Football Program

UMES president Juliette B. Bell today announced her acceptance of a task force recommendation that the university not restart its football program, which has been dormant since 1980. Bell had commissioned a task force to evaluate a study conducted by an independent consultant that weighed the pros and cons of adding a football program at UMES. “The university is not currently in position, with either human or fiscal resources, to reinstate football at this time,” the task force report said.

Corey Johnson, who coached Patterson for six years, will be named to replace Dante Jones as Edmondson's football coach Monday. Johnson confirmed Saturday that he will take over a Red Storm program that has been one of Baltimore City's most competitive football teams under Jones, who is moving on to coach in Delaware. “I thought it was a wonderful opportunity to get back to a school that has a winning tradition, following Dante Jones and Pete Pompey,” Johnson said. “There's great support for the team and when you have a winning tradition, you seem to get the kids all the time, so this is a great opportunity to carry on that tradition.” Jones, who said Saturday that he was on vacation and would talk later about his departure from Edmondson, is taking over the football program at Dover High School.

NCAA president Mark Emmert brought down the proverbial hammer on Penn State Monday morning, imposing severe sanctions that will likely cripple the program for at least a decade. The school received a four-year bowl ban, 10 less scholarships per year until 2014-15, a $60 million fine, and all wins from 1998-2011 will be vacated in the wake of the Jerry Sandusky child-abuse scandal.  The program will not cease operation or receive the so-called 'death penalty,' which many in the national media called for. Some experts have said the sanctions imposed are actually worse than the suspension of a season.

LaVar Arrington was one of the nation's highest-rated linebackers in the nation during his high school and college career. He was named Parade National Player of the Year after his senior year at North Hills Senior High School in Pittsburgh, and he was drafted No. 2 overall in the 2000 NFL Draft after his junior season at Penn State. But the former Washington Redskins star said he never would have reached those heights if he didn't know the fundamentals. That's why he's teamed up with Heads Up Football to help teach youth football players the proper way to play the game.

Villanova's football program was living on borrowed time. Telltale signs were the red ink that flowed over financial statements, the apathy that infiltrated the student body.Reports of the program's demise may have been premature at the start of the 1980s, but by the spring of 1981 they proved numbingly accurate.It was in April of that year when the university's board of trustees unceremoniously turned thumbs down on football. The decision was made in the early afternoon on a Tuesday. It wasn't until 8 that night that coach Dick Bedesem found out. And as legend has it, he was in the home of a recruit at the time.

The Harford-Baltimore County Youth Football League is celebrating its 20th anniversary this season, and there's no question that the times are changing in local youth football. This league covers all of Harford County along with parts of Baltimore County, plus other areas nearby where teams can easily travel to play. It now covers 28 areas and 319 teams along with more than 8,000 players in nine different age groups, and it has become one of the biggest recreation football leagues in Maryland.

Negotiations continued into this weekend to settle a dispute that includes allegations of financial irregularities and other issues that have two parent groups fighting over the youth football program that competes as the Columbia Bulldogs. "When this sorts out, there'll be two organizations - that's become definite," said Mike Milani, who as the Howard County Department of Recreation and Parks' community sports supervisor has been mediating the dispute. "It means, though, there'll be more opportunities for kids to play football," said Milani.

As part of its continued campaign to increase the size of its student body, specifically by adding more male students, Stevenson University said Friday that it will field a varsity football team next fall and begin to play games in the fall of 2010. Stevenson, which changed its name from Villa Julie College in 2008, was founded in 1947 as an all-women's school and didn't admit its first male student until 1972. In recent years, it has attempted to attract more male students in various ways and found success by adding sports such as lacrosse to its stable of Division III athletic programs.

One in a series of occasional articles High schools were closed for a second day after the historic Dec. 19 snowstorm, and Ed Hottle couldn't help but mourn the lost hours he could have spent wooing football players. "You always feel like you're behind," he said, picking at a plate of fries. It hardly mattered that Hottle was talking about a Division III football program that didn't exist this time last year and won't play its first intercollegiate game until 2011.

LaVar Arrington was one of the nation's highest-rated linebackers in the nation during his high school and college career. He was named Parade National Player of the Year after his senior year at North Hills Senior High School in Pittsburgh, and he was drafted No. 2 overall in the 2000 NFL Draft after his junior season at Penn State. But the former Washington Redskins star said he never would have reached those heights if he didn't know the fundamentals. That's why he's teamed up with Heads Up Football to help teach youth football players the proper way to play the game.

