We’re going to make a routine of updating our NESCAC fantasy teams every Friday from the week before.
After Jeff won our Week 1 matchup in pretty dominant fashion—winning by 12 points despite getting no production from four spots—I was worried that his team at full capacity might be hard to best. Thanks to big games from Foote and Minno—and they could have been even better—I held off Jeff in a high-scoring, NBA All-Star game-esque affair. We both had excellent quarterback play as Foote, Doll, Warren and Ciero combined for 77.2 points. It’s not often that NESCAC quarterbacks outproduce their backfield counterparts, but that was definitely the case last weekend. Evan Bunker was stuffed by the Williams defense—the NESCAC’s standard bearer had just 44 yards on 22 carries—and while there were some solid performances here and there, only LaDarius Drew entered the quarterback echelon.
Jeff got great production from his receivers as Joe Jensen and AJ Jones combined for 36 points, more than the total of all my wideouts not named Matt Minno. In fact, his skill positions gave him a narrow lead before the defenses and specialists were accounted for. It took a pair of dominant performances from my defenses, including a pivotal play by Matt Crimmins that had as big an impact on our fantasy matchup as it did on the field to even the score after two weeks. Crimmins’s tie-breaking pick six created a 10-point swing—the winning margin of our matchup—as my team got 2 points for the interception, 6 for the touchdown and Jeff took a -2-point hit for Ciero’s turnover. Talk about life mimicking art … or something.
Here are our full results from Week 2:
| Jeff | Damon | ||||
| QB | Warren | 20.1 | QB | Foote | 22 |
| QB | Ciero | 15.1 | QB | Doll | 20 |
| RB | Drew | 21.6 | RB | Stannell | 3.8 |
| RB | Donnarumma | 1.2 | RB | Curit | 7.3 |
| RB | Bunker | 6.7 | RB | Scyocurka | 13 |
| RB | Gibson | 3 | RB | Crick | 13 |
| WR | Rankowitz | 3.7 | WR | O’Malley | 10.2 |
| WR | Jensen | 16.3 | WR | Minno | 20.1 |
| WR | Jones | 20.6 | WR | Hurwitz | 4.6 |
| WR | Duncklee | 9.4 | WR | Ragone | 1.8 |
| WR | Davis | 9.3 | WR | Fabien | 12.9 |
| WR | Payton | 5.8 | WR | Duval | 0.1 |
| TE | Hughes | 13.1 | TE | Kenyon | 9.7 |
| TE | Budness | 8.7 | TE | Sadik-Khan | 14.1 |
| D/ST | Bates | 4 | D/ST | Trinity | 15 |
| D/ST | Amherst | 16 | D/ST | Middlebury D/ST | 17 |
| K | Donahue | 1 | K | Mallock | 1 |
| 175.6 | 185.6 | ||||
| Bench | Adrinka | 4.2 | Bench | Cooleen | 4.9 |
| Bench | Laspada | 0 | Bench | Zelkowitz | 7.6 |
Jeff dominated the waiver wire a week ago, adding Jesse Warren and Ryan Davis, who combined for nearly 30 points this week. I didn’t have nearly the same luck as Hurwitz and Ragone combined for fewer than 7 points. The biggest miss, however, was electing not to pick up Bates running back Shawn Doherty, who followed up his 10-rush, 91-yard performance in Week 1 with an eye-popping 24-carry, 182-yard, 2-touchdown performance this weekend against Tufts. Doherty is the NESCAC’s leading rusher after two weeks and was, unsurprisingly, the number one addition this week.
| JEFF | Add SHAWN DOHERTY Drop TIM LASPADA |
| DAMON | Add ALEX WAY Drop ANDREW DUVAL |
| JEFF | Add WES D/ST Drop AMH D/ST |
| JEFF | Add BOW D/ST Drop WES D/ST |
Jeff adds Doherty to an already stacked team. So deep at the running back position, in fact, that he will have Doherty on his bench this week. He also had a late-night revelation, adding the Bowdoin defense (playing Tufts this weekend) instead of the Wesleyan unit. Evening the score at one apiece is important in an eight-game season, but at what cost? Jeff has championship depth and elite talent throughout his roster. Missing out on Doherty a week ago could haunt me for the rest of the season.
Coming tomorrow a.m.: Our preview of Middlebury-Amherst.