this point.”
Holy Cross opens the season against Georgetown at 1 p.m. tomorrow at Fitton Field. The Crusaders will be looking for their 10th straight win over the Hoyas.
Fouracre: HC's Randolph Is the Best
Dominic Randolph is the best college quarterback in New England at any level. So says veteran Holy Cross radio voice Bob Fouracre.
Yes, Fouracre believes the fifth-year senior from Amelia, Ohio, could start for Boston College ahead of the four inexperienced quarterbacks fighting for that job.
HC has had some prolific QBs through the years, including Jeff Wiley and Tom Ciaccio in the late 1980s and early ’90s, but Fouracre picks Randolph as the best he has seen. That’s saying something considering Fouracre, 71, grew up following the Crusaders and is entering his 40th year of calling play-by-play for HC football, including his 24th consecutive season on radio.
Dominic Randolph, Holy Cross Vying for First Patriot League Title Since 1991
Dominic Randolph remembers it well: The interception. In fact, he brought it up himself earlier this month during a conversation at the Patriot League’s annual football media day at Green Pond Country Club in Bethlehem Township.
The pick, by Colgate cornerback Wayne Moten with 11 minutes remaining in the Raiders’ 28-27 victory last November, all but sealed the league championship and the team’s eighth trip to postseason playoffs.
“It, obviously, was frustrating,” said Randolph, who played that game in Hamilton, N.Y., as a “senior.” The immediate future for football at Holy Cross took on a rosier hue last December, when the Patriot League granted the Crusaders’ prolific quarterback a medical redshirt season and fifth year of eligibility. The Crusaders, staring at a middle-of-the-pack finish, now are positioned to win their first championship since 1991.
And Randolph has one final season to make amends.
Matt Bellomo ready to tap potential at Holy Cross
HOLLISTON - Matt Bellomo has been spending countless hours this summer getting his body ready to handle the rigors of college football. He’s been alternating with trips to Gold’s Gym in Ashland, Athletic Base Training in Holliston and to Holy Cross in Worcester to keep up with his workout routine.
The results show. Bellomo, the Tri-Valley League’s football MVP for the Holliston Panthers two years ago, has gone from a 6-foot-1, 187-pound high school senior to a chiseled 201-pound college sophomore running back for the Holy Cross Crusaders.
“The ‘Freshman 15,’” said Bellomo with a laugh about his weight gain.
2009 Patriot League Football Preseason Poll and Award Winners Announced
Bethlehem, Pa. - After finishing one game off the pace in each of the last three seasons, Holy Cross has been picked to capture the 2009 Patriot League Football Championship in a poll of the League’s head coaches and sports information directors, it was announced at Tuesday’s Football Media Day at Green Pond Country Club.
The Crusaders were picked first on half of the 14 ballots, and finished with 67points to earn the top spot. Defending champion Colgate was just behind with six first-place votes and 64 points. Archrivals Lafayette and Lehigh shared the third position in the poll, each garnering 46 points while the Mountain Hawks also took home the remaining first-place vote. Fordham (35), Bucknell (24) and Georgetown (12) round out the rankings.
- 949 words - Patriot League, Holy Cross Crusaders, Bucknell Bison, Fordham Rams, Colgate Raiders, Georgetown Hoyas, Lafayette Leopards, Lehigh Mountain Hawks Four more Payton Award candidates announced by Sports Network
Randolph among four named to Payton watch list
Two-time Walter Payton Award finalist Dominic Randolph is one of four players who have been added to the 2009 Payton Award watch list, bestowed annually upon the top player in FCS.
Randolph has 9,689 yards passing and 83 touchdowns during his Holy Cross career. He finished 12th in 2007 and ninth in 2008 in the Payton Award voting.
- 812 words - MEAC, SoCon, Big Sky Conference, Montana Grizzlies, Patriot League, Holy Cross Crusaders, Florida A&M Rattlers, The Citadel Bulldogs OH Players Both to Play FCS Football
A pair of Chagrin Falls football standouts will continue their careers at the next level. Matt Diles has signed a national letter of intent to play at Bucknell University while teammate Jack Karlovec will be playing at the College of Holy Cross.
