The unofficial online home for fans of the Kent State University Golden Flashes. Part of Collegiate Sports Nation (CSN).

Kent State football has yet to win a division one game this season - what a joke. Please God end this season.

There is little doubt in my mind that we are the bottom team in all of D1 FB. That is not all. It will get worst. We can even make Buffalo healthy. Next year looks no better.

I disagree GFlash68. Next year should be much better. Obviously Kent is playing poorly right now because of all of the injuries the team has incurred. With the players Martin has at this point, both the offense and defense has not been able to do much. The question I ask is should Martin recruit some junior college players who will be able to come in and play right away next year? How many scholarships does Kent have for the next recruiting class?

GFlash68 Wrote:There is little doubt in my mind that we are the bottom team in all of D1 FB. That is not all. It will get worst. We can even make Buffalo healthy. Next year looks no better.

Don't say that about next year.
In 2004 we were in the same situation as you are now and look at us this year.
Keep hope alive. :angel:

Martin explained the current situation with his offense in this week's press conference. On the lack of a running game affecting the passing game, Martin stated the following:

What the inability of running the ball has mainly taken away is our ability to use the play-action pass. Play-action passes are a great way to keep your quarterbacks percentage high. Northern Illinois was doing it Saturday and when we throw the play-action pass it doesn’t have the validity that theirs does, because they can hand the ball off and get 13 yards on a third-and-three. It’s hurting us and it’s something that we have to make a conscience effort to improve for the remainder of this year and throughout next spring.

It’s unfortunately been a catch-22 with the running game. At the beginning of the year, we didn’t have any running backs who were comfortable running the ball. Now, we are losing offensive lineman left and right (to injury).

Regarding the injuries after the game with Nortern Illinois, Martin stated the following:

We lost (backup center) Josh Perry to an MCL injury, so he is likely out for a while. Nate Manning and Daniel Carter (offensive tackles) both missed the game on Saturday with concussions and we are unsure about when they will be back- though, Carter is probably close. Shawn Donaldson, who was our number two center up until he got hurt at Navy, is still out with a stress fractor in his foot. (center) Kiff Kinkead is battling through some tough injuries. (H-back) Tony Smith had his knee scoped late last week to clean up some cartilage and he will probably be out for a few weeks. It might be easier to go over the list of who’s healthy to be honest with you.

With respect to the defense, Martin explained the following:

On the play of the defensive line versus Northern Illinois…
It wasn’t the defensive line that was hurting us what was hurting us was the linebacker play. Our linebacker play right now without John Sessler is a little bit of an adventure and that’s where we got hurt.

GFlash68, I realize the team is not playing well. Obviously the Flashes had problems today against a blitzing defense. The offensive line is so poor at this point it can't protect the quarterback and everyone knows Kent has no running attack. However, I am confident the offensive line will be better next year but I question whether the Flashes will have anyone who can run the ball with authority. I suggest that Martin recruit the best junior college running back that he can find who will be willing to play in his system. It is evident to me that no running back on the current roster will be able to step up and do the job that is necessary for the offense to be effective. Any thoughts on this?

It is not the running backs, it is the system and the OL. Heck, Jim Brown could not run for this system and OL.

GFlash68, I agree that the offensive line is a major problem and before the season even started I questioned whether the OL would be strong enough and have the technique needed to be successful in a passing offense. However, I don't buy into your argument that the system is totally wrong considering the personnel that Kent currently has. I agree that when Cribbs was quarterback, Kent should have implemented a running attack. It was obvious to me Josh was not a passing quarterback but he did reasonably well with what he had.
Now that Cribbs is gone and Machen is now our quarterback, Martin needs to utilize his skills and come up with a scheme that will better fit the current players.

In the future if Kent ever is able to recruit another Josh Cribbs, then I will be the first one to suggest implementing a running offense.

There is no way to put a good spin on this season. End of story.

However, I am about as sick of kicking this team when it's down as I am of its performance. Seems like more it's kicked, the worse it performs and the worse I feel.

Time to face reality. It's no where near the year I expected, which is a huge disappointment. Time to look ahead. Martin will be around at least one or two more years. He'll get the time to show if his system can work. Therefore, fans have two ultimate choices: 1) give up and move on or 2) hang on and hope for better things. CC, Laing and the new President have more choices, but unless you are one of those three, pick one or the other. Ranting on here does not help- trust me. Staying away doesn't help- everyone already does that. Witholding money doesn't help- football doesn't get much anyway and has had to learn to live without extra support. They don't expect the check in the mail anyway, so calling to threaten has little or no impact.

I choose option two. At times, I'd like to choose option one out of sheer exhaustion and endless disappointment, but I know I would not stick to it. As soon as some promise was shown, I'd be back on the bandwagon. So, I'm going to just sit quietly in the bandwagon corner and wait it out. If nothing else, I have a good seat for the championship parade.

We should move to the single wing or the option offense because this crap aint getting it done. With the WING-T you get more out of less, control the ball and the clock.

All the coach talks about is the freshman class. What happen to the soph through senior class? These guys have to feel isolated. The soph class was suppose to be a good class when Pees recruited them.How many are playing? How many have left? When you listen on the radio or look at the newspaper and all you hear or see is how great the freshman class is, you have to feel bad for the rest. If coach Martin will include all positive comments as a team instead of isolating them in the media, maybe the players will step up. I dont think talking about the freshman all the time is good team unity. I also heard A.D. Kennedy echo Martins comments about the freshman class on the radio, not good for team spirit. It takes a team to win, not a freshman class.

FlashFan Wrote:There is no way to put a good spin on this season. End of story.

However, I am about as sick of kicking this team when it's down as I am of its performance. Seems like more it's kicked, the worse it performs and the worse I feel.

Time to face reality. It's no where near the year I expected, which is a huge disappointment. Time to look ahead. Martin will be around at least one or two more years. He'll get the time to show if his system can work. Therefore, fans have two ultimate choices: 1) give up and move on or 2) hang on and hope for better things. CC, Laing and the new President have more choices, but unless you are one of those three, pick one or the other. Ranting on here does not help- trust me. Staying away doesn't help- everyone already does that. Witholding money doesn't help- football doesn't get much anyway and has had to learn to live without extra support. They don't expect the check in the mail anyway, so calling to threaten has little or no impact.

I choose option two. At times, I'd like to choose option one out of sheer exhaustion and endless disappointment, but I know I would not stick to it. As soon as some promise was shown, I'd be back on the bandwagon. So, I'm going to just sit quietly in the bandwagon corner and wait it out. If nothing else, I have a good seat for the championship parade.

I am with you. I choose option two as well. I will be at the last two home games, and I will keep my season tickets for next year as well.

For a lot of people that don't seem to care, there certainly is still a lot of football talk on here. I thought most were disowning it weeks ago. What gives?