Rover,
Thanks. None will play on Saturdays meaning upper echelon D1 schools? That is a surprise. Did seem the conference allowed a lot of points this year. But, D seems to be an afterthought at many schools in their rush to emulate the BIG-12.
Why not play beyond their borders with 7/8 conference games? Did Freedom have to play ES-S and PM-W per crossover agreement. Too bad they don’t come down here to SE PA or to District-3 to play MP-Commonwealth or LL-1 teams like they (Easton, Parkland) used to. Could also engage Jersey teams.
About Beca, they same is said of Coach Weachter at Harrisburg’s McDevitt….in some circles….that they never get over the hump. And wow, have they had some teams.
I mean I don't think they have a college football player at receiver or running back. Maybe Rontay Dunbar plays Division III? Jalen Stewart, one of their running backs, I guess will be an FCS player on defense, but he's light years better on that side of the ball than as a running back. The quarterback, Jared Jenkins, is probably a Patriot League type player, but everybody he's getting the ball too probably played their last organized football game in the state playoffs. Now, that's not the whole roster. Linebacker Tristan Wheeler will play at Richmond, offensive/defensive tackle Kaden Moore is a Temple-type recruit, Jacob Schwind on the offensive line is probably an FCS player. But none of those guys touch the football.
You are right that the EPC South has turned in to the Big 12. Look at the coaches/coordinators. Tom Falzone at Nazareth, Harold Fairclough and Matt Senneca at Emmaus, Bret Comp at Parkland, Brian Gilbert at Whitehall (until last year) are all some of of the best X and O guys in the eastern part of the state when it comes to passing spread offenses. Schematically, it's tough to defend that much of the field in high school. And it's trickled out. Hell, Easton fired the winningest coach in school history because he didn't score enough points. Now their QBs are throwing the ball 200 times a year.
Freedom has emerged a a contender because Roeder's defensive scheme (3-3-5 with a hybrid defender) is built to stop spreads and pass happy teams. Parkland's run of 6 straight titles was largely because they were always the best defensive team and had Tim Moncman coordinating that side of the ball. Easton was winning 10 games a year when they were the best tackling team in the Valley and had Doug Powell teaching scheme.
I wish they still could play nonconference games. Part of merging the MVC and LVC was the mandatory crossover (it's in all sports, Easton wrestled East Stroudsburg South tonight in a gigantic waste of time, but doesn't have Northampton on the regular season schedule...). The MVC was having trouble getting full schedules, so it works to their advantage, I'm not sure how it helped the LVC schools (other than was an opportunity to try and screw Becahi, which they ultimately backed off on and by then it was too late). But I miss Easton having Pennsbury, CB West, Altoona, Cardinal O'Hara, etc. on the schedule like they have in the last 15 years.
I think I'm in the minority on Henrich. He's definitely gotten that program out of the basement and back to being locally good year in and year out. But the best team of the new era was the year he took a leave of absence and Kyle Haas had the team on an interim basis. They're good, they just always seem to do dumb stuff. I thought they were the clear class of the EPC South this year, and they finished in third.