The group of veteran slotbacks who handled most of the work at the position have departed Navy's football program. A former starting quarterback heads into his senior season without much chance of unseating an incumbent who was electric as a freshman last fall. Those two issues could tie together into an intriguing subplot as the Midshipmen prepare to open spring practice Monday. Trey Miller, who started the first five games of 2012, is listed as Keenan Reynolds' backup at quarterback.

Varsity boys basketball Gilman seeks to join MIAA A Conference Gilman has petitioned for its basketball team, which has been competing in the Maryland Interscholastic Athletic Association B Conference, to make the jump to the A Conference. The school has applied to the conference's competition committee, which will consider the petition at a meeting set for March 18. After capturing the B Conference championship in the 2011-12 season, the Greyhounds went 16-15 and advanced to the title game this year.

UMES president Juliette B. Bell today announced her acceptance of a task force recommendation that the university not restart its football program, which has been dormant since 1980. Bell had commissioned a task force to evaluate a study conducted by an independent consultant that weighed the pros and cons of adding a football program at UMES. “The university is not currently in position, with either human or fiscal resources, to reinstate football at this time,” the task force report said.

Archbishop Spalding athletic director Jeff Parsons has been looking for someone to permanently replace longtime football coach Mike Whittles, who died of pancreatic cancer in June. On Wednesday, Parsons announced that Kyle Schmitt, who coached at Atholton for the past four years, has been named the new coach of the Cavaliers. Schmitt, who played football at Maryland, compiled a 38-9 record and led the Raiders to playoff appearances in all four seasons. Atholton lost in the Class 3A East regional final in 2011 and 2012.

Navy athletic director Chet Gladchuk said that Navy, which is scheduled to move into the Big East in 2015 for football only, is continually “reviewing all the moving parts” and will figure out where its football program will land once the other schools decide where they are going. “We have the latitude to evaluate the bigger picture for the next couple of years,”  Gladchuk said Thursday. “This is a obviously a new development. We're not in a position where we're panicking.

Morgan State football coach Donald Hill-Eley said he might soon be out of a job after he accidentally received an e-mail earlier this week outlining the university's plans to seek his replacement. Hill-Eley, who has led the Bears to a 54-69 record in 11 seasons, said he hadn't heard anything official from the university as of Friday despite receiving the e-mail on Tuesday evening. "I don't know what's going on," Hill-Eley said when reached on his cell phone. A university spokesman said he had no immediate comment about Hill-Eley's status.

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- He had been gone more than two years, a wisp of a man who spent 11 seasons here and, like many of the legendary coaches preceding him, became larger than life at Notre Dame. But when Lou Holtz returned to the campus one day last spring, it was as if he had never left.Holtz had come to give a motivational speech for 200 people at the business school. It turned into an impromptu pep rally for more than 500, including a horde of students that was barely out of grade school when Holtz led the Fighting Irish to their last national championship in 1988.

Corey Johnson, who coached Patterson for six years, will be named to replace Dante Jones as Edmondson's football coach Monday. Johnson confirmed Saturday that he will take over a Red Storm program that has been one of Baltimore City's most competitive football teams under Jones, who is moving on to coach in Delaware. “I thought it was a wonderful opportunity to get back to a school that has a winning tradition, following Dante Jones and Pete Pompey,” Johnson said. “There's great support for the team and when you have a winning tradition, you seem to get the kids all the time, so this is a great opportunity to carry on that tradition.” Jones, who said Saturday that he was on vacation and would talk later about his departure from Edmondson, is taking over the football program at Dover High School.

Mount St. Joseph coach Blake Henry has been named Ravens' High School Football Coach of the Week after guiding the Gaels to an upset victory over Archbishop Spalding in Saturday's MIAA A Conference quarterfinals. The Gaels did not win an A Conference game during the regular season and entered the A Conference tournament as the No. 6 seed, but they beat the third-seeded Cavaliers, The Baltimore Sun's No. 10 team at the time, 19-13.  “We altered the offense a little bit from the first time we played them.

What in the world is happening to Maryland's football program? This is getting scary now. The way players are dropping down in College Park, it's like the orthopedic version of typhoid fever is sweeping through this team. Now it's senior linebacker Demetrius Hartsfield who's out with a season-ending ACL tear , apparently hurt in the second quarter of the Terps' loss to Georgia Tech on Saturday. Hartsfield is the fifth Terp lost for the season with an ACL tear, joining quarterbacks C.J. Brown, Perry Hills and Caleb Rowe, along with defensive lineman Andre Monroe.