“I chose Bucknell because it’s a great school academically and the football coaches were amazing,” Diles said. “The atmosphere there was very welcoming.”
Diles said he chose Bucknell over the University of Dayton, Case Western Reserve University, the University of Pennsylvania and Cornell University.
Patriot League discusses football scholarships
Fordham has declared its intent to offer athletics scholarships for football student-athletes beginning in 2010, and the Patriot League now will grapple with whether to allow its member institutions to follow suit.
The league’s presidents will decide by December 31, 2010, what direction to take.
- 866 words - Patriot League, Holy Cross Crusaders, Bucknell Bison, Fordham Rams, Colgate Raiders, Georgetown Hoyas, Lafayette Leopards, Lehigh Mountain Hawks Six Patriot Leaguers Receive Preseason FCS All-America Recognition
Center Valley, Pa. - Six Patriot League football student-athletes have recently been named to a preseason Football Championship Subdivision All-America team, including a pair of honors for Holy Cross senior quarterback Dominic Randolph and Colgate senior wide receiver Pat Simonds.
Randolph and Simonds were second-team selections by both The Sports Network and Phil Steele’s 2009 College Football Preview. Lehigh senior linebacker Matt Cohen was the only first-team preseason All-American out of the Patriot League as he was honored by Phil Steele’s. Three players joined Randolph and Simonds on The Sports Network list, as Lafayette junior kicker Davis Rodriguez was also a second-team choice while Bucknell junior wide receiver Shaun Pasternak and Lehigh junior offensive lineman Will Rackley were placed on the third team.
- 611 words - Patriot League, Holy Cross Crusaders, Bucknell Bison, Fordham Rams, Colgate Raiders, Georgetown Hoyas, Lafayette Leopards, Lehigh Mountain Hawks Team USA (w/FCS Players) Crowned Inaugural IFAF Junior World Champion
A collection of 45 American teenagers gathered in Canton in the middle of June to complete a mission on the football field.
The mission was to win the 2009 International Federation of American Football (IFAF) Junior World Championship, an inaugural tournament being contested at Fawcett Stadium which consisted of players aged 19 and younger from eight countries, spanning four continents.
For USA Football’s Junior National Team, that mission was accomplished Sunday July 5, 2009.
- 1082 words - FCS News Articles, Holy Cross Crusaders, Eastern Illinois Panthers, Texas State Bobcats Can the Ivy League Get Its Game Back?
Lackluster teams prompt calls for change; a new chief’s listening tour.
The schools of the Ivy League are among the nation’s finest and richest, with billions in endowments under their command. From law to business to medicine, they’re No. 1 in practically every department but one: sports.
Why are the Ancient Eight increasingly irrelevant in the most competitive arena of all? The short answer, the long-accepted one, is that they choose to be: that they won’t sacrifice their academic ideals by giving athletic scholarships to athletes. But other factors—like a long-standing ban on postseason football games and the schools’ academic standards for athletes—appear to be dragging the league down.
Patriot League Teams Begin Spring Games This Weekend
Five Schools Will Also Host Bone Marrow Registration Drive
With the spring football practice schedule wrapping up throughout the Patriot League, four teams will play their spring intra-squad game this weekend and two more will follow next week.
- 398 words - Patriot League, Holy Cross Crusaders, Georgetown Hoyas, Lafayette Leopards, Lehigh Mountain Hawks Holy Cross Can’t Brush Off Painful Colgate Loss
WORCESTER — Chris Smith arrived at Holy Cross in the fall of 2005 with an injury and missed his entire freshman season. He knew he would have an extra year of eligibility, and the way last season ended made the decision whether to use it an easy one.
“You can’t end your career like that,” said Smith, HC’s starting center the last three years. “It’s something I can’t talk about without getting fired up.”
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