Yale to face Cornell in crucial early match-up

The battle between the two pre-season favorites will come down to a battle between our line and theirs.

Cornell University has some very big holes to fill. Like those that Bucknell running back Jabu Powell '02 powered through on his way to a Patriot League record of 282 rushing yards and a 38-12 victory last Sat., Sept. 16. "We played poorly against a good team, especially against the rush," said Cornell Coach Peter Mangurian, whose team was picked to share the Ivy League championship with Yale in the preseason media poll. "Coordination was our major problem," he added. "Things snowballed when we didn't execute our assignments."

JULIA TIERNAN/YH Rashad Bartholomew, MC '01, led last week's offensive onslaught.

"We really didn't have to do anything different against them," said Powell, who averaged 9.4 yards per carry against Cornell after rushing for only eight total yards in Bucknell's season-opening 10-7 loss to Richmond on Sat., Sept. 2. "[Cornell's] linemen really didn't catch me much. Our offensive line was able to blow them off the ball pretty quickly. It was mostly their linebackers and safeties who had to tackle me." George Paraskevopoulos '02 was the only Cornell defensive lineman in the team's top five in tackles against Bucknell.

Bucknell's imposing offensive linemen average 290 pounds, 20 pounds more than Yale's, but the Bulldog front five are two inches taller, on average—and, as Dayton coach Mike Kelly learned last week, they are quick. "They're nice athletes," Kelly said of Yale's offensive linemen, who opened up enough terrain to allow Yale runners to gain 355 yards in the Bulldogs' 42-6 pasting of the Flyers on Sat., Sept. 16. "We see a lot of 300, 320, 330-pounders, but they're not athletes. We try to aspire to be like Yale's offensive line."

The main beneficiary of the Bulldog linemen's dominant play was running back Rashad Bartholomew, MC '01, who rushed for 201 yards and three touchdowns on 23 carries. Bartholomew's performance was so impressive that espn.com included him in its user's poll, "Who was Saturday's top performer?," alongside Heisman Trophy candidate LaDainian Tomlinson, a senior running back at Texas Christian. But to Bartholomew, running against Dayton was easy. "It did not seem like I was running that much," he said. "When the line blocks like they did, a 40-yard run feels like nothing. It didn't feel like anything to me."

With quarterback Peter Lee, TD '02, making his first start as a Bulldog, the Yale coaching staff felt that it was important to establish the run early, and they did. "We're going to be a better running team than we were a year ago," Coach Jack Siedlecki said. "It was kind of nice for Bartholomew last year. He didn't have to be the guy."

That's because last year, the guy was quarterback Joe Walland, TD '00, who set 22 offensive records in his time at Yale. "They weren't giving the quarterback too much to do," Kelly said of Lee. "What he did, he did well." Of 80 Yale offensive plays, only 23 were passes. But Lee took advantage of his opportunities, completing 19 passes for 193 yards and two touchdowns. Lee's completion percentage of .826 was just shy of the all-time Yale single-game record of .846, set in 1947.

When Lee did hand off the ball, he found that a number of backs besides Bartholomew were capable. In Yale's last scoring drive of the game, running back Jay Schulze, SM '03, ran for 57 of the Bulldogs' 73 yards, including the touchdown. Pat Bydume, MC '04, added 46 yards on 12 carries. "We have a good stable of backs," Siedlecki said. "I'd like to see [Bartholomew] carry 200 times. If we give him 250 to 300 carries, we may start to have some problems. We have to stay healthy."

Fullback Jim Keppel, SY '02, is healthy this week, and he will add to Lee's options out of the backfield, although he was out of practice until this week. Keppel was First-Team All Ivy in 1999 after catching 32 balls for 345 yards.

The unsung heroes of Yale's rushing feast last week were the veteran offensive linemen. But they realize that this week's trench warfare will be less one-sided, as the Cornell defensive linemen pack on 15 more pounds, on average, than Dayton's. "That Dayton game really built our confidence up that we can run the ball," guard Ben Sproul, BR '02, said. "This week we have to prove we can run the ball against better competition."

The Big Red line may provide better competition than Dayton did, but they didn't show it against Bucknell last week. If they want to compete for the Ivy title, they need to fill their holes before Bartholomew does.

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