Born

[Saluki 4 Life]

Anyone got any info at UNI on Bowen Born? I heard he was held out due to precaution, is he going to play Sunday? Is this the same issue he has been dealing with all year? I was sad to not see him play last night at SIU, was looking forward to watching him, hoping to see him in STL next week.

[BCPanther]

Anyone got any info at UNI on Bowen Born? I heard he was held out due to precaution, is he going to play Sunday? Is this the same issue he has been dealing with all year? I was sad to not see him play last night at SIU, was looking forward to watching him, hoping to see him in STL next week.

He's got a left shin and calf injury that he's been playing through for 6 weeks. He's said he's been about 70% for a while now. The calf locked up on him last night.

I imagine he'll try to go Sunday but they'll pull him again if it flares. He's not going to be healthy so it's a matter of managing pain and keeping loose.

I don't expect UNI to win another game this year. The future is really bright here but it's okay that this year is ending. Jake actually did a hell of a job just to win 9 league games.

[Dawgbit]

Anyone got any info at UNI on Bowen Born? I heard he was held out due to precaution, is he going to play Sunday? Is this the same issue he has been dealing with all year? I was sad to not see him play last night at SIU, was looking forward to watching him, hoping to see him in STL next week.

He's got a left shin and calf injury that he's been playing through for 6 weeks. He's said he's been about 70% for a while now. The calf locked up on him last night.

I imagine he'll try to go Sunday but they'll pull him again if it flares. He's not going to be healthy so it's a matter of managing pain and keeping loose.

I don't expect UNI to win another game this year. The future is really bright here but it's okay that this year is ending. Jake actually did a hell of a job just to win 9 league games.

Jacobson is my second favorite coach in The Valley. He is a quality person who I have always respected.

[unipanther99]

It's weird... Even when we're not playing well at all, I never feel too down about the future of the program. I think that's the sign of a good, stable coach.

If Jake ever leaves, we are probably screwed.

[BCPanther]

It's weird... Even when we're not playing well at all, I never feel too down about the future of the program. I think that's the sign of a good, stable coach.

If Jake ever leaves, we are probably screwed.

If any of our major sport coaches leave/retire, we're Evansville with a football program...

[Saluki 4 Life]

Anyone got any info at UNI on Bowen Born? I heard he was held out due to precaution, is he going to play Sunday? Is this the same issue he has been dealing with all year? I was sad to not see him play last night at SIU, was looking forward to watching him, hoping to see him in STL next week.

He's got a left shin and calf injury that he's been playing through for 6 weeks. He's said he's been about 70% for a while now. The calf locked up on him last night.

I imagine he'll try to go Sunday but they'll pull him again if it flares. He's not going to be healthy so it's a matter of managing pain and keeping loose.

I don't expect UNI to win another game this year. The future is really bright here but it's okay that this year is ending. Jake actually did a hell of a job just to win 9 league games.

That stinks... I hope he can go Sunday and in St. Louis. Rooting for UNI to beat Belmont Sunday to take the pressure off SIU needing a win to avoid falling to Thursday, I hope he can play and play well at Arch Madness though. If he is close to himself they can give anyone a scare.

[BEARZ77]

Not sure how to pose this w/o it offending Panther faithful, as I definitely respect Jake and all he's accomplished, and he's had the Bears # pretty consistently over the years. I know you have a young team and a lot of optimism for the coming years , but does it concern Panther fans that Jake has been .500 or worse 5 of the last 7 years. Now the other 2 he won MVC titles , but still 5 of 7 is a bad trend. Injuries, covid, lots of contributing factors I'm sure, but it seems he's gone away from the core defensive strengths his program was built on. Just curious what those close to the program see/feel.

[SalukiWorld]

Not sure how to pose this w/o it offending Panther faithful, as I definitely respect Jake and all he's accomplished, and he's had the Bears # pretty consistently over the years. I know you have a young team and a lot of optimism for the coming years , but does it concern Panther fans that Jake has been .500 or worse 5 of the last 7 years. Now the other 2 he won MVC titles , but still 5 of 7 is a bad trend. Injuries, covid, lots of contributing factors I'm sure, but it seems he's gone away from the core defensive strengths his program was built on. Just curious what those close to the program see/feel.

Think the main problem with Jake is his unwillingness to improve via the portal. UNI could have easily competed this year if they put some veteran pieces around Born and Anderson. They do have a great HS class coming in though so don't think they'll be down for long.

[BCPanther]

Not sure how to pose this w/o it offending Panther faithful, as I definitely respect Jake and all he's accomplished, and he's had the Bears # pretty consistently over the years. I know you have a young team and a lot of optimism for the coming years , but does it concern Panther fans that Jake has been .500 or worse 5 of the last 7 years. Now the other 2 he won MVC titles , but still 5 of 7 is a bad trend. Injuries, covid, lots of contributing factors I'm sure, but it seems he's gone away from the core defensive strengths his program was built on. Just curious what those close to the program see/feel.

That's totally fair.

There was a period pre-AJ where he read his own headlines and thought that he didn't actually need talent to win games. He thought that he was good enough to get by on how good he is on the bench. At the same time, he decided that we needed to play faster and was willing to sacrifice his defensive scheme in order to speed up the tempo and kind of lost his identity. He also continues to schedule like he's got an at large quality team every year which actively hurts his younger teams.

He's a really inflexible guy and, frankly, pretty thin skinned which leads to some animosity towards him from the more casual fans. He also, secretly, lost the automatic rollover on his contract a couple years ago and I've heard that started the problems he and our (terrible) AD have right now.

I think the next two years are awfully important. He's not going to use the portal, he's been burned over and over by transfers that he didn't recruit out of high school and he's not changing on that. He does, however, have easily the best high school recruiting class in the league coming in next year and one of the two or three best that he's ever had. I expect that we'll be much better next year but I'm not convinced we'll see that result in more Ws, that schedule is loaded again.

TL:DR. He's not as bulletproof as he was 5 years ago and he needs to get back to the tournament simply because you can't draw casual fans based on league titles in the Valley with a Big Ten and Big 12 program 90 minutes from your front door.

[Bulldog4life24]

BC - If you can keep everyone from this year though, along with your recruiting class (very jealous of it as a Drake fan, btw), and you plug in Phyfe, thats a pretty deep team.

Agree its tough to tell how it translates into wins, but could see you playing 10-11 players any night next year.