UD adds final pieces

[YoUDeeMan]

Watch out FCS, the Blue Hens are loading up for deep playoff run. The offense returns 10 of 11 starters, and the D has been bolstered by several strong FBS transfers (Talley, from Notre Dame, Smith from UConn, among others) and the return of some talented player who were injured last year.

The Hens just added two more transfers to bolster their only weak points.

"NEWARK -- The University of Delaware has bolstered its young secondary with two transfers, just in time for the start of preseason football camp.

Defensive backs Durrell Clark-James, from the University of Minnesota, and Karl Pope, from Arizona Western Junior College, expect to be in uniform when drills start Friday morning, each said Monday.

The Blue Hens open the season Aug. 30 at William & Mary.

Clark-James is a 6-foot, 207-pound cornerback who played the past two years at City College of San Francisco in his hometown. He signed with Minnesota after the 2006 season, when his six interceptions and 26 solo tackles led the team and sparked CCSF to a 9-1 record. He began attending the Big Ten school in January.

But the firing of coach Glen Mason, who had recruited Clark-James, and the subsequent staff shakeup led Clark-James to seek a change after participating in spring drills with the Golden Gophers."

"Pope, a 6-2, 215-pound safety, signed with Temple out of Wilson High in Washington, D.C., but agreed to first attend junior college for more seasoning. A subsequent coaching change at Temple erased those plans.

He was a JUCO preseason All-American in 2006, but didn't have as successful a season as he had hoped because of injuries. When Delaware began to show interest, Pope jumped at the opportunity."

http://www.delawareonline.com/apps/pbcs ... 002/SPORTS

[JMU2004]

good lord....how many transfers is that now? K.C. needs to learn to recruit traditionally.

[ChickenMan]

good lord....how many transfers is that now? K.C. needs to learn to recruit traditionally.

Not as many as UMass.. be more than enough to handle JMU...

[JMU2004]

good lord....how many transfers is that now? K.C. needs to learn to recruit traditionally.

Not as many as UMass.. be more than enough to handle JMU...

with as many transfers as UD has taken over the last 2 years, ya'll have to be closing in on Transfer U-Mass

[ChickenMan]

Not as many as UMass.. be more than enough to handle JMU...

with as many transfers as UD has taken over the last 2 years, ya'll have to be closing in on Transfer U-Mass

UMass seems to be doing just fine with all those undesirable 'transfers'.


ps... one of the UD transfers this year.. Jonathan Smith.. a LB from UConn was also pursued by JMU.....

[YoUDeeMan]

Aw shucks, everyone would like to have home grown talent through and through. But, that is not the way things are done these days; even ASU is getting into the game by filling important DL losses with SEC transfers.

As long as the kids are quality people and good students, then I don’t have a problem with transfers.

UD has had an unbelievable number of career ending (not just a few games missed) injuries over the past two years, especially on defense. It has been truly mind boggling. A few injuries can be expected, but when you end up losing the two (and sometimes three) deep on over half your defensive positions it dramatically alters everything, especially on an FCS team. We ended up burning some redshirts and playing some young folks who were not ready.

Of course, all of that resulted in some pretty uncharacteristically poor play and sub-par results over the past two years.

Coach Keeler has done an outstanding job of getting transfers that fill needed positions. And, due to the new transfer rules (at least 2 years of eligibility), the D looks to be very good in 2008.

Several transfers have been here since spring ball, so that should help dramatically. I’ve attended the spring practices and some of the voluntary practices. This team is hungry and has a lot of talent. If the newest guys blend in well…yee-haaaaaaaaaa!

[GannonFan]

Youngstown was well over 20 transfers on last year's semifinal team - UMass was well into the teens. And Montana's lived off of transfers for years. That's 3/4's of last years final 4. Don't see anything wrong with having 10 or 12 on the team like UD's going to have this year.

[GreatAppSt]

UD could turn out to be scary good.

[ChickenMan]

UD could turn out to be scary good.

I don't know about that... but the defense should be much improved over last year.

[WA Griz]

I don't know why everyone gets so hot and bothered for transfers. Montana usually has three or four, most notably at quarterback. We've had a couple more in the last couple years, but a lot of these players don't end up being better than the kids recruited as preps. In the last 10 years, we've had transfers that never panned out, including two from BYU and one from the Irish that didnt' make it beyond September.
In the 90s I used to look over team rosters trying to see who had what it took to make it to the title game. The Leathernecks always seemed to have a boatload of quality transfers from big time college programs. And they had tough teams, but they never had a national champion.

[BlueHenBill]

ChickenMan, I love that photo! Where did you get it?

[YoUDeeMan]

For all the transfer bashers, read the article. These 2 players are from junior colleges (with one spending a semester at UMinn).

Welcome to the board, efari71!

[ChickenMan]

ChickenMan, I love that photo! Where did you get it?

Found it on the Internet a few years ago.

[BlueHenBill]

Any idea what school those cheerleaders are from? Would you email me that photo or a link to it? Thank you.