The November 1 homecoming game against Duke will be an ESPN360 broadcast with a 3:30 kickoff. Pretty good game time, but obviously not the most attractive TV slot (if you can really even call it that). It's hard to argue, though. I can't imagine Wake vs. Duke has a whole lot of national interest right now.

Edit: I'm an idiot. This game is not homecoming. Homecoming is the following weekend against Virginia. Thanks for the catch Anon.

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The game at Miami on October 25 will be a noon kickoff on ESPNU. Not exactly the most glamorous of assignments, but at least its still widely available. I think it may end up being a pretty good game.

ACC announcement of October 25 game times

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Edit: those of you who read this post earlier in the day know what the exciting news is, but due to a couple of issues things have been postponed a week. They've asked us to wait until they announce it next week to tell you about it, so those who didn't read this morning will be in the dark. BlogPoll this week will operate exactly the same as previous weeks. Sorry!

I try hard this far into the season to submit a ballot based on resume, meaning most undefeated teams will be ranked higher than most of those who are not. This will probably continue until teams get a significant chunk of their conference schedules under their belts, which is likely to hurt the Ball States of the world pretty significantly.

Rank	Team	Delta
1	Oklahoma	--
2	Alabama	6
3	Missouri	3
4	LSU	--
5	Texas	2
6	Penn State	7
7	Texas Tech	9
8	South Florida	4
9	Vanderbilt	9
10	Southern Cal	8
11	Brigham Young	2
12	Connecticut	12
13	Oklahoma State	9
14	Georgia	11
15	Tulsa	11
16	Utah	3
17	Ball State	9
18	Northwestern	5
19	Kentucky	7
20	Boise State	5
21	Florida	16
22	Auburn	4
23	Wisconsin	13
24	Wake Forest	13
25	Virginia Tech	1

Dropped Out: Minnesota (#14), Nebraska (#17), Colorado (#20), TCU (#21), East Carolina (#25).

As always, let me know why I'm an idiot in the comments.

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I apologize for having been somewhat worthless this week; I guess I took a cue from the football team and decided to take things a little bit easier. Still, I'll try to get back to doing more than just a Wake up call today or tomorrow.

Blogpoll came out yesterday, and Wake moved up two spots to #18. Despite leaving Wake exactly where they were in my ballot last week, I'm actually third in this week's CK award, I guess because the BC guys both lost. I hope I don't ever end up #1 in the list - the curse is 2/2 this year - but we'll see what happens.

Here's a photo gallery of Jim Grobe's trip to ESPN which I wrote about yesterday. Thanks to Brian, a reader, for pointing out to me that technically Grobe ran the "Gantlet" not the "Gauntlet" at ESPN. According to the Columbia Guide to Standard American English:

A gauntlet is “a heavy glove, often armored” or “a glove with a heavy cuff covering part of the arm.” To throw down the gauntlet is to challenge someone; to pick up the gauntlet is to accept someone’s challenge. A gantlet is “a lane between two lines of people armed with staves or whips, through which someone being punished is forced to run while being clubbed or whipped by the people on either side” (run the gantlet) and, figuratively, “any series of trials and difficulties.” To complicate matters, each is a variant spelling of the other.

Man. That's more grammer/vocabulary/English (or whatever you want to call it) than I can handle this early in the morning. But at least we've got it right now. Thanks, Brian.

With the bye week there isn't really any new MSM news today. Have a good one!

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Head football coach Jim Grobe spent Tuesday in Bristol, CT interviewing with multiple ESPN outlets, including ESPN2's First Take, ESPN's College Football Live, ESPN Radio's Scott van Pelt Show, ESPN News' Overdrive and a chat on ESPN.com. Dan Collins writes about Grobe's experience here.

This whole concept of spending a day at Bristol is an interesting one, and it speaks to the power of ESPN these days. Not only is this one of the best ways for Wake Forest to get exposure, but according to the article, it's incredibly beneficial for Grobe to "make friends" with the ESPN talent and personalities so that they'll be more likely to cover Grobe and Wake in the future.

When you step back and think about it, that's really a pretty crazy concept. ESPN has so much power these days that the best way for a team to get relevant national media exposure is to send it's coaches and/or players to Bristol and buddy up to their talent.

We all know ESPN has what nearly equates to a monopoly on the sports TV market, but the whole thing just doesn't sound quite right to me. It's one of those things where you'd like to think that performance on the field is all that matters. I'm not saying I blame Grobe or the media relations staff for having him go up there and do it - you've go to cater to what works - I just wish it didn't have to be that way.

