BC Report

BC football hopes blooming in spring

Date: April 21, 2013

Author: Mark

The words coming out of Steve Addazio’s mouth were what you would expect to hear from any football coach in April.

“I see nice things out there,” said the Boston College football coach when asked for a quick analysis of a team and a program he was hired to fix as quickly as possible “I see some real positive things.”

Phase one of the transition to Addazio, who was hired to replace Frank Spaziani at BC after the Eagles’ crash and burn 2-10 season last fall, is now over. It ended quietly and reflectively as the annual Jay McGillis Spring game was cancelled in the aftermath of the Boston Marathon bombings.

Addazio and his staff will now have three months to put together a reconstruction plan for the Eagles, who will next meet officially in August.

Bad times coming for BC?

Date: March 31, 2013

Author: Mark

Categories: BC Report, Blau's Blog, College Basketball, March Madness

Comments: 5 Replies

The Boston College basketball season ended again well before the Ides of March with a losing record, but cautious signs of optimism for next year for Coach Steve Donahue’s Eagles.

BC will be better next season, but will anyone really notice?

Look at the coming attractions in the ACC, which has perennially been a Duke-North Carolina driven road show.

Not any more. Coming next year will be Syracuse, Pittsburgh and Notre Dame. Coming in 2014 will be Louisville.

Add that with a revitalized Miami program under Jim Larranaga, one more season of Maryland, which is in the Final Four of the NIT, a upsurging Virginia team which is also in the NIT Final Four, as well as the potential for quick revival by Clemson and Florida State.

Where does that put BC in any projection list? 11th, 12th, 13th?

BC spring football set to begin: All jobs are open

Date: March 18, 2013

Author: Mark

Categories: BC Report, Blau's Blog, College Football

Comments: 8 Replies

The whistles will blow. The players will do their sprints and drills and it will begin. Boston College football in the Steve Addazio era will officially begin on Tuesday with the first day of spring practice.

On Monday, Addazio made his mission perfectly clear. “We need to find out who can play and who can’t play,” said Addazio on Monday. “We’re going to try not to overwhelm them and find out who we are physically.”

What Addazio also wants to find out is who wants to play and who can do the job.

When asked if any job was secure, Addazio laughed. “We won two games last year,’ said the man who took over in December after Frank Spaziani was fired after the Eagles posted a 2-10 record. “Our message is clear. We need to find out who can lead, ad who can win. Everybody has to earn their job. They have to go out there and show me.”

A good day in a bad year at BC

Date: March 3, 2013

Author: Mark

Categories: BC Report, College Basketball

Comments: 4 Replies

The script came out of Hollywood–or heaven. Final seconds of a relatively meaningless game for Boston College in terms of stature, but filled with emotion because of the guy sitting at the end of press row as he has done for so many games for the past 22 years.

BC beat Virginia on Sunday afternoon, 53-52, on a Joe Rahon’s 3 point shot with 8 seconds left. The outcome was not really decided until the final buzzer sounded a tick before Virginia’s Akil Mitchell’s half court shot swished through the nets, which would have been the ultimate downer for the Eagles in a season which has been filled with them.

But for the majority of the 5,062 fans who came to Conte Forum on Sunday afternoon, the ultimate story line should have been that it was a win for Dick Kelley.

You won’t find Kelley’s name in any BC boxscore. You won’t find his name in many stories. That wasn’t his job when he was a student at BC and it wasn’t his job when he came to work for BC in 1991 and worked his way up the food chain to an Assistant-Athletic Director–Media relations, with men’s basketball being Kelley’s prime responsibility.

Kelley was and is a BC guy in the truest sense of the word.

Bates making the right moves

Date: February 26, 2013

Author: Mark

Categories: BC Report

Comments: 7 Replies

In the grand scheme of things, it was just a blip on the screen, noticed by almost no one. But in terms of direction and promotion for a football program which needs both, it was a very positive move.

Boston College announced its 2013 football schedule on Monday. The Eagles will play Villanova in the opening game on Labor Day weekend.

