Hanover
“We’ve got a game this week!” bellowed the senior at the group of backups known as the offensive scout team. “Give us a decent look, for (heaven’s) sake!”
The scout teams’ assignment is communicated to it before each practice snap via diagrams on poster-board sheets or electronic tablets. They mimic the upcoming opponent’s formations and plays for Dartmouth’s first- and second-string offense and defense. If you were a third- or fourth-team player this week, you were pretending to be Holy Cross (1-2), which hosts the Big Green (1-0) this afternoon in Worcester, Mass.
Virtually every freshman comes to Dartmouth having been a high school star, but almost all serve time on the scout team.
It’s at about this point of the season that it dawns on many a rookie that he’s probably going to be on the scout team all fall. It’s the stage at which older players and coaches conduct unofficial mental heath checks on youngsters who are wrestling with backup status, homesickness and eye-popping academic expectations.
At the same time, there’s not much coddling involved. Which is why Di Leo’s outburst made head coach Buddy Teevens nod in appreciation.
“He let them know to gear up,” Teevens said. “It’s great to have the type of leadership where someone says, ‘Hey, man, I need more than that out of you.’ Coaches can push, but when your peers call you out, people respond.”
Watching the online video highlights of Dartmouth’s younger players, a viewer sees touchdowns and tackles and marching bands and bleachers crammed with, in some cases, thousands of fans. It can be a large emotional leap to go from being the center of such pageantry to something resembling cannon fodder in less than a year.
“The young guys have to accept that their role in Saturday’s game is preparing someone else to play,” said Teevens, who recalls being one of 10 quarterbacks on Dartmouth’s freshman football roster when he arrived on campus. “That can be a hard thing emotionally, but we all have different responsibilities at different junctures, and they still have to come out and play hard.”
Holy Cross began the season with a close loss at Colgate before suffering a rout at Boston College. The Crusaders don’t appear on any future Dartmouth schedules, meaning a series led by the Big Green, 39-37-4, has come to at least a temporary end. The other opponent closest in frequency is New Hampshire, with 39 games.
Dartmouth and Holy Cross first played in 1903 and have met every autumn since 2000, with the exception of 2015. Dartmouth has claimed the last three meetings and three of the last four, but lost six in a row starting in 2004. The Big Green claimed last season’s clash, 27-26, in overtime in Hanover, and the average score over the years has been Dartmouth 17, Holy Cross 16.
Based on those numbers, the Crusaders seem a perfect, nonconference fit for the Big Green.
“I don’t know how that happened,” Teevens said. “My vote was to continue it. Hopefully, at some point we will get it back in action.”
Teevens noted that UNH came off his team’s slate several years ago, but is booked in 2021 and 2022.
Senior quarterback Geoff Wade led Holy Cross to an overtime victory against defending Ivy League champion Yale last week. Had things unspooled differently, the Needham, Mass., product might have been on the visiting sideline for today’s game.
Teevens noted this week that the Big Green recruited Wade out of prep school and that the signal caller was seriously interested, but the process didn’t work out. Wade has completed 23 of 38 passes for 269 yards and two touchdowns against the Bulldogs. Two of his passes have been intercepted.
Wade’s father, also named Geoff, is described on his son’s Holy Cross online biography as having played football at Dartmouth while also throwing the javelin for the track team. He does not appear on Dartmouth’s list of all-time football letterwinners. His mother, Meg, is described on her son’s bio page as a onetime member of the Big Green women’s basketball team.
How long has Teevens known Hanover High junior Maddie McCorkle?
“Since she was this high,” the coach said with a broad grin, holding his hand below his knee.
Hard to believe, then, that was the same person flying around the Memorial Field track during the Big Green’s Tuesday practice. McCorkle’s father, Sammy, is the 14th-year defensive secondary boss and associate head coach. He and his wife, Vicki, moved their family to Hanover from Windsor several years ago, and Maddie, the eldest of three daughters, has become a standout basketball and lacrosse player and a Division I college prospect in the latter sport.
“I’m proud of her and her parents,” Teevens said. “She’s a tremendous student, so she has opportunities at a variety of academic institutions and scholarship opportunities. She’s put herself in a position to have a lot of options, and it speaks well for Hanover, athletically and academically.”
Although it’s become not unusual for Marauder athletes to exit early to attend prep school, Maddie McCorkle said she intends to stay local. She travels to Boston regularly during the fall, competing for a club lacrosse team there that plays games as far afield as Maryland and Virginia.
Has Teevens begun to tease Sammy McCorkle, a former University of Florida football player, that he’s now his family’s second-best athlete?
“Oh, he already knows that,” Teevens said.
Notes: Dartmouth quarterback Jared Gerbino, who missed last week’s opening rout of Georgetown because of an injury, has taken snaps this week, but common sense would seem to dictate that Dartmouth won’t use him if it doesn’t need to. The next two weeks bring the opening of Ivy League play with a home game against Pennsylvania and a road date at Yale. … Teevens estimated his team showed roughly 40 percent of its offense and defense last week. … Holy Cross and Yale are the only games Dartmouth will play on grass this season. Teevens said freshman placekicker Connor Davis, who made 2 of 3 field-goal attempts last week, grew up in Florida kicking on natural surfaces and should have no adjustment problems. … With the start of classes, sophomore kicker Kalle Wagner is back on the roster. The Fresno, Calif., product is a member of Dartmouth’s ski team, but his presence allows Davis and punter Davis Brief not to strain their legs during practice. … Former Woodstock High and Colby-Sawyer College sports standout Doug Avellino has been filling in on the Dartmouth athletics equipment staff while football equipment man Steve Ward deals with health issues. Avellino is the son of Woodstock boys soccer coach Tom Avellino, who coaches sophomore Tom Bissaillon, the son of the Big Green’s head equipment manager, Mike Bissaillon. … Dartmouth’s roster numbers 114 athletes. … Freshman Chris Sykes, of Hawaii, caught four touchdown passes during Sunday’s junior varsity scrimmage rout of Norwich.
Tris Wykes can be reached at twykes@vnews.com or 603-727-3227.