I've read Grobe's ESPN.com chat and look forward to seeing some of his other segments later in the week - it should be fun to see him in-studio at ESPN - but I look forward to the day where Wake can get the coverage it deserves just by performing on the field.

I think I'll have to stick to dreaming; that day is unlikely to ever come.

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Another week, another blogpoll ballot. To be honest, I don't quite know what to do with this right now - just not enough data, so fill free to give me a piece of your mind. Except for Oklahoma at #1. It's not changing until they lose or I have an incredibly compelling reason to change it. So basically, until they lose. Let it go (Kyle).

Rank	Team	Delta
1	Oklahoma	--
2	Southern Cal	--
3	Georgia	--
4	Florida	--
5	Ohio State	--
6	Missouri	--
7	LSU	--
8	Auburn	--
9	Texas	--
10	Alabama	--
11	East Carolina	14
12	Wisconsin	1
13	Oregon	1
14	Wake Forest	--
15	Texas Tech	--
16	Kansas	2
17	Arizona State	--
18	South Florida	1
19	Utah	1
20	Florida State	1
21	Brigham Young	5
22	California	1
23	Penn State	3
24	UCLA	--
25	Fresno State	1

Dropped Out: West Virginia (#13), South Carolina (#22).

In other news, Riley Skinner and Sam Swank were both players of the week. Good stuff - not that I'm surprised.

Jim Grobe is apparently in Bristol today doing various things with ESPN. I guess with the bye week and the day off tomorrow he has time for that type of thing. Should be great for some publicity. He'll be doing a live chat at 12:30 if you want to participate in that.

Game times are out for week 4. Wake will play FSU at 7:00 p.m. on ESPN2. I'm interested to hear your opinions on playing down there in a night game. I guess it worked well last time. Anyone going? I'm trying to decide if I am or not.

Only seen one news link: The defense isn't satisified with their performance. Glad to hear that. I'm sure they'll bring it at FSU.

It's a bye week so we've got some time to kill. If I get a couple hours to spend breaking down the film I'll try to do that. I'm sure we'll come up with something.

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I saw the TV coverage maps for Saturday's game for the first time last night, and Deacons in the middle of the country are in an unfortunate position. Most of Big 12 country (and a few other states) is going to get Cincinnati @ Oklahoma on ABC, and unfortunately Oregon State @ Penn State on ESPN2. This means your only option for seeing the Wake game is to find a friend or sports bar with the GamePlan package.

I feel sorry for those who won't get the game, and I want to provide some help for those who just may not have any other option, and another outlet for those of you who may be watching the game at home and have access to their computer at the same time. I'm going to be at the game, but I'm looking for someone who will have the game on TV to run a live blog here at Old Gold & Blog. It really isn't hard - all you have to do is provide some commentary and play by play, and monitor comments from other readers. If you'd be interested in doing this send me an email and let me know.

As for the news, Deacon Tower's first game this weekend is prompting some more coverage, and Dan Collins profiles running back C.J. Washington. From Edward Robinson in Raleigh, the receivers are off to a good start and having fun. The week 1 blogpoll came out yesterday and full results are here. Wake comes in at #20, and I'm still in the running for the Coulter/Krugman award. Still, I didn't come anywhere close to the Boston College guys - I may regret having picked them to beat Georgia Tech this week, as the CK award curse continued last week for Michigan State (read the post if you don't have any clue what I'm talking about - it's fairly interesting).

5 Good Questions coming later this morning, enjoy!

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On Thursday I let you know there wasn't going to a be a live blog, and promised an explanation would come later, so here is that explanation.

Old Gold & Blog all of a sudden finds itself in a bit of a transitional period, and I’m going to use this post to explain to all of you what is happening. In the following paragraphs I’ll lay out a variety of information, but ultimately what they’re all going to add up to is this: Media relations has tightened their policies and Old Gold & Blog won’t be getting the same kind of access it has enjoyed for the last year. Live blogs, in particular, won’t be happening the same way.

To understand where we are, I need to explain where we’ve come from: I first began publishing Old Gold & Blog in late September 2007, explaining in my first post that I wanted to fill a void. I had a vision for what I thought the site could become, but I knew that the site was just as likely (if not more so) to fail completely as it was to meet that potential. Things were probably pretty touch and go those first couple months, but I stuck with it, my writing started to improve, and the site developed a small but strong base of readers.

At the beginning of the 2007-2008 basketball season, with the encouragement of a friend, I approached the athletic department about getting media credentials for basketball games. Wake’s athletic department hadn’t ever been presented with such a request, and was willing to test it out with me. Things went well and I received credentials to every game I requested them for throughout the season. I posted updates and analysis (a “live blog” if you will) at every media timeout (sometimes more often towards the end of halves), and interviewed coaches and players after the games for my post game stories. Readers seemed to enjoy the content the access provided.