No big deal right? Well, yes. But six weeks ago, the opening game was not Villanova, it was Stony Brook.

Again, this shouldn’t be a stop-the-presses moment. But it was for a couple of reasons.

BC hoops may have crossed the threshold

Date: February 20, 2013

Author: Mark

Categories: A Jersey Guy on National College Football & Basketball, BC Report

Comments: 3 Replies

It is still February and the madness of March and post season basketball is still 3 weeks away from beginning, but if you are a team in the Atlantic Coast Conference and need a boost in the ACC tournament to elevate your post season status, the one team you don’t want to see as an opening round opponent is…Boston College.

Don’t laugh. Yes, we know that Miami, Duke, North Carolina and North Carolina all appear to be more dangerous. And on any given evening or afternoon Florida State and Clemson can pose all sorts of problems.

What is different with those squads is that all of them had or have great expectations this season. Or greater expectations.

BC has not. Not yet at least, as Eagle coach Steve Donahue goes about his business of reconfiguring BC basketball into a competitive force.

For BC, the process still is painful

Date: January 30, 2013

Author: Mark

Categories: BC Report

Comments: 7 Replies

The script has been played out before. Close, competitive game for 30, 35, sometimes 39 minutes. And then comes what many coaches say with pained expressions: “some freshmen moments.”

And with that, Boston College basketball coach Steve Donahue follows his team off the court, wondering if he could have done more with less for just a longer period of time.

The operative words around the Boston College men’s basketball program these days are “process” and ”patience.” To complete the first, you need to have lots of the second available in your DNA.

Thankfully, for BC, Donahue does. With 16 years as an assistant coach, and spending the next 10 years coaching in the Ivy League verified that.

BC’s Shinskie looking at Delaware

Date: January 21, 2013

Author: Mark

Categories: BC Report, College Football

Comments: 5 Replies

It could be a relationship based on mutual interest and need. Former Boston College offensive coordinator Dave Brock, who became the OC at Rutgers last season, was hired as the new football coach at Delaware last week.

One of the players that Brock recruited when he was at BC was quarterback Dave Shinskie. Shinskie came out of high school in Pennsylvania, but chose a career in baseball, before switching back to football four years ago as a 25-year old freshman.

Shinskie started for most of a season at BC before giving way to freshman Chase Rettig, who has had the starting job for the last three seasons.

Addazio settling in at BC

Date: January 17, 2013

Author: Mark

Categories: BC Report

Comments: 3 Replies

He was hired more than a month ago and he hasn’t slowed down. Recruiting, evaluating, buying a new house, getting settled into a job and a life style that fits his personality.

In the middle of January, football is not the topic dejour at Boston College, but new coach Steve Addazio, sitting in his third floor office at the Yawkey Center in the middle of the BC campus still wants to amp up the intensity.

Even though the introductory press conference, which at times sounded like a recruiting trip/pep rally, has been replaced by the daily routine of meeting with coaches and players to formulate a plan for the next few weeks and months as the countdown to the season opener against Stony Brook on August 31st begins.

We’ve got to do a great job recruiting to rebuild and bring back up the level of excellence here,” said Addazio, his voice filled with enthusiasm of sending the message. “There have been some great players here and we have to bring in a bunch of great players in here to keep it going. ”

Kuechly back at BC–going to class

Date: January 15, 2013

Author: Mark

Categories: BC Report, Blau's Blog

Comments: Leave a reply

The first day of classes for the new semester at Boston College began on Monday and the new student was checking out his schedule–which was loaded with four classes. He was also busy shopping for essentials for his dorm room–sheets, pillow cases and assorted items.

But this kid wasn’t a freshman entering in mid year to get a jump-start on his college career. And this wasn’t a kid who needed to go shopping at places like Target, which is where he was indeed shopping. What he really wanted to do was just hang out with his buddies, who were all over the BC campus and beyond.

Say hello to Luke Kuechly, who was back at BC this week, fulfilling a promise he made to his parents after he took off from the BC campus last winter, a year and a half before he was scheduled to graduate.