Orangeyes Daily Articles for Friday for Football

[sutomcat]

Welcome to Army Day!

Army Day honors those in the United States Army. It was created as a nationwide observance to draw attention to national defense, to acquaint the public with the Army's activities, and to highlight the need for military preparedness. Defense Test Day was held in 1924 and 1925. Congress did away with it and the Military Order of the World War under the direction of Colonel Thatcher Luquer established Army Day, which was first held on May 1, 1928. That date was chosen to try to overshadow the celebration of International Workers' Day by Communists. But, the following year it began being celebrated on April 6, on the anniversary of the United States' entry into World War I. On April 4, 1936, Franklin Roosevelt issued a proclamation for the day saying it should be acknowledged by Congress and be observed nationwide on April 6. Accordingly, Congress passed Resolution 5-75 on March 1, 1937, officially establishing Army Day. The day was last observed nationally on April 6, 1949. It was then replaced by Armed Forces Day. That new holiday did away with officially celebrating days dedicated to the Army, Navy, and Air Force, although Army Day continued to be observed unofficially.

SU News

syracuse.com (facebook.com; Nett)

Syracuse football players trudge through the snow on their way to spring football practice, Thursday April 5, 2018.

ACC football championship staying put. New Panthers stadium? It's in the contract. (charlotteobserver.com; Marks)

The ACC Championship game won't be leaving Charlotte any time soon.

On Thursday, the conference announced it has reached a 10-year agreement with the Charlotte Sports Foundation to keep its football championship game at Bank of America Stadium through 2030. Seven of the past eight ACC Championship games have been played in Charlotte, with the lone exception coming in 2016 (when the game was moved to Orlando in response to N.C. House Bill 2).

This agreement works as a 10-year extension to the parties' original deal.

"Our game has grown into one of the premier sporting events in the country," ACC Commissioner John Swofford said. "We look forward every year to this annual celebration of ACC football."
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Notre Dame Football: Irish set to have nation’s best defense in 2018 (saturdayblitz.com; Miller)

Building a championship defense is a task that Notre Dame football head coach Brian Kelly successfully completed for the 2018 season.

No program has more returning production along the defensive side of the ball this year than Notre Dame football. Even though the Fighting Irish don’t have near as much offensive experience coming back to South Bend in 2018, the defensive prowess should be able to balance things out.

According to SB Nation’s research on how much returning production each program brings back in 2018, Notre Dame is set to have 96 percent of the previous seasons production back for this year. Very few new faces are set to be seen on defense for the Irish at any point but garbage time in 2018.

Since Notre Dame’s offense does have the potential for a solid campaign through the upcoming regular season schedule, the Irish should fall as a legitimate College Football Playoff contender through the bulk of the 2018 slate. In recent years, National Championship squads in college football are still mostly built through balanced rosters on both sides of the ball.

Although much of the responsibility of the success for the Irish lies with the offense piecing the puzzle together. Yet, that responsibility is still tough for the defense since there’s large expectations for the product put out on the field each week.
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Analyze This: A conversation with ACC broadcaster Stan Norfleet (theundefeated.com; Dodson)

The Analyze This series is a daily Q&A with African-American college football broadcasters and analysts during The Undefeated’s Fall TV Week.

Stan Norfleet, the new co-host (with Katie Witham and Tommy Bowden), of the ACC Network’s pregame show ACC Blitz, was a letter-winning linebacker at the University of Virginia, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in African-American studies/history in 2003. He then spent a season playing at historically black Texas Southern University as a graduate transfer, where he earned a master’s degree in speech communications. Norfleet worked for several years on the business side of sports — with the NFL, NBA, MLB and NHL — before delving into broadcasting by covering University of Kentucky football and men’s basketball, starting in 2011, as both a radio and television personality. Before the college football season, Norfleet spoke about his path to broadcasting, black representation in the field and student-athletes speaking up on social issues. (Note: The ACC Network is an ESPN partner.)
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Other

Meet Bill Eimicke, mysterious merchant of data and clout never charged in Cor case (PS; Knauss)

Professor William Eimicke has taught at Columbia University in New York City for 30 years. He has written books and articles on public administration and effective management.

But that's not why Syracuse-based Cor Development Co. paid him more than $350,000 over five years.

Cor hired Eimicke for clout.

So did other companies. Eimicke (pronounced Emmick) is a longtime associate of Gov. Andrew Cuomo's family. After Cuomo was elected, Eimicke parlayed his unique combination of Ivy League credentials and political connections into a lucrative side business helping developers get state money or other support.

He worked hand in hand with lobbyist Todd Howe, another longtime Cuomo family associate. Together, Eimicke and Howe got things done for developers and made a bundle in the process, profiting from an Albany culture that values connections and loyalty.