There are lots of college fan blogs being published around the country, but very few of those do so with any kind of official access, they’re just fans posting from their living rooms. There are also a decent number of truly “professional” journalists working for local newspapers or national outlets whose job it is to attend games with press credentials and publish blogs (Dan Steinberg for the Washington Post and Heather Dinich for ESPN.com are good examples). I was in the unique position of having the access of a professional journalist while maintaining the independent status of your average fan blogger.

Back in the spring everything seemed to be going well. The media credentials allowed me to live blog from games and interview coaches and players afterwards for my post-game stories. The number of readers continued to grow and I was proud of what the site had become.

When spring football rolled around, I decided to head out to practice and tell people what I was seeing. I was amazed by the positive response from those posts, because I had not realized how starved for information fans were when it came to things like spring practices. The fact is, at a school like Wake Forest, there just isn’t a whole lot of coverage from traditional forms of media, and a site such as Old Gold & Blog seemed to step in nicely to fill that void. It seemed like a beneficial relationship for everyone; Wake Forest was getting more “media” coverage, and I had the fun, enjoyment, and a small stream of revenue from running the site.

I thought all of this was setting up for a pretty outstanding 2008-2009 athletic year, including continued access to football and basketball games (and really any other sport I wanted to cover, like soccer). I had some new software I wanted to use for the live blogs that were going to make them interactive and a lot of fun, and after a successful soccer experiment I couldn’t wait to try them out for football.

Media relations had different plans, however. They have tightened their credentialing guidelines to only include established media outlets, meaning that an independent website like mine is no longer allowed press box access to blog. Unless Old Gold & Blog were to become an established media outlet, or join an existing media outlet, there aren’t going to be any more credentials. Even if one of those things were to happen, there would likely be restrictions placed on live blogging.

I’ve loved doing live blogs from games. They’re fun and I know that readers enjoy them. This does not prevent me from sitting on the couch and live blogging, but it does keep me from doing it with a credential at a game. It’s unfortunate, but that’s the way it is. As much as I love live blogging for you (particularly with the new format that allows for so much more interaction between all of us), I’m not going to sit on my couch in the dorm to live blog when the actual game is happening in the stadium five minutes away – I just can’t miss out on that fun and I think you’ll understand. For road games I often will live blog from the couch, but just not for home games. I will, of course, continue to provide my post-game thoughts and analysis the same as always, except that it won’t contain any quotes from coaches or players since I won’t be in the locker room to get them.

Like I said, as much as I love live blogging, I’m going to go to the home games I can make it to, not sit on the couch and blog. I know, however, that there are many of you who aren’t able to make it to games and are doing exactly that – sitting on the couch at home. Many of you would probably even enjoy looking at and participating in a live blog while you watched. So here’s what I want to do: I want you to run the live blog yourself. It’s not overly difficult to do (I’ll teach you) and it’s a lot of fun. If you’re interested in giving this a try, send me an email and let me know. We can work on a schedule for the rest of the season, but for now all I need is a volunteer who knows he/she will be able to watch next Saturday’s Ole’ Miss game on TV in its entirety, will have a computer with internet access, and is willing and able to run the live blog. If this sounds like you, let me know and we’ll see what we can work out.

I don’t know how big of a change this will really end up being to the site, but there isn’t anything that can be done about it, so (to use the cliché) we’re going to make lemonade out of lemons.

I apologize for the length of this post, but I didn’t think it would really make sense without giving a larger picture for what that has happened. I’m curious to see what you all think about the whole situation, so let me know by leaving a comment.

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This morning basketball takes the spotlight, as yesterday Philadelphia point guard Tony Chenault verbally committed to play basketball for the Demon Deacons, joining the class of 2010. Chenault is currently a three star prospect according to Scout.com. I'll publish my own take on this commitment in the next day or two, but here are some other stories until then.

Speaking of basketball, the pairings for the Anaheim Classic have been announced, and Wake Forest will face Cal State Fullerton in the first round, Thursday, November 27, on ESPN2. UTEP and St. Mary's are the other teams in Wake's bracket, and Wake would face the winner/loser of their game Friday on ESPNU. The final games are set for Sunday the 30th, with the championship being played on ESPN2. This doesn't exactly set Wake up for the matchups they would have most wanted from a strength of schedule perspective, but it does set them up well to have a good shot at winning the tournament.

