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Today's Blue & White
The Citadel Brigadier Foundation's Official Electronic Newsletter
Friday, September 18, 2009
Opening Kickoff!
 Spike enjoyed watching U.S. Senators Lindsey Graham and John McCain respond to questions at their Town Hall meeting Monday morning in McAlister Field House. It was refreshing to see other standouts perform admirably on the McAlister Field House floor.
In today's issue we welcome "Voice of the Bulldogs" Darren Goldwater and his weekly "From the Press Box" column that is certain to add unique insights. Also, Coach Ed Conroy has released the basketball schedule, and we've got updates on our spring sports.
After a week off to heal, the football-playing Bulldogs return to action Saturday by venturing to Princeton and the Ivy League for the first time. Kickoff is set for 3 pm.
As you've come to expect we have a packed issue of Today's Blue & White, so let's get to it and Go Bulldogs!!!
Citadel Athletics Begin to Twitter
Bear with us as The Citadel Department of Athletics begins to tweet as we've recently joined the twitter rage.
To start receiving our regular tweets, visit www.twitter.com and click on the green "sign up" box. Once registered, click on "find people" (at the top) and type in CitadelAthletic (singular), and then click on "follow." You'll soon be receiving tweets from us and will be informed with results and can't-wait-news.
Need Tickets?
Please consider this a friendly reminder that if you need tickets to any Citadel football game - home or away - please contact our Athletic Ticket Office at 843/953-DOGS (3647). And be sure to ask about our aggressive group rates for all home contests.
Football Heads to Princeton
 The Citadel and Princeton meet for only the second time in the schools' storied histories and the first time in Princeton, NJ. Last season's 37-24 Citadel victory in Charleston was their first meeting and it marked the first time The Citadel played a team in football from the Ivy League, which includes Brown, Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, Harvard, Penn, Princeton and Yale. It was also the first time that the Bulldogs played a football opponent from New Jersey.
Flying for the First Time
Of the 64 Bulldogs who made the travel squad to Princeton, three have never flown before: Freshmen Greg Adams, Bucky Kennedy and redshirt freshman Keith Gamble will experience being on a plane for the first time as they travel to Princeton, NJ on Friday.
Basketball Releases 2009-10 Schedule
 Citadel basketball will travel to Texas A&M and the University of Houston after hosting
one of the most elite teams in America in Michigan State at McAlister Field House as the 2009-10 schedule was released this week.
The Bulldogs will host 16 home games at McAlister Field House, including the College Insider.com Skip Prosser Classic, which includes Savannah State, Central Connecticut State and UVA-Wise.
The season will tip-off Nov. 13 when we host Kenyon College (Ohio). The Bulldogs then welcome Charleston Southern back to McAlister Field House where they defeated the Bucs for the second consecutive time last season.
The Bulldogs then travel to Springfield, Mo. to compete in the Hispanic College Fund Classic against Eastern Michigan on Nov. 20, Missouri State on Nov. 21, and Maryland-Eastern Shore on Nov. 22. After leaving Missouri, the Cadets travel to Charleston, W. Va. to take on the Mountaineers of West Virginia on Nov. 24.
The Citadel will return home to host the Skip Prosser Classic on the Saturday and Sunday of Thanksgiving weekend before opening the conference portion of the schedule against Davidson on Dec. 3 and Georgia Southern on Dec. 5 at McAlister Field House. The Bulldogs then host last year's national runner-up Michigan State on Dec. 7 before breaking for exams.
For more information, please refer to www.CitadelSports.com.
Soccer Falls at Presbyterian; Tops Coastal Carolina
 The soccer team earned their first-ever win over a Big South Conference opponent Tuesday night when the Bulldogs defeated Coastal Carolina, 1-0, in Conway.
The Citadel scored when Dianna Martin assisted a goal by Amy Loughran early in the match. For the contest the Bulldogs managed seven shots while the Chanticleers fired 19 times.
This past Friday, the soccer team fell to Presbyterian, 1-0, at Clinton. Although The Citadel dominated the first 45 minutes outshooting Presbyterian, 4-3, it was the second half where PC tightened up their defense. Nikkita Persaud led the Bulldogs with two shots on goal while Nikki Mares had one.
For more information, please refer to www.CitadelSports.com.