Eimicke could produce an economic impact study saying your project would create a jaw-dropping number of jobs -- say, 2,700. Then he could get you a meeting with Cuomo's top economic development aide to talk about a $5 million grant.

That's what he did for Glenn Donnelly, who is struggling to finance a new racetrack in Oswego County. Cuomo announced the $5 million grant in September 2015.
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With nine days until spring game, Clemson defense still looking to perform to Brent Venables' standards


CLEMSON — This time last week, Brent Venables found himself so dismayed by the lack of leadership and focus with his Clemson defense, that the Tigers' defensive coordinator turned to the universal post-practice punishment to see if he could get through.

For about 15 minutes after a March 28 scrimmage that the offense dominated came to an end, the defense ran.

Then the offense walked off the field. Then the defense ran some more.

And if that wasn't enough, once the metaphorical message was sent, Venables sent a literal, vocal one, too.

It is April and Clemson's football team is not expected to be in midseason form right now, as coach Dabo Swinney pointed out Wednesday evening. But Venables wants more from his esteemed defense and he has made that crystal clear over the past week.

That much is evident from what he told them once he had time to digest what it was that had him so irked from that scrimmage.

"He just kept it real with us, told us the bad, told us the little good that we had and told us basically (that it was) upon the leaders to make sure it's corrected," rising senior defensive end Austin Bryant said Wednesday night. "(He) put it on each guy to take responsibility of what they did and own up to what they need to do better in order to make the unit better.

"I think with the guys we have on this team, talks like that really resonate well because we have the type of guys that are going to respond the right way."

But perhaps that response is still a work in progress.

If Swinney had to gauge Venables' level of satisfaction Wednesday night after Clemson's football team held a half-scrimmage during the second half of practice, the head coach was willing to bet his assistant was still bothered.

"Probably not," Swinney swiftly said, when asked if he thought Venables would be happier this time around.

Then he explained:

"The first drive was a long drive — now they did stop them on the goal line. But it was a long drive, third-and-10, we jump offsides. Now it's third-and-five and it's a lot easier to call plays on third-and-five than third-and-10. They get the first down and then here comes a drive. Just some things like that," Swinney continued.

"The defense, I thought, they did a great job in (the) two-minute (drill). They did a really good job in our short-yardage, competitive situation today. So there was some improvement in some areas. But we’re a mixed bag right now."

As Clemson looks to move forward and get the defense back to the standard Venables expects, the good news for the Tigers is that they have some of the best leaders in the country in Bryant and fellow linemen Christian Wilkins, Clelin Ferrell and Dexter Lawrence. There are also several returning faces at the linebackers position and the secondary is talented, even if it is thin.

The less optimistic news is Clemson is running out of time in spring practice and only has nine days until the annual spring game kicks off on ESPN April 14. Should Venables' unit lack that focus or execution then, it would be a disappointing showing by a unit whose coach demands the best.

Bryant seems confident the pieces will come together sooner rather than later.

"Oh most definitely," he said, when asked if Venables has gotten the defense's attention. "He's got to challenge us and I wouldn't want it any other way."

Dabo's plea to fans
Fewer than 10 days remain until Clemson's 2018 football team gets its first real look at the new squad during the April 14 spring game and Swinney has a plea for his fans planning to check it out.


"It's a big deal. As y'all have heard me say many times, we don't get preseason games. When we play, the scoreboard is for real. So this is a great opportunity to create the best environment we can to just give us another opportunity to evaluate our players and help them get better," he said.

"The crowd, the type of crowd that we have, it's going to be on ESPN. It's going to be a big deal. I hope our fans will show up and it'll be a packed house in here and we can really challenge these guys from a game-day environment standpoint."

Coaches in town
It is quite the busy week for Swinney and his Tigers, who are hosting a major coaches clinic all week. According to Swinney, 700-plus coaches will trickle into Clemson on Thursday night for the beginning of the clinic, which extends into Friday, too.

With loads of high school coaches in attendance, Swinney wants to shed some insight into how Clemson does things for those interested in learning. Then Friday night, Clemson will welcome Super Bowl-winning coach Doug Pederson of the Philadelphia Eagles to town for the keynote address.

"The Friday practice is much more oriented for the visiting coaches to try to help them," Swinney said. "We don’t have a scrimmage on that day. We try to help them so they can see how we practice, how we install things in individual work, stuff like that."

Galloway still a work in progress
Freshman tight end Braden Galloway is still a work in progress health wise now that he is starting to make strides from an offseason foot injury that required the insertion of a screw. Galloway has been in all of the team meetings and the next step is getting him more physically developed. Galloway was in a green jersey Wednesday, meaning he participated in everything except for contact drills.

 

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