Of course we can't totally ignore football, so here is Dan Collins' usual football notebook, as well as this feature on Josh Adams.

I'm traveling today, so if I'm slow to answer emails or anything like that I apologize. I expect to still have a full practice report up tonight.

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Not surprisingly, Media day for the Demon Deacons means plenty of coverage from a variety of outlets. The story that will probably be read more than any other is this AP story, which talks about Deacon Tower and the high expectations of Wake Forest fans these days.

I've been surprised by how difficult it's been to find photos of the event, but here's a pretty cool shot of everyone getting ready for the team photo. You may notice that the uniforms look a bit different. Russell Nenon has informed me that the new jerseys are "nice with skinnier numbers. The pants are a similar material with a black stripe down the side."

I'm guessing these new uniforms are one of Nike's newer, tighter fitting materials, and probably lighter weight and more breathable for increased player comfort. I'll be curious to see how the new piping on the pants looks in an actual game, and how it translates to the all black uniform.

It's a popular time to profile the 2008 defense, with this Dan Collins article about the players and Stan Cotten writing about new defensive coordinator Brad Lambert.

The Demon Deacons will practice again today at 3:30.

Photo by Bob Hebert

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Yesterday Patrick Hite at ACC Nation wrote a column about the ACC's perception throughout the country. For once someone wasn't trying to tear down the ACC or trying to defend it. The column had a very different purpose.

"The conference will never be a consistent threat to win a national title and I’m OK with that," wrote Hite. "Teams should embrace an ACC title and, if things fall into place they may earn a shot at a national championship. If things don’t fall into place, which happens more often than not, the ACC title is still pretty special."

I was caught of guard by this a little bit and had to stop and think about it. Should I just enjoy the ACC schedule and the possibilty of an ACC Championship and not worry about the rest of the nation and what they think?

Hite is absolutely right about how special an ACC Championship is. Wake fans only have to look back two years to remember, and I know that no one really cares that the rest of the country called it a down year in the ACC.

Still, it's frustrating to watch ACC football week-in and week-out and not feel like it gets the credit it deserves. There are a lot of talented teams and just because Florida State and Miami aren't the best schools in the conference right now doesn't mean the conference is awful as a whole.

I think I both agree and disagree with Hite's point at the same time.

I agree that an ACC Championship is special no matter what the conference looks like that year. If you listen to most players and coaches at the begining of the season they aren't talking about how they want to win a National Championship, they're talking about how they want to win the conference.

Ultimately, though, it is impossible for me to not want to come to the ACC's defense becaues I don't think the rest of the nation's criticism of the ACC is fair. All I ever hear is that the ACC can't be good because Miami and FSU aren't good. Why do those schools have to be the best schools in the conference? How long until it isn't a sign of a weak conference to have Wake Forest or Boston College be one of the best teams?

I love ACC football; it's fun to watch, fun to cover, and there is some great talent. If I thought the ACC was significantly worse than the other BCS conferences then criticism from others wouldn't bother me, but because I find the criticisms of the ACC unfair, I can't help but be annoyed by it.

Obviously it wouldn't hurt for the conference to win a few more bowl games, too. But is that all it's going to take? A national title? Even just a BCS win? Let me know what you think.

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Many of you may have been following the coverage coming out of the ACC's Football Kickoff, essentially a three-day event for the media to talk to conference officials, coaches, and players (and of course play some golf).

It is an event I would have loved to attend, but wasn't able to because of my summer job (and I'm not sure they would let me anyway). I've tried to do my best to keep up with everything coming out of all the interviews happening there, but to be honest I haven't been able to read everything.

Nonetheless, I have noticed (and I've seen many Wake fans point it out) that there haven't been many features on Wake while most other schools have gotten more coverage. The one notable exception to that is this great piece Gregg Doyel did on coach Jim Grobe.

I've seen plenty of people complaining about the lack of coverage (most specifically on the Scout boards regarding ESPN's ACC blogger Heather Dinich) and I think people are losing perspective in their complaints.

Yes, Wake should be one of the best teams in the ACC this season, but I haven't seen anyone in the media say otherwise.

The fact is, a national media outlet like ESPN has to cater first and foremost to the teams that bring the most readers to the site. Just because Wake is going to be good this year doesn't mean the general public wants to read about it. Florida State could go 7-7 every season and there would still be more people interested in them in the preseason than a great Wake Forest team.

Why are the Red Sox and Yankees on TV all the time when they aren't the best teams in the baseball? Obviously because the most people want to watch them.

