Knowles Looks to Continue Climb to Top

When Cornell head coach Jim Knowles took over the Big Red football program three years ago, the team was coming off a 1-9 campaign and a winless Ivy League season. Ever since, the team has placed in the top half of the league. This year, Knowles hopes his team will make another jump toward the top.

“We have three recruiting classes now,” he said. “We are still young, but there is a sense that we’ve been through this before. We know how we’ve won them and how we’ve lost them.”

Last season’s team went 5-5 overall and 3-4 in the league, losing to Brown, Harvard, Yale, and Columbia. Knowles says that for his team to continue its rise in the Ivy League standings, it will have to improve offensively.

“We led the league in rushing the last two years,” Knowles said. “Our defense was down last year and we just didn’t score enough points. We moved the ball but didn’t get it in the end zone.”

The offense is led by junior quarterback Nathan Ford, who is also the MVP of the Big Red baseball team. Knowles called him the “consummate student-athlete” and compares his quiet leadership to that of John Elway. Ford passed for over 1,400 yards last season and ran for 345, but threw only eight touchdown passes.

Given its powerful running game, improvement in the passing game could turn this team’s offense, which was sixth in the league in scoring last season, into a juggernaut. The Big Red ran over 1,800 yards last season and was led by senior running back Luke Siwula, who compiled over 1,000 all-purpose yards.

“Luke is really tough,” Knowles said. “He’s become a better blocker and pass-catcher. He’s never going to take negative yardage.”

The offensive line welcomes back three starters, including two fifth-year All-Ivy seniors in Ted Sonnenberg and Brian McGuire.

“Scheme-wise we are doing a lot of good things,” Knowles said about the running game. “We are not a team that’s going to pack it all in on the offensive line and run it down your throat. We find ways to generate the running game.”

Defensively, Knowles hopes that his team, which finished sixth in scoring defense last season, will return to the top of the league, where it was in 2005. Four starting defensive backs return to anchor a pass defense that was third in the league, including All-Ivy junior safety Tim Bax, who recorded 57 tackles and led the team with 7.5 tackles for loss.

Junior return man Bryan Walters finished second in the league in kick-and-punt returns last year and gives the Big Red yet another weapon on the field. “Looking at a good returner from the other side, you hold your breath and think about kicking it away from him,” Knowles said. “You have to develop a plan for him.”

After trouncing Bucknell 38-14 to start the season, Cornell will play Yale, the preseason number one team in the Ivy League. Knowles recognizes the Bulldogs’ overall talent and the consistent success of its program, but feels that if his team plays a complete game, Cornell could win. After that, Cornell has two non-conference games against Georgetown and Colgate before a game against a Harvard team that lost to Holy Cross on Saturday. The season concludes with the remaining five Ivy teams. Unfortunately for the Big Red, only three of their seven league games are at home, where they went 5-1 last season.

For Cornell to inch into the company of elite Ivies, it will have to figure out how to win on the road—something it failed to do once last season.