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(01/21/16 1:17am)
Loyal fans, I write to you from Jersey Mike’s sub shop in the beautiful Newark International Airport to report that something ‘glaurieous’ emerged from the pit of despair that was exam week. Like a phoenix, the car column rises out of the darkness of exams and into the glaurie of the light. If you haven’t picked up on the hints as subtle as an Atwater pickup line, the non-award-winning car column, Broke College Students in Cars Getting McDonalds, is making its one article return featuring one of Middlebury’s newest faculty members, President Laurie Patton. The Glaurie Ride happened, and it was glaurieous (ok, I promise I’ll stop now).
I grew bold after successfully taking President Liebowitz to the greasy temple of McDonalds last year to complete his farewell tour. After spending the entire summer calculating the conversion of the Liebowitz-o-Meter car rating system to the Patton-o-Meter, I wasn’t about to just not test out the new metric. In case you were wondering, the conversion is precisely two Pattons to every Liebowitz, so that the Patton meter is a rating out of ten.
The Car: 2014 Dark Blue Subaru Outback
Car Name: Renée
The Owner: Middlebury College (Renée’s actually a college car)
Styling: She wore a long denim skirt and a cardigan, totally outclassing us slovenly students. In terms of the car … The closest thing to camouflage that you can drive on a Vermont road, the Outback is ubiquitous. Only a “peace,” “eat more kale,” or “coexist” sticker on the back would make it look more Vermont. Compared to the previous generation, which looked like a slightly overweight and confused angry frog, the newest model slims down and focuses up, now looking exactly like an angry frog.
Patton-o-Meter: 8/10 Lauries.
Interior: Comfortable. Spacious. Practical. These are all words that describe the interior of the Subaru Outback. The Bosnian Back Seat Tester (BBST) had to be replaced for this drive as he had failed his duty and gone abroad to Uruguay. Luckily, after much searching, I found a replacement. Laura Harris, arguably Laurie Patton’s biggest fan, filled in as the Vermont Back Seat Tester (VBST). The VBST enjoyed vast amounts of space while having a spiritual moment in the back seat. I’m pretty sure Laura was speaking in tongues for a couple hours after the drive.
Patton-o-Meter: 8/10 Lauries.
Handling and Performance: I did not have the clearance to drive President Patton, so she drove us. Patton has already gotten the hang of whipping around Middlebury like a pro. One thing: she didn’t fully stop at the stop sign by the biomass plant. Better watch out for pub safe, Patton; they gave me a $50 ticket for doing that!
Patton-o-Meter: 7/10 Lauries.
Drive-through-ability: The Subaru wants to be a mass market American car: of course this thing kills the drive through! It’s got huge cup-holders and armrests to fit all of your greasy dreams. The window is at close to ideal drive-through height.
Patton-o-Meter: 10/10 Lauries.
The Drive: A truly transformative and yet intimidating experience. I would highly recommend going to McDonalds with President Patton to anyone. In case you’re wondering, she goes to McDonalds to “be alone,” so it might be tough to interrupt her deep-fried me time. On our drive we talked about fries, the origins of sexual, racial and religious violence, and China. I made the mistake of telling President Patton that my history thesis was about Bangladesh, which she has studied extensively … whoops. Needless to say, she knew far more about my topic than I did.
In terms of our order, we went for two cups of water (because we’re healthy and sustainable Middlebury students), a small and medium fry and an iced tea. President Patton pulled a wildcard and ordered a broccoli soup, becoming the first person to order soup from the Middlebury McDonalds ever. I didn’t even know McDonalds had soup. President Patton is probably the smartest person I’ve had an extended conversation with. Now that she’s driven to McDs with some random students, she is officially a part of the Middlebury community. Congratulations, President Patton, you’re going to make a great president.
Patton-o-Meter: 10/10 Lauries.
(12/10/15 2:17am)
Well here it is, the final issue of the semester. And just like that you no longer have time to do all of those things you said you were going to do. So much for getting your life together. The time is approaching to escape with your sanity, that remaining portion of your dignity and whatever a night of cramming all the readings you “forgot to do” can get you on your exams.