Volleyball Drops Three Matches in Arizona; Maas Named All-Tournament
The volleyball team dropped their three matches at the Fiesta Bowl Tournament in Flagstaff, Ariz., falling to Utah State, Northern Arizona and Wyoming by identical 3-0 scores. Utah State use a .440 attack percentage and 43 kills to blow past The Citadel. Jessica Maas had six kills while Tatum Jestila added six digs to pace The Citadel. The Bulldogs dropped all three sets to the Aggies falling 12-25, 15-25 and 19-25.
On Saturday, host Northern Arizona took control and defeated The Citadel 25-16, 25-19 and 25-15. The Bulldogs were led by Maas and Kaona Mercer, who each had eight kills.
Later in the day, Wyoming downed The Citadel, 25-19, 25-16 and 25-19. The Bulldogs recorded eight total team blocks and Jestila led the way with seven kills and a service ace with a .357 attack percentage.
For her efforts, Maas was named to the All-Tournament team. The junior from Richmond, Texas, collected 20 kills, four digs and two service aces.
For more information, please refer to www.CitadelSports.com.
Cross Country Competes at Elon Invitational
The cross country teams competed in the Elon Invitational on Saturday with Brendan Kight leading the men to a fifth place finish with 120 points and the women finishing eighth overall with 195 points.
Kight ran across the finish line with at time of 26:54 for 11th place. Freshman Kyle Keen was next finishing 21st (27:28) and a few seconds later, Nathan Jackson ran a time of 27:40 for 26th place. Freshman John Gatewood came in at 30th overall (27:45) and Atom Young followed with a time of 27:54 for 35th place.
On the women's side, senior Katheryn Gatewood was the first Bulldog to finish the course, coming in at 37th (20:51). Natalie Wolin finished 40th overall (20:59) and Suzanne Gay came in at 50th (21:15).
For more information, please refer to www.CitadelSports.com.
From the Press Box with Darren Goldwater
Thank goodness it's football season. Together, we all witnessed the emergence of Andre Roberts onto the national stage as an elite receiver and return-man. We hung on every shot as Ed Conroy's team rattled off 11 consecutive wins en route the best season in Bulldogs Basketball history. We finished off the athletic calendar with Wes Wrenn capturing SoCon Pitcher of the Year, before joining four other Bulldogs from this year's team in the professional ranks. Suffice it to say, it was a special year in Bulldogs sports.
There's plenty of reason to hope this year can rank right up there with last. Despite the injuries at the running back position, Kevin Higgins' fifth Bulldogs team is as deep as any he's had at the school. As has been well documented, they're bigger, stronger and faster than they've ever been. Kevin Hardy looks poised to have a breakout year alongside Roberts at the receiver position, while Miguel Starks showed flashes of his potential game-breaking ability in the season opener at UNC. Plus, the schedule brings some of the toughest conference games to Johnson Hagood Stadium, where the Bulldogs are 12-5 in the last three years.
But before The Citadel opens its home schedule, this Saturday it's off to Princeton. By all indications, it's a Tigers team in a very similar position to what the Bulldogs are facing. Princeton is determined to erase the memories of last year's four-win campaign. They had more players stay behind over the summer to workout than ever before in Head Coach Roger Hughes' 10 years ... often times they worked out at 5am. Generating more turnovers is paramount this season to a team that forced only 12 a year ago. Sound familiar?
The Bulldogs do have one major advantage Saturday: game experience. As Hughes mentioned in talking to the media early this week, The Citadel not only has played a game, but has had two full weeks to iron out the kinks. Many coaches will tell you teams make their biggest improvement between weeks one and two, so while Coach Higgins and Co. have the luxury of fixing certain aspects of their team, Hughes is still uncertain about how his team will come together. And that begins with his sophomore quarterback, Tommy Wornahm, who's completed a whopping two passes in his career. Wornham will benefit though from handing off to Jordan Culbreath, the reigning Ivy League rushing champion who rushed for 276 yards in the 2008 season finale.
It'll be fun to watch the Bulldogs' front seven try to slow down the Princeton spread offense, and to see if Andre Roberts can find some space against an experienced Tigers secondary. The return of running backs Terrell Dallas and Van Dyke Jones should help the Bulldogs' cause as well.
We've recently launched a unique website devoted to Bulldogs athletics, www.thecitadelsportsnetwork.com. There you'll find daily audio clips, from player and coach interviews to game highlights and recaps. We'll preview upcoming games and give you the chance to vote on our weekly poll. We'll have everything archived so you can always go back and listen to what you've missed. Plus you can email your questions. I'm also wide-open to suggestions as to how to improve the site, all in an effort to try and quench a growing thirst for Bulldogs coverage.