There is a reason Old Gold & Blog is the only independent site covering Wake Forest when every other ACC school has more than one. Even so it's a pretty good day when a few hundred people visit the site. There just isn't that large of a fan base who are interested enough to constantly follow the Demon Deacons.

If you're interested in the ACC at-large then I think Heather and the others at the Kickoff did a great job of covering everything being talked about there. Many stories about various issues in the conference included Jim Grobe's thoughts and comments, but when it comes to stories specifically about Wake, it just isn't always practical.

Wake is getting plenty of preseason respect, and I look forward to seeing the team prove that respect is deserved on the field. I'll do my best to keep providing good Wake coverage between now and August 28, and hopefully I can make it to the 2009 Kickoff to give Wake the coverage it deserves.

Right now I'm just going to enjoy the excitement surrounding this 2008 season.

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As has been rumored for the last week or so, Wake Forest, Baylor, and Fox Sports Net have come to an agreement that will move the season opener from Saturday, August 30 to Thursday night, August 28.

It was possible (although I think unlikely) that the game would not have ended up on TV at all had it been played Saturday. The move to Thursday guarantees not only that the game will be televised but that it will be televised nationally. Since it's the first day of football for the year, I have to imagine our football-starved nation will be desperate to see any football at all and that our game will get pretty good ratings. Because they will play a game three days earlier than most schools, Wake will be allowed to start practicing three days earlier, and will have more time to rest up and prepare for the home opener (and long awaited Deacon Tower opening) against Ole' Miss the following weekend.

The move does have some downsides for Deacon fans, though. Although it would not have been a huge contingent even without the change, I imagine the number of Wake fans attending the game would have been larger on Saturday than it will end up being Thursday night. Traveling to the game isn't exactly easy when it's on a school/work night. It will also cause the athletes to miss at least two, but likely all three of the first days of school. It remains to be seen whether or not they will fly out Wednesday or Thursday, but from a football perspective Wednesday is definitely preferable.

In the end, I think the advantages of the national TV exposure far outweigh the potential downside for fans and players. It's a great opportunity to make inroads in Texas recruiting as well.

Had the game been on Saturday I was definitely going to be making the trip, however Thursday makes things a bit more difficult. I'm hoping to make it work and successfully attend every game this season. We'll see what happens.

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There are a couple notes of interest here on Tuesday morning:

Defensive Coordinator Dean Hood is set to be named Head Coach at FCS Eastern Kentucky University, apparently at 2pm this afternoon. This is definitely an unfortunate loss for the Deacs, but I expect that whoever fills his shoes will do so admirably and that next season's defense will be just as incredible as we all expect it to be.

The basketball team heads down to Clemson tonight for a 7 pm tip. I'm hoping to have an interview up later, but it seems that may have fallen through. If there isn't one I may attempt some sort of preview, but we'll see. Have to figure out my new class schedule and when I can write.

Last night I was a guest on the ACC Nation radio show/podcast, which provides an excellent look around the ACC every week. You can listen to the whole show (or just my part - I think it starts about a third of the way through the program) here at ACC Nation.

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The idea of Time-Warner picking up this game and showing it throughout North Carolina isn’t bad, but the execution is clearly awful. When Winston-Salem and the entire surround county can’t even see the game when it starts (yet to be determined if we’ll see it at all) you’ve got a pretty terrible system going on. To be honest I can’t imagine there are more than 100 people in this county who care about this fishing show. How can we not get this game on TV?!?!?!?!?!?!?

I’m not sure this is actually better than having it on ACC select, because I’d be more than happy to pay to see this game then not see it all. Add to that the fact that no one can get through to TWC to find out the problemand you’ve got a very very bad situation. All I can say is this fishing show better not last very long (hopefully only a half hour) and then we’ll get the game. I’m not counting on it at this point.

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Lincoln has agreed to sell its sports holdings to Raycom.

It appears this move was expected to happen eventually, as Lincoln ended up with the sports rights after merging with Jefferson-Pilot last year. Raycom will now be the sole holder of the broadcast rights to ACC and SEC football and basketball previously held by Lincoln. I don’t think this will have any significant impact on fans, but it is worth noting. I think we’ll just be calling it “Raycom” pretty soon.

Raycom Press Release

MSN Money article

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It's worth mentioning that the Associated Press has finally gotten their act together and now correctly identifies the Wake student section as the Screamin' Demons, rather than their previously incorrect "Screamin Deacons"

You can see the corrected article from the Fairfield game here.

Apparently the AP Style Guide incorrectly states that the student section is called the Screamin' Deacons, however it looks like we may have finally gotten this straightened out.

The question now becomes - will the next AP writer who writes about the Deacs get it right?

My money's on no.

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