This semester I feel as if I’ve covered all of the issues that needed discussing, totally no exaggeration.
I’ve covered the ever-pressing topics of vegan riblets, Ross smoothies, Battell Bathtubs, BannerWeb and many other undeniable priorities of Middlebury College life.
Ok, but in all honesty, how is my column still a thing?
To quote the always wise Bob and Bob from Office Space, “What would you say you do here?” Well to be totally honest, I have no idea. I guess I write 500 words a week, so there’s that.
I spend every column venting about minor inconveniences that in no way actually matter. Does it matter that the mailboxes are a little bit finicky? Not at all. Do you have to eat the vegan riblets? Nope. And I mean really, have you ever had to take a bath in Battell? I sure hope not… If you did, then please report back that you are, in fact, still alive.
My theme isn’t even original. I stole it shamelessly from the writers of Last Week Tonight. You would think that I could have at least come up with a significantly different title than John Oliver’s “How Is It Still a Thing,” but no. As I stated in the first column of the year, I prefer to think of myself as efficient rather than lazy, so I just threw Midd in there and called it a day. Brilliant. So much for creativity!
If you did, in fact, ride it out and read all of my columns (I’m looking at you, Mom), thanks and congrats.
You have made it through over 5,500 words of a mediocre satirical column that has a strange obsession with arbitrary percentages and references to mediocre movies forgotten by 67 percent of their viewers within one week of watching. (Pro tip: check out the 2006 animated film Barnyard, starring the illustrious Kevin James as a bull with udders, for an example.)
I’m going abroad in the spring, so the quality of writing and reporting in this paper is going way up.
But before I do so, I will bring the maturity of the Campus back down to a middle school level one time during J-term when the car column makes its triumphant return for one last GLaurie Ride. That’s right, in a rare lapse of judgment, President Patton has agreed to drive with me to McDonald’s. It will be the pinnacle of my journalistic career. Stay tuned.
(12/03/15 1:08am)
If you were to think of the most surefire way to make yourself look stupid what would it be? Answering a question wrong in class? Calling someone the wrong name? Pushing a pull door? Nope. Without a doubt it has to be opening the McCullough mailboxes.
The McCullough mailbox locks have probably caused me more embarrassment than my mouth ever has — and that is saying something. How are these locks still a thing?
Mailboxes are so important here: I probably get what, seven letters a year? Two are pamphlets from the bookstore, four are holiday letters and the last is a cryptic newspaper clipping from my grandma. Big shout out to my grandma for being the only person to make a college-aged male hum the “We Just Got A Letter” song from Blue’s Clues as he goes to open his mailbox.
Here’s the thing; when I finally finish humming Blue’s Clues songs and go to open my mailbox, I’m faced with a puzzle that would have caged Nic Cage in “National Treasure.” I have yet to check if the solution is hidden in the Declaration of Independence. Nothing cages Nic Cage … except for the McCullough mailbox locks.
If you have ever had to get mail out of your mailbox, you know what the problem is. Never had a problem opening your mailbox? Congratulations, you’re a master lock picker. I am convinced that opening a Middlebury mailbox in one try is a miracle almost as great as breakfast for dinner.
It should be a straightforward affair. All you have to do is twist a knob to three numbers, turn the knob one more time, and pull the door to you. It just never goes that easily.
The mailboxes can smell fear. You double-check your mailbox combination because despite being a college-aged student able to remember obscure details about the mitochondria (the powerhouse of the cell!), you can’t for the life of you remember three one or two digit numbers. You then double-check the instructions so there is no way you turn the knob the wrong way.
Finally, you muster up the courage to make your attempt. After turning the antagonist wheel with a precision you last used entering your CRNs in Bannerweb, you pull the door only to be met with a thunk.
