Hillsdale's Andre Holmes in the thick of Cowboys' off-season plans

Former Hillsdale College record setting WR Andre Holmes is yet to take a snap in a regular season NFL game, but his name has been popping up a lot this off-season as the Dallas Cowboys figure out whether to  come to terms with their free-agent receiver Laurent Robinson.

Holmes, who was an undrafted free-agent signee with Minnesota, was added to the Cowboys' practice squad after he was released by the Vikings. He was then moved to the active roster in December and was discussed by Dallas owner and GM Jerry Jones at the Combine last week.

“We have, in addition, a very good young receiver (in Holmes) that we’re really proud of, so he’s a factor in what we do here with Robinson, not do diminish what Robinson did here for us this year or can do in the future. He has a real knack of keeping the play alive, and that works real well with (Tony) Romo,” Jones told Tom Osborn of the San Antonio Express-News.

Cowboy fans are pretty apprehensive about the risk of bringing in such an unknown as Holmes but Jones' is ready to roll the dice on the Hillsdale grad.

“There’s no way to put a team on the field and not play players who have never played before in the NFL…You’re just more comfortable with a guy that you think knows what to do, ever though you’re sitting there with somebody that’s making as good of plays or better plays than guys ahead of him every day in practice.”

Remember when Andre Holmes finally got to see the field in Hillsdale? Worked out pretty well. Didn't it?

Hillsdale set to battle California University of Pennsylvania in season opener

http://nationalchamps.net/Helmet_Project/

Nobody can accuse Hillsdale College and head coach Keith Otterbein of ducking a tough opponent in the school lone non-conference football game.

Hillsdale will play a rare Thursday night game to open the season on the road and along the banks of the Monongahela River on August 30th.

The Vulcans advanced to the second round of the Division II playoffs last season and finished #15 in the final American Football Coaches Poll. They lose however 3 seniors who made various All-American teams including first-teamer Thomas Mayo at WR. Mayo was second in D2 in receptions.  Second Team All-American guard Rishaw Johnson played last weekend in the Senior Bowl. In all they graduate 10 seniors who were returning starters in 2011. First team All American Rontez Miles returns for a senior season at defensive back.

Hillsdale is the defending GLIAC champion after posting an 8-3 record and finishing #23 in the D2football.com final poll. The Chargers return most key parts intact including consensus All-American RB Joe Glendening who broke every single season rushing and TD record on Hillsdale's books.

Glendening, White, and Hixson get Don Hansen Recognition

I have been listing all winter all of the first team All-American honors that Joe Glendening has been bringing back to Hillsdale as a first team on essentially every team there is in the Don Hansen team.

It's time to make sure  two other guys get their recognition. Senior DB Nick Hixson was recently named a 3rd team All-American by the Don Hansen Weekly Football Gazette.

Hillsdale TE Cam White received honorable mention.

Hansen Team Release from GLIAC.org

Report: Ashland head football coach Lee Owens claims other GLIAC schools bad-mouthed AU, cheated to get recruits

At yesterday's presser to discuss his new set of recruits, Ashland University head coach Lee Owens was quoted by the Ashland Times-Gazette alleging that other GLIAC teams lied about Ashland to bolster themselves and that at least one broke NCAA rules and provided illegal benefits to an athlete.


"We had a lot of schools that tried to negative recruit us, say things that weren't true, just to make their programs and their teams seem better than they were," Owens said. "(The Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference) literally had a team that broke the rules and provided improper benefits to a recruit to get him to change his mind to go to their school (rather than Ashland)."

"We're going to do things right and we're not going to cheat -- we don't have to cheat to recruit to this school and to our football program," he added. "

No specifics of the benefit or which school committed the infraction was mentioned

The quotes can be seen in their context of the full article.