Messages

[worry about if Evans is fired is if that makes Leah Earnest leave for her last year of eligibility. I'd hope Earnest stays to mentor the younger players, but I'm not sure about that.]

Disappointing weekend to say the least. Especially considering that there had been signs of progress recently and these two winnable games just flopped. Have to rebound this week or else we'll just be limping to the conference tournament.

As for Evans, it doesn't look good, which is a real shame because she does at least seem to have built a decent culture in the team. Perhaps it's a different story if we have consistent 3 point shooting but this weekend showed we don't. The only thing I worry about if Evans is fired is if that makes Leah Earnest leave for her last year of eligibility. I'd hope Earnest stays to mentor the younger players, but I'm not sure about that.

I think the larger risk, and one I think needs to be taken, is that her departure will lead to several of our promising freshman to hit the portal as well.  The good news here is that women don't seem to hit the portal like the men and, although it was six years ago, prior to all the portal stuff, when Dorrow left she had a simliar situation, with seven players either as red-shirt freshman or true freshman.  Six of those plyers stayed to play for Evans.

We do not keep Evans under any circumstances.

Mismanagement from prior administration and President put us in this mess
Baseball and Softball competed very well in Horizon now no chance

Mens basketball is young and we have a new lease with Powell
Womens team is abysmal-and seem to get worse

Would the Horizon take us back? Has any one ever done that? Gone back to a conference they left?

Yes, UMKC and Oral Roberts came back to the Summit

Well that was as bad a half as possible.

[SPOILER ALERT]

16,  it's obvious by the scheduling that we're in the process of loading up on FBS xfers and we have corralled some very experienced assistant coaches to take the '24 team to new competitive heights. 🤣
You are correct about St Francis the NY one never played football and l believe dropped all sports a couple of years ago.
OR.......

We are loading up on body bag games to salt away enough funds to, hopefully, be a little more competitive in the future.

SPOILER ALERT: People, we have freakin scheduled 1/6th of the entire MVFC just for smiles and giggles. 

And BTW, I believe the St. Francis you listed is in the NEC and is in Lorretto, PA.  There was a St. Francis, Brooklyn, but they didn't play FB and left the NEC in 2022. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

We have beaten Bradley 5 times in a row. Their coach was suspended earlier in the year for some transgression. The good news is we get them again soon.

A better performance against Illinois State. In the next 7 games we play 2 games against Bradley who we have beaten 4 times in a row. 2 against Evansville who appear to be worse than us. 2 against Indiana State who aren't very good and UIC who is just average. Some wins perhaps.

Disagree, it is just sustaining with embarrassing, terrible results, and you have to wonder what recruits are thinking. No reason to keep this situation - hire the assistant as an interim and move on if you know a change is needed.

This is typical Valparaiso leadership being overly passive.

I have come around to your way of thinking. 2 more blow outs. Watch the press conferences Evans is clueless. Drake runs something unique on offense that our freshmen haven't seen. Evans has for 5 years. Perhaps prepare!  UNI hit us with a zone. It was like we had never seen one or thought to prepare for one. Sad.

The team made a valiant effort after adding Brown to the injured list. Still lost but it looked like a blow out was coming.

Van Weedlin who had made 7 3's in a year and a half at under a 20% success rate made 4 of 6.

[The Jackson twins are legit dawgs]

The Jackson twins are legit dawgs.  I hope they stick around in a potential coaching change, as they have a bright future.  Both of them remind me of Jenna Stangler from my time on campus, as being very lanky/still getting used to their longer limbs, but very skilled at their current age.  If they stick around for 4 years, Valpo will do well in years 3 and 4.  Raeven Raye-Redmond has some potential, as well, since she has a nose for finding the ball on defense.  I don't quite understand her lack of play for the bulk of the season (maybe lacking a consistent shot at this time), as she is definitely a spark plug when inserted into the lineup.  When Jill Harris was healthy, we were fairly competitive, so I look forward to her return, if she will do so this year?

And remember that Layla Gold was an Indiana All-Star yet Evans is getting very little from her.  The big blow is if Liv Brown is done for a long time. The ankle injury looked pretty bad. Without her, well you know.

When did she get hurt, I was long gone early last night

I am guessing whoever was responsible for the women's team coverage was coaching the bowling team. We signed 2 HS Seniors that were never announced.

Their announcement doesn't include her stats from this season, as she had 23 more starts.  Regardless, she did her time at Valpo over 4 full seasons, so I don't fault her for trying the SEC.  I'm with a poster on another thread when I say that I think that the NCAA gave that extra COVID year to everyone a bit too soon.  Many people played 4 full seasons, and it makes no sense.  As much as we appreciate Nikki for her stellar play at Valpo, it doesn't really make sense that she has a full 5th year to use.  The NCAA should have made it more conditional on actual games played during the COVID year.