Convinced that everyone in the mailroom is watching you, you feel like a miserable failure. That’s what the mailbox wants. Maybe it’s the fact that the locks spin in the opposite direction of normal locks, or maybe it’s that finicky last turn at the end, but in any case, these locks are legitimately the worst.
I am utterly convinced that switching out the mailbox locks would decrease student embarrassment numbers by at least 37 percent. This is clearly a switch that needs to be made. It’s time for you to stop feeling like a failure and start feeling like Nic Cage.
How are the mailbox locks still a thing?
(11/18/15 7:24pm)
White is black and black is white and everything becomes grey. No, this isn’t a riddle; this is just a description of many of my laundry experiences here at the College. I will admit that I’m pretty awful at doing laundry, but it must also be acknowledged that the laundry system here is just a tick better than unbearable. How is the current system still a thing?
First off, why isn’t laundry just free? Yes, I know this has as much a chance of happening as my wish for the remote control from Click (perhaps the crowning achievement of Adam Sandler’s never-ending quest to create the world’s most mediocre comedies).
Over my three years at the College, I have come to despise the name of our laundry provider, Mac-Gray. Mac-Gray is basically the world’s least intimidating, but most frustrating villain. They won’t ruin your life but they might lock up your clothes in the washer for a couple of hours. Why? Because Mac-Gray feels like it, that’s why. They should seriously consider changing their slogan from “Mac-Gray: Intelligent Laundry Systems” to “Mac-Gray: The World Leader in Minor Inconveniences.”
Let’s say you finally decide to stop competing to see how long you can make dirty clothes seem clean (I know you made it three weeks last time and want to get all the way to four, but trust me, you really shouldn’t wear that pair of socks again; I’m pretty sure they have new forms of life growing on them). You throw all of your clothes into a hamper and begin your once-a-month full body workout: hauling that hamper to the laundry.
You walk past each and every machine, gradually losing all hope as every one so far has been taken. Rounding the corner, a ray of hope appears in the form of an open door. Out of breath after hustling to get to the washer first, your soul is crushed. The washing machine is as broken as your dreams.
It seems like half of the machines are broken at all times, each broken machine laughing in your face with the strangely capitalized message, “ouT oF ordEr.” After waiting around like a vulture for what seems like ages a machine is finally available, you swoop in, stuffing every color of your clothes into the same washer because at this point you really couldn’t care less if everything becomes tie-dye.
You go to start your machine only to find out that you’re fifteen cents short. You walk over to the card machine to refill, but only have one dollar bills. Guess what? Our card machines only take fives and up. Why? Because Mac-Gray’s only goal in life is to make you miserable.
After racing back to your room to grab that crumpled up ten-dollar bill in your desk, you finally manage to start your laundry. By the time you finish, it will have been three hours. You didn’t have anything better to do with your afternoon, now did you?
After doing laundry here it makes a little more sense why we have not one, but two competing laundry service businesses. In closing, I ask, how is our current laundry system still a thing?
(11/12/15 12:20am)
Someone needs to invite the producers of “Hoarders” to this campus. The hoarders? Us. What we hoard? Dining hall dishes. Good luck in pinpointing which student has the most extensive collection, some of which are impressive, to say the least. Many students own a complete set of dishes from every dining hall, including the more obscure items like serving platters and soup ladles. Some true Middlebury hoarders also have sets of both Proctor’s old (think abnormally round bowls and exceptionally oval plates with China-like designs) and new dishes.
Yes, it is time to address this campus’s deep and never-ending love for industrial grade melamine dishware. How are we still not bringing dishes back? How are personal dining hall dish collections still a thing?
(Side note: I feel like I’ve basically become the official campus complainer and nitpicker. I swear I actually love it here. So much that I’m honestly running out of things to complain about.)
But anyway, back to complaining. While the purchase of new Proctor dishes did much to alleviate the great Proctor bowl shortage of 2015 (and 2014, and 2013 … ), the days of dish shortages are not over.
