Thursday, October 20, 2005

The JMU football team’s white away jerseys won’t be white for long. After last weekend’s muddy loss to the University of Massachusetts, the Dukes won’t get a break as far as field conditions go.

As JMU football bulldozed toward the halfway point of its 2005 season, the early reviews held the Dukes in high esteem. JMU outscored its first five opponents by a combined score of 228 to 50, and there were some who claimed the Dukes were more impressive than in their championship-winning 2004 campaign — even after that little hiccup at Coastal Carolina.

There is a bit of convention within the world of higher athletics — oral tradition if you will — that JMU women’s basketball coach Kenny Brooks cites as applicable to his Dukes as they open the 2005-’06 season.

Playing volleyball in the small town of Steamboat Springs, Colo., developed Bayli Stillwell’s desire for the game, but coming to JMU gave her the opportunity to fulfill her dream of playing Division I volleyball.