Completely agree the COVID year while well meaning has had the unintended results of penalizing those who came after. Thankfully this is the last year. Having said that hopefully she does well.

I expected the Bethune Cookman loss, looking at their schedule they looked pretty good. 35 points I am sure had SID's researching the last time we scored that little. A Quick Look's says 2005 or so we scored 31.

I thought Stetson was beatable but no go.

Not sure what is going on. Harris has missed a bunch of games with an undisclosed injury. Johnson disappeared from the roster.

They signed 2 players for next year...no mention.

Bowling has a new interim head coach.
[tweet]1734596503618859194[/tweet]

Bowling has a new interim head coach.
[tweet]1734596503618859194[/tweet]

This seems like a great hire.

13 - Brandon Barthel - WR has entered portal

Did Barthel ever play?

Tough OT loss at Western Michigan, after leading by 3 in the waning seconds of the second half, only to have a banked 3 pointer go in at the buzzer for WMU, from straight on (not intended at all).  This was after two pretty solid losses at Southern Miss and UAB.  I like that we aren't just chucking up 3's at this point, like we have in prior seasons.  There seems to be a concerted effort to get the ball inside. 

The classic do you foul before a 3 is shot.

They aren't winning but there is hope.

Where was Harris, she has been pretty solid. Without her we still could/should have won.

I am surprised that Grand Canyon hasn't added a Pioneer football team, plus I live in the area!

Part of the reason the Ivy League has opted out of the FCS playoff is that member schools have agreed that they do not want 100+ football players staying in season throughout  the playoffs (assuming an Ivy team would make it deep into the playoffs 🙄  ).  That's why I suggested just one game. Incidentally (or hypocritically), the Ivies don't have a problem with other NCAA tournaments (like March Madness that stretches for weeks) because the rosters of those sports are a fraction of a football roster is my guess. .

So...... If that can't be arranged, perhaps the PFL needs to expand to 12-14 or even 16 teams (6-7 division games and 1-2 cross-over game to fill out a PFL 8 game schedule), organize into two geographic divisions, and have a league championship title game. That way the players have something to shoot for that is settled on the field, not just in the standings. The PFL used to do that. The SWAC still does that and has elected not to participate in the FCS playoffs.

It seems to me there are a number of schools giving FCS scholarships that make sense (to me) to become Pioneer schools, basically the entire Northeast Conference, Robert Morris and Lindenwood from the OVC/BSouth.

Uh, two things.

Why isn't this in the basketball thread and, more importantly,  would someone please  tell me why the coach with the most VU WBB wins, Keith Freeman, got fired — which led to this situation?

Freeman's last three years had wins of 7, 9 and 10 with nothing in the pipeline. His dismissal was warranted. Dorow was a disaster, however, she understood you needed height. Evans had one winning season and that was with Dorow's recruits. She has never recruited a player over 6-1 and has had one at 6-1. We have a team full of wings yet she is always surprised we don't rebound.
At least this year she recruited taller wings so that is something.
We have one shooter in Brown and through 2 games we can't get her shots.
We just lost one of only 2 home games in the pre-conference. It could be a long season.
I do think this freshman class has potential for the next staff.

Valpo 1 Missouri State 0 in double OT. Between this and regular season 200 minutes, one goal. Drake beating UIC 2-0 through 30 minutes

I will play counter and say Valpo wins 24-21.

I was one of the lucky ones who saw Butler score 72 in Carlson's last game. Ah the memories! 

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/sports/toreros/story/2023-08-29/university-of-san-diego-usd-toreros-football-hazing-incident-suspensions-cal-poly-slo-opener-james-harris-letter

Of course we don't play them this year

How did the WBB program not get addressed? Apathy? they have been brutal.

This will be her fifth year out of probably a five year contract.  Given the costs surrounding the firing of Matt and the hiring of Roger, buying out a woman's coach probably didn't make sense financially.  The women's program has historically been awful except during the coaching of Keith Freeman.  Letting him go was probably one of the biggest mistakes Mark LaBarbera made while AD.

I would agree and disagree. If the men's team wasn't a dumpster fire needing addressed I think Evans is gone. I thought and still think the timing of getting rid of Freeman was correct. 3 very bad years and nothing to suggest a turnaround. The biggest issue was his replacement.

At least I'm not bringing up the game of the week in Boulder!!!

Completely agree about that

I feel better now, I was worried we would get through a season without a NWMO reference.

What a difference a year makes. If this schedule was announced with last years staff the bitching would have started immediately....no home games I want to attend, bad days of the week, games with the students gone, a non D1 game....
For the record I am fine with this schedule.