Seriously, how many times have you gone to get your third bowl of ice cream salad (apparently salads are healthy, so I’ve started to add the word ‘salad’ to everything I eat) of the day only to find out that Proc is out of bowls? Talk about a buzzkill. One moment you’re psyching yourself up for your upcoming recreation of Holes featuring an ice cream scoop and the half-empty bin of coffee heath bar crunch, and the next moment you’re disillusioned with the world and seriously considering transferring to some horrible place like Williams because you hear they have bowls.
But here’s the thing: the dish shortage is our fault. Using extensive research and my trusty abacus, I have calculated that the average Middlebury student has 1 mug, 1 glass, 2 bowls, 1 plate, 1 spoon, 3 forks and 1 knife in their room at a time.
I’m as big a fan of the Ross “Pizza-To-Go” strategy as anyone and fully get why you’d take dishes from the dining hall. Like any aspiring competitive eater, I realize that the secret to success is perseverance; the need to eat a disgusting amount of food can strike at any time, especially at the inconvenient 8:01 P.M. Taking a dish or two back to your room from dinner and then bringing them back in the next day is totally fine.
The problem arises when those plates start adding up in your room to the point where you have enough mediocre college-grade dishware to create a crusty shrine to your mediocre college GPA. Why do you have a set of dishes for a family of four in your single when the dining halls for the masses have nowhere near enough? I know you’ve started to form a real attachment to that one yellow bowl in particular, but even in high school I learned that “Nothing gold can stay.” We’re all clearly amazing at taking dishes to our room, but why can’t we be good at returning them? How hard can it be?
Seriously, how is dish hoarding still a thing? Let’s start taking things back so that we’re never forced to use a spoon as a fork again.
(11/04/15 7:25pm)
Amazingly, it’s almost time for registration, and that can mean only one thing: you are going to have to use BannerWeb. I make fun of BannerWeb a lot, I’ll admit it, but this week it’s the star of the show. Seriously, BannerWeb is just the worst for so many reasons. How is it still a thing?
Let’s start with its general design and layout. Think of the BannerWeb design as a throwback to the simpler times of the Internet. It looks so dated that I half expect Clippy the paperclip to pop up on my screen at any moment. All BannerWeb really wishes is that Windows 95 was still the dominant operating system. They were made for each other.
The problem is that BannerWeb doesn’t just look like a late 90’s program, it functions like one too. Nothing is more frustrating than trying to navigate BannerWeb when you need something. Have to pull up your transcript? You better make sure you know how to get there. Picking housing for room draw? Good luck. Enter one of the approximately 1,000 numbers wrong and you have to do it again.
But the true centerpiece of BannerWeb’s world-beating incompetence lies in registration. Rather than just having us enter our preferences well beforehand like most schools, we are allowed the rare pleasure of getting to try and enter our classes in real time. And, because it wouldn’t be any fun if there weren’t a challenge, the course entry names follow no rational pattern. Instead, you get to enter a series of totally random numbers!
Did I mention that if you just so happened to enter one of those random five-digit numbers incorrectly the first time you have to reenter it, at which point there’s a good chance that the class is already filled? Oh, and in case it wasn’t implied, you’re competing against all of your classmates at the exact same time. That’s right, classes are awarded based on how quickly and accurately you can type. Pro tip: break out your middle school copy of Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing 2003 for a competitive advantage.
If your internet crashes your hopes of getting into that class that you really want to take with five seats left drops to your chances of getting on the NESCAC snap story as a Middlebury student that’s not in an a capella group (seriously who runs that thing?). Luckily for you, the internet never crashes here.
To further ensure an enjoyable registration experience, there’s a 44 percent chance that BannerWeb will crash on you at random. You would think that a stable program backed by servers that can handle several hundred entries at once would be a prerequisite for a campus registration program. But no, here at Middlebury College we’re all about putting excitement into registration.
Let us not forget that all of this is happening at 7am. Because, of course it is.
While I’m going abroad and won’t have to deal with the joys of playing the BannerWeb roulette until next year, I’d rather not play ever again. There has got to be a better way to do this. Seriously, how is BannerWeb still a thing?
