Thursday, September 14, 2017

UMass Football News--September 14th, 2017


MAJOR UPDATE: UMass has announced a major change to the 2017 schedule because of Hurricane Irma. The UMass at USF game previously scheduled for October 14th, 2017 has been postponed until 2022 or 2023.

The Minutemen will play at FIU on Saturday, Dec 2nd, 2017. That will be the 12th game for both teams.

This will create two addition bye weeks for the Minutemen. UMass will have two weeks to prepare for Georgia Southern's triple-option offense and the Minutemen will also get a bye week before BYU.

This seems to be a good deal for the Minutemen. USF could be the top Group-of-Five team in the nation. It was almost certain to be an ugly loss. FIU will be highly motivated after two losses in a row to UMass, but we should be competitive.

Mike Traini has a post on on the changes and notes the UMass brass went out of their way to accommodate the AAC. That might leave some coin in our bank if there should be some conference re-alignment someday,

BTW, the FIU football team is still stuck in Birmingham, AL

The AAC reworks its schedule in the wake of Hurricane Irma.

NBC Sports has a post on the AAC changes and mentions UMass.

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Matty Vautour has the inspiring story of UMass offensive lineman Ray Thomas-Ishman.  It's a real credit to Ray, after all he's been through, to be interested in academics and have his head on straight.

"Success comes to the lowly and to the poorly talented, but the special characteristic of a great person is to triumph over the disasters and panics of life"
                                     
                                                                     -Seneca, On Providence

Matty also has some out-takes from his story on Thomas-Ishman.

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Philly.com has three things to watch for in Friday's UMass-Temple game.

Athlon Sports has an Owls-Minutemen preview and prediction.

UnderDog Dynasty also has a UMass-Temple preview and prediction.

Temple remains 8th in the AAC conference's power rankings.

The Spread.com says take the under in the UMass-Temple game.

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HERO Sports picks Coastal Carolina to go 2-0 against UAB.

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Georgia closes the 2018 season with three straight home games: Auburn, UMass and Georgia Tech.

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