We'll be on the air on our statewide network this Saturday at 1:30 for the 3 pm kickoff at Princeton. (Darren Goldwater is in his second year as "Voice of the Bulldogs" and will be a regular columnist for Today's Blue & White.)
And Having Absolutely Nothing to Do with Athletics
Shrimp-baiting season opened last week and runs until noon on Nov. 10. The S.C. Department of Natural Resources predicts an average year, depending on the weather; tropical storms and heavy rains can cause small shrimp to migrate prematurely. Here are five shrimp-baiting facts from DNR:
- Sales of shrimp-baiting licenses hit a peak in 1998, when 17,497 licenses were sold;
- The number of licenses sold has dropped steadily since 1998, with 8,346 licenses purchased last year;
- DNR has been surveying shrimpers at the end of each season since 1988, and those surveys put recent total catches at less than 1 million pounds per season (heads on). The peak total catch was more than 3.6 million pounds in 1997;
- Despite the decline in total catch, the average catch per trip has stayed mostly stable at 20-22 quarts per trip since 2001. DNR experts say the stability means that "shrimp abundance" has remained relatively good, and that the lower overall harvest is the result of fewer licenses being issued and the number of shrimping trips being down;
• The catch limit is 48 quarts of shrimp measured heads-on (29 quarts heads-off) per boat or set of poles per day. Each boat is limited to a set of 10 poles.
Source: CharlestonCurrents.com.
They Said It:
"It would be easy to point to specific accomplishments that merit the Order but in facto your entire life and career have been marked by a level of commitment to South Carolina that brings enormous credit to our state. The sheer number of community and charitable organizations to which you've given time and resources is incredible. That kind of generosity is virtually unequalled."
- South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford, on Board of Visitors member Tom McQueeney '74, during Friday's Dress Parade in which McQueeney received the Order of the Palmetto, the state's highest civilian honor.
"We played against great competition this weekend. We switched the lineup around I thought it was a valuable change for us. Our best match was against Wyoming as we blocked well against them and I thought our freshmen played well this weekend. The Fiesta Bowl committee really take care of us and we had a great following here. There were lots of family, friends and alumni that came to support us."
- Volleyball coach Carolyn Geiger, on the Bulldogs' participation in the Fiesta Bowl Tournament in Flagstaff, Ariz.
"Just getting those two guys back, I think will help us a great deal."
- Coach Kevin Higgins, on the return of running backs Terrell Dallas and Van Dyke Jones, who missed the North Carolina game due to injuries.
"I am very proud of the girls for persevering after several close games that did not go our way. Tonight (Tuesday) we were very composed in our defending to win a nail-biter."
"This schedule will be extremely challenging. Michigan State and West Virginia are going to have the chance to be as good as anybody in the country. Texas A&M will be a top 25 team. Houston should be picked to finish in the top three in Conference USA and as always, the Southern Conference will be one of the top mid-majors leagues in the country."
- Coach Ed Conroy, on the 2009-10 basketball schedule.
"I am worried about our kids getting used to the speed of the game and the speed of this Citadel team. I hope we can do so quickly before we fall behind or give up some big plays during that adjustment period."
- Princeton coach Roger Hughes, on playing The Citadel.
Upcoming Birthdays
Sept. 20 Daryle Wong Football
Sept. 26 Matt Smith Sports Medicine
Sept. 28 Lt Gen John Rosa President
Upcoming Special Events
Oct. 30 Hall of Fame Banquet Holliday Alumni Center
Nov. 6 Baseball Team's Golf Outing Legend Oaks Golf Club
Nov. 6-7 Alumni & Friends Tennis Fundraiser Earle Tennis Center
Have a Friend Who Might Be Interested?
Today's Blue & White is the sister publication of the The Blue & White, the official publication of The Citadel Brigadier Foundation that is printed monthly. In order to receive the printed version, one has to be a member of TCBF. However, we've opened Today's Blue & White to anyone and everyone who has a computer and who is interested in activities of TCBF and, of course, The Citadel's Department of Athletics. Today's Blue & White is free. All one has to do is sign up and register under the Free E-News section at CitadelSports.com.
Today's Blue & White is the official electronic publication of The Citadel Brigadier Foundation, Inc. with its office located at The Citadel, McAlister Field House, 171 Moultrie Street, Charleston, SC 29409 (office 843/953-5277).
Publishers..................Jerry Baker & Larry Leckonby
Editor.....................Andy Solomon
Photographer.............Russ Pace
Layout/Design............Noelle Orr Blaney
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