(10/21/15 4:02pm)
It has been 285 days since the College unveiled its new logo. Each and every one of those days could have been just a tad bit better if the new logo never existed.
That’s 6,840 hours with a logo that looks like the College proudly unified with DeVry University to create one comprehensive institution. I look forward to our inevitable rebranding to MiddVry University and the opening up of student enrollment to the acclaimed DeVry School of Small Business Management and Entrepreneurship Specialization.
Seriously, our new logo sucks. Yes, I know we complained about it plenty last year, but I did not write this column last year and it still fits the theme, as the logo is still a thing when it should very much not be.
If you haven’t yet watched the release video for the new logo, I highly recommend you do. The background music sounds exactly like the music you’d imagine an accounting firm would play in the background of its recruiting video. Look at us! Our employees are happy and the job totally isn’t boring! We’re lying through our teeth! Those are paid actors! Accounting!
On top of the accounting background music, the logo video does an incredible job at blatantly avoiding explaining why the College decided that emojis were probably the best things to include in the logo. Nothing says “esteemed global institute of higher learning” like a globe emoji and a book emoji, right guys? Guys?
Also let us not forget that the video tells us for a solid three quarters of its duration just how exciting it is that all of our institutions now have the same identifying logo and that this is a BIG DEAL.
And then the last quarter of the video arrives. PUMP FAKE. We actually have two logos! That’s right; Monterey has a different logo to embrace its “independent history and West Coast location.” So apparently we don’t have a comprehensive logo for everything … I’m just as confused as you are.
Here’s the thing: I fully get the desire to have one logo for all of the College’s entities. The problem is how the logo came into being. The logo release video proudly tells you that the logo went through screening after screening from a wide variety of people and then edit after edit until everyone was happy. The whole point of the logo is to apparently include as much as possible about what the College has to offer. The College shouldn’t have to do that.
We are not a for-profit institution functioning as a corporate entity attempting to brand our way into relevance. We are a 215-year-old, highly respected institution of higher learning. By putting the logo through focus group after focus group, we’ve been left with something that can only offend someone with its mediocrity.
Rather than representing a unique institution “that is more than the sum of its parts,” as the video proudly declares, the logo actually feels less than Midd. We can do better. Let’s get rid of the emojis and the focus groups and try again.
(10/14/15 6:36pm)
“Are you doing points?”
“Yes,” I robotically rattle off my ID number. Sick! I just got Panther Points!
Wait … I’ve been here over two years and I still honestly have no clue what my Panther Points are good for. This isn’t necessarily a case of “how are they still a thing” so much as it is a case of “what are these things?” A little bit of research on the Bookstore’s amazing website (which barely lost out to BannerWeb for the best web design of 1997) reveals that for every dollar you spend at the Bookstore, you get one panther point. Cool. Further research reveals that certain numbers of points grant you different gift cards with exciting names like bronze, silver, gold, platinum and platinum+. Because nothing says, “Momma, I’ve made it”quite like a platinum+ card to the Middlebury Bookstore. Now what the conversion rate is of points to gift cards to actual monetary value is well beyond me. This conversion is nowhere to be found. I think I remember rumblings that a thousand points can get you a fifty-dollar gift card. That’s a whopping value of five percent back of your total purchases!
As much as I look forward to the day I’m told I have enough points to get one of those fine gift cards, I feel like there’s probably some ways to make this whole rewards program work better. Just spit-balling here, but maybe, for starters, tell people how much those points are actually worth. Or just lower storewide prices by five percent. I honestly feel like that might do a lot for both customer satisfaction and bookstore sales. Let’s face it, the bookstore prices are really high, but seeing that $300 textbook listed at $285 might just make it so more people decide to purchase it on campus rather than outsourcing to Amazon.
But these options all pale in comparison to this potential Middlebury rewards program: Dr. Panther Points.
