Camel Foe – Week 5, Drake

The Fighting Camels fell to 1-3 with a 35-14 loss at Butler last week. In his second start, QB Dakota Wolf was 17-23 passing for 159 yards and ran for 111 yards on 31 carries. Kurt Odom provided the scoring with 2 short touchdown runs. Jordan Hildreth had 4 catches for 58 yards and Chad McMichael 6 for 45 yards. The Camels rushed for 206 yards but the defense allowed 452 yards and the 35 points. Paul Pizzuti had 12 tackles and a fumble recovery for the defense. After two consecutive road losses, they return to the friendly confines of Buies Creek this week to face Drake University.

Drake University

Location: Des Moines, IA (population: 203,433 as of 2010 census, the largest city in Iowa)

Established: 1881 by Francis Marion Drake, who lead a group of staff members from Oskaloosa College to form the new institution.

Enrollment: ~5,200

Nickname: Bulldogs

Mascot: Spike is Drake’s mascot. Spike is on Facebook and has an “army” for Drake students to join.

Affiliation: Drake is a football-only member of the Pioneer Conference. Except for women’s crew, the rest of its teams compete in the Missouri Valley Conference. The crew team is a member of the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference.

Random Fact #1: On September 17, 1969 the Drake student newspaper, The Times-Delphic, published what appears to be the first documented account of the famous Paul is dead hoax, written by Tim Harper.

Random Fact #2: Drake’s law school is one of the twenty-five oldest law schools in the nation, tracing its history to 1865. It is a charter member of the Association of American Law Schools, has been accredited since 1923 when accreditation first began, and is one of only seventy-five ABA-approved law schools to have a Chapter of Order of the Coif.

Random Fact #3: The athletic teams received their nickname of Bulldogs in 1904 from a sportswriter who noticed that John L. Griffith, who coached every sport, was bringing his pet bulldogs to the practice fields. The teams had previously been known as the Ducklings and Ganders. (I, for one, am sad they are not the Drake Ducklings.)

Random Fact #4: In 1928 Drake defeated Simpson College 41-6 in what is believed to be the first night football game west of the Mississippi River. Perhaps the most famous incident in Drake’s football history is known as the Johnny Bright Incident, where Pulitzer-Prize winning photographs in the Des Moines Register proved an intentional attack on the African American quarterback by Oklahoma State Cowboys football players. Drake withdrew from the Missouri Valley Conference in protest of the lack of disciplinary action taken against those responsible. Today, Drake’s football field is named Johnny Bright Field in memory of the incident.

Random Fact #5: The university hosts the Drake Relays during April. This track and field event has been held since 1910, and is the second-largest collegiate track and field event in the United States. The 1961 Drake Relays was the first sporting event televised on ABC’S Wide World of Sports anthology show.

Notable Alumni:

• comedian Steve Allen, the first host of the Tonight Show
• Terry Branstad, former and current governor of Iowa
• NFL kicker Billy Cundiff
• Michael Emerson, Emmy-winning actor as Ben Linus on Lost
• PGA golfer and 2007 Masters champion Zach Johnson
• actor Jeremy Piven (did not graduate)
• actor Sam Wanamaker (Private Benjamin, Raw Deal)
• WGN TV producer-director Arne Harris (if you watched Cubs games on WGN, you instantly remember that name)

We’ll expand the list t0 10 this week. You can never list too many notable Iowans.

• Tionne “T-Boz” Watkins of TLC, Grammy winning R&B Singer
• actor Stephen Collins, the dad from 7th Heaven
• Peter Hedges, writer of What’s Eating Gilbert Grape
• multiple Emmy-award winner Cloris Leachman
• Olympic gymnastics gold medalist Shawn Johnson
• Track & field world champion LoLo Jones
• NFL quarterback Kyle Orton
• former MLB player Casey Blake
• 7 of the 9 members of the band Slipknot
• former NFL quarterback and league & Super Bowl MVP Kurt Warner

Oh yeah, the Football Team:

• Drake is 2-2 (1-0 in the PFL), with both losses coming to FCS scholarship programs (Montana State & Indiana State)
• Drake defeated conference foe Morehead State 28-25 in Des Moines last Saturday.
• Drake leads the series between the two school 4-0.
• In the teams’ only previous game at Campbell in 2010, Drake eked by with a 14-12 victory.
• Drake trailed Morehead State 17-7 in the 4th quarter last week before scoring 3 TDs in a span of 9:40
• Senior QB Mike Piatkowski, the reigning PFL Offensive Player of the Year, threw for 268 yards and 3 TDs and became the school’s all-time leader in passing yards. Gary Scott added 125 yards on the ground and 1 TD.
• The defense was paced by John Hugunin’s 16 tackles and 1 sack while Travis Merritt added 14 tackles.
• Drake leads the PFL in sacks with 14, which ranks them sixth in FCS. They have ranked in the Top 10 nationally in each of the past three seasons.
• The Bulldogs are looking for their 6th consecutive PFL victory and their fourth straight 2-0 start in conference play.
• Piatkowski also holds the career record for completion percentage (62.2) and needs just 7 TD passes to become the all-time leader in that category as well. He ranks 5th all-time in the PFL in passing yardage. With 7 games remaining he must average 228 yards/game to pass current San Francisco 49ers QB Josh Johnson for 2nd all-time in the conference.
• In last season’s meeting Piatkowski set an FCS record for completion percentage by a QB with at least 30 completions, going 30-33 (90.9%) in a 31-14 Bulldog victory.
• Stat Leaders:
  • Passing: Piatkowski – 110-178, 1179 yards, 7 TD, 3 INT
  • Rushing: Scott – 64-285, 3 TD
  • Receiving: Kevin Marshall 23 receptions (198 yards); Joey Orlando 219 yards (21 catches, 1 TD); Nick Rosa 3 TD (13-208)
  • Defense: Hugunin 46 tackles; Brandon Coleman 8 TFL; TylerMoorehead 4 sacks; Drew Ormseth 2 INT
• Best Name Nominees:
  • Neko Graf, Naser Hannoon, Paddy O’Connell, Ezekiel Okeleye, Zach Zlabis & Caz Zyks
  • The winner – Caz Zyks

Prediction:

Drake has not yet lost to the Fighting Camels in four tries and were picked to finish 2nd in the league by the coaches in the preseason poll. Campbell has still yet to score in the first quarter this season (outscored 45-0) and seeks a better start than the past 4 weeks. The defense is allowing 466 yards per game to opposing offense, including more than 10 yards per pass attempt and will be severely tested by Drake’s all-time leading passer, Mike Piatkowski. Drake’s defense has allowed 215 yards per game on the ground this season, which may be an opening for the Camels’ ground based offense. Dakota Wolf is the first Camel QB to top the 100-yard mark in back-to-back weeks and may find #3 against the Bulldog defense. However, poor starts and a weak defense have the Achilles heel’s for the Camels this season and again portend doom against Drake. I will boldly predict that the Camels dent the scoreboard in the opening stanza for the first time this season and that Dakota Wolf again manages 100+ yards rushing, but Piatkowski, Scott and the rest of the Bulldogs recover and will celebrate  a 28-14 road victory.