Some personnel notes

June 20, 2009

By Drew Champlin

The following four players won’t be back at Troy this fall.

**Defensive tackle Tim Lamb didn’t make his grades. Lamb redshirted last year in his freshman year and is the brother of linebacker Xavier Lamb, who is in good shape.

**Cornerback Demarcus Robertson didn’t make his grades. Robertson was here just one semester after coming in from JUCO.

**Running back Chris Anderson didn’t keep the pace he needed to academically. The NCAA ruled him a partial qualifier early in the season and he had to maintain a certain pace academically to be eligible by this fall and apparently did not do so. He’ll head to junior college.

**Defensive end John Mark Patrick is transferring to South Alabama to play his final two years. Since South Alabama isn’t FBS yet, he’ll be eligible to play immediately. Good kid who just got caught up in a numbers crunch. He redshirted in 2006 and played mostly on special teams the last two years, but had 7 tackles last year.

Some Trojan news

June 18, 2009

By Drew Champlin

First off, congrats to Brett Henry, a gold glover, as announced by Rawlings and the American Baseball Coaches Association. Henry had a good year offensively and a great year defensively to finish off his career. Of all the home runs I remember him hitting, it seems like every one was an opposite-field blast.

Also, the 2009 volleyball schedule was released today.

Look ahead/look back Thursday: Part 2

By Drew Champlin

This is the second part in a series as we count down to the Thursday night opener at Bowling Green

LOOKING AHEAD: Florida

Is there much more to say about Florida? Urban Meyer is building a national power in Gainesville, and even though I wonder what life will be like after Tim Tebow, The Chosen One is still there for another year. Tebow, who has one Heisman and should have gotten another last year, is finally a senior and a favorite among many national announcers. Seriously, the first time he did something wrong in his life was when he did the gator chomp to an Oklahoma defender late in the BCS title game last year, drawing a 15-yard penalty. Tebow is all power, but UF has plenty of speed to make even the best defenses look bad. Running backs Jeffrey Demps and Chris Rainey are small, but lightning quick. The Gators have experience at receiver with Deonte Thompson, Riley Cooper, Louis Murphy and tight end Aaron Hernandez. There are studs across the board on defense, but senior linebacker Brandon Spikes, who made a surprise decision to return for his last year instead of going to the NFL, is the top one. Defensive end Carlos Dunlap, who is 6-foot-6 and 290, will be a major test for Troy’s new tackles James Brown and either Nic Riley or Kyle Wilborn.

What would I say? (and I should have done this last week) Coming off a double-digit win at Bowling Green, Troy doesn’t look near as bad in the first half as they did in 2007 in Gainesville, but Florida takes a 24-point win.

Read about the Gators: Where not to read? Try the Gainesville Sun, the St. Pete Times, always a personal favorite newspaper of mine, and the Orlando Sentinel are three of the top choices.

LOOKING BACK: Troy 65, Alcorn State 0

What happened? It was a mismatch from the start, as the Trojans set records for total offense and first downs in a game and tied marks for most completions, points in a half and interceptions in a game. Jamie Hampton played a half, throwing for 327 yards, and safety Sherrod Martin had three interceptions in the second quarter. Troy led 52-0 at the half. Final game stats are HERE.

Our coverage: Jon Johnson stepped in and covered this one for me, as I figured it was better to visit family than cover this one-sided affair. The gamer is HERE and the notebook is HERE

The big highlight: Maurice Greer, who ran for 101 yards, broke off a long run here

The Q and A’s return

By Drew Champlin

If you stimulated the economy and picked up a Dothan Eagle, you saw the centerpiece was this Q and A with Bear Woods.

It’s the second one I’ve done in the paper this summer. The first one is with Levi Brown

Bleacher Report has this piece on Troy and its potential to be a BCS buster. Look at the t-shirt of the author, his picture is on the right.

Some prognosticators make their picks

June 17, 2009

By Drew Champlin

A couple of my Media General brethren did some forecasting of Troy football this year.

Patrick Johnston of the Eufaula Tribune has some very high hopes for the Trojans. Or does he? Click the link.

Tim Cottrell of the Opelika-Auburn News previewed Troy here.

If someone asked me right now, I’d probably say 9-3, with losses to Florida and Arkansas and a slip-up in conference play, most likely at FIU depending on how the Golden Panthers start their season. I still think that would be good enough to win the league, but I can always change my mind by the end of August.