Dr. Panther Points gives the people what they want -- Dr. Feelgoods. If we’re going to actually have a rewards program on campus, why isn’t it campus-wide? Realistically, students shop at the bookstore probably twice a semester, but include the Grille, MiddExpress and Crossroads and there’s a legitimate amount of on-campus commerce on a weekly basis. Seriously, if I knew that I could get a “free” Dr. Feelgood for every $100 I spent on campus, you know I’d be heading to MiddExpress for my weekly box of Lucky Charms, rather than driving to Hannaford’s.
This week I’m asking, “How is this not a thing?”
Let’s celebrate the inauguration of a new college president with the inauguration of a new college rewards program. This can be a momentous moment for the Middlebury community. A future where you can turn purchased books into chicken tenders stuffed inside of a grilled cheese is a future I want to be a part of. Let’s make this happen.
(10/07/15 9:32pm)
Dear Ross,
You are not a five star restaurant. It’s okay; we know and love you just the way you are. You don’t need to disguise the real you. Be free. There’s no need to hide behind fancy names or complicated ingredient lists.
Let the real Ross shine: fry all the things, make pizzas best described as cheese or meat, serve vegetables with a description that stops at the vegetable’s name, have breakfast for dinner every week, and keep playing those 1970’s Ross jams (“Pour Some Sugar On Me” by Def Leppard at breakfast? Why the hell not?). If you feel like the social pressure is just too much, and you need to continue putting random adjectives in front of food names and throwing wild card ingredients into one dish a day, that’s okay. I get it. Just please stop calling the smoothie served at dinner “chilled strawberry soup.” Don’t do it for me, do it for you. You’re better than that silly name, Ross.
Sincerely,
Concerned Ross Diner
Seriously, chilled strawberry soup, how is it still a thing? Every once in a while you’ll be checking out the soup selection at Ross and you’ll think to yourself, “geez, that tomato soup looks awfully pink.” You investigate the sign and realize that this mystery pink liquid in a bucket is not tomato soup made with elusive pink heirloom tomatoes, nor is it that industrial sized vat of Pepto Bismol you always wished Ross had on fish fry night. Nope. It’s supposedly “chilled strawberry soup.” Ross is lying to you; this is a strawberry smoothie. I’m on to you, Ross!
Here’s the thing: marketing a smoothie this way seems pretty counterproductive. I think I’ve seen one person actually pour this “soup” into a bowl … it must have been a mistake. If you’ve ever actually had it as a soup, I would love to hear your thoughts on the subtle taste differences of eating a smoothie with a spoon rather than drinking it. It seems a little wasteful to me because the smoothies in the morning always seem to be popular. I know, I know, smoothies aren’t supposed to be a dinner thing. But why not? Take that big vat of smoothie soup and stick it where the smoothies usually are. Get rid of the “oup” in the name and replace it with “moothie.” Stick some cups next to it, and watch it go.
Let’s start a smoothie revolution or some ridiculous marketing term like that. An independent and totally legitimate research team hired by me has revealed that changing the name of chilled strawberry soup to chilled strawberry smoothie would cause a 237% increase in consumption with only a 29% increase in letters used. The research team also discovered that changing the location of the smoothie would cause an additional 14% increase in consumption. You can’t argue with those statistics, people.
In closing, I ask: chilled strawberry soup, how is it still a thing?
(09/30/15 8:59pm)
It’s Sunday and you decide that you’ve probably watched one too many episodes of Netflix and need to get some actual work done. If you stay in your room you’ll inevitably just end up succumbing to temptation, cracking open that bag of popcorn that you’ve been staring down all day and ripping through seasons three to six of some show. You keep telling yourself that you’re an adult that makes big-person decisions; however, you decide that today is not that day.
Today, you’re actually going to do work. You throw everything into your bag, text the other members of your group project, and head to the library. All of that Netflix did a number on your workload, so you really need to get this project done. A study room is just what you need. You walk by the first one: the table is covered in papers and books, but there’s no one in there and the light is off.
Ok, maybe that one is taken.
You walk by the second one: there’s one person sitting in there, and when you peer in you make eye contact and lock stares for just a fraction too long. You regret everything and move on. All of the next ones are variations on the same thing. Only one of them actually has more than one person inside.
If you are one of the aforementioned study room hoggers, congratulations, you’re the subject of my column this week. In short, please stop. I ask, people hogging an entire study room, how is it still a thing?
Here’s the deal, they’re called group study rooms for a reason. The rooms make it so no one has to hear the lovely discordant sound of your hastily thrown together economics group project getting passive aggressive. If you’re doing a group project, by all means, take a study room. Every other person in the library should not be subjected to your fierce debate about which Powerpoint theme to use. (Pro tip: hit up Visiting Assistant Professor of Geology Tom Manley if you want to learn the art of including as many transitions as possible in your Powerpoint presentations. You never thought that your slides needed sound transitions, but they do.)
Things get trickier when you’re solo. If you just want a quiet removed room to study in, I get it. Go ahead and work in a study room, just please don’t try and make it look like you need the entire room by spreading half of your life’s positions over the table and on the chairs. This is essentially the college student equivalent of a male dog peeing on everything to mark its turf. You are not a male dog; please don’t spread your stuff all over or pee on the table. If someone looks into the room, don’t give them the Clint Eastwood Gran Torino, “get off my lawn,” death stare that you’ve been practicing.
Let’s just all be decent human beings about this. Let someone that you might not know enter your study room dojo. It’ll be fine; I promise. Thanks. People hogging entire study rooms, how is it still a thing?
(09/24/15 12:34am)
Let’s talk about Battell bathtubs. Seriously. How, how, how are they still a thing? There are currently eleven bathtubs in Battell. Eleven! That’s more than most old people homes, which average 5.7 bathtubs per building. College records show that the last person to have bathed in one of these godforsaken bowls of plague bacteria (composed of 50 percent stale beer, 42 percent broken dreams, and 8 percent actual infectious diseases) was a member of the class of 1954, who did it after losing a bet over whether or not Atwater would ‘throw down’ that night. It didn’t, mostly because it didn’t exist – the loud thumping of a Ke$ha remix was but the faint, questionable whisper of the future. I’m pretty sure bathing in one of the bathtubs would come with one of those super long medical warnings that rambles on and then tells you to see their two page spread in Golf Magazine, where there are even more medical warnings. WARNING: possible side effects of bathing in a Battell bathtub include complete loss of self-esteem, increased right armpit hair growth, memory loss, actually becoming dirtier and the sudden loss of muscle control in the feet. For more information see our ad in this week’s edition of Vineyard Vines Lifestyle Magazine.
Here’s the kicker: these things have existed as basically useless space hogs for years, and they don’t have to be. Bathtubs make pretty good showers; they just need – you know – a shower. A little bit of research revealed that it would probably cost in the region of $400 to convert a tub into a bonafide, useful shower. The bath capability needn’t even be taken away! So, by doing some simple math we can work out that it would cost the College approximately $4,400 to convert every single bathtub in Battell into a shower. To put that into perspective, that’s about 7% of a single student’s annual cost of attendance, or 0.03% of the annual cost of attendance of all of the students in Battell, or just 0.0004% of the College’s endowment. Yup. Midd, could you possibly just splurge a tad for the sake of freshman cleanliness? The entire student body would be grateful. Geez, I just did some actual reporting. I really don’t know how I feel about this.
As a former Battell resident, I actually care about this. A little bit. By all means, keep every other wonderfully dubious Battell hallmark: the sketchy basement beanbags, the sweating walls, the study room that tries its hardest to convince you that there is no joy in this world. Just please turn the bathtubs into showers. Because this is totally something that you should care about, I have started a ‘We The Midd Kids’ petition and will create a petition for every single column I write from now on. Yay for trivial things that really don’t matter! In closing: Battell bathtubs – how are they still a thing? Shout out to Laura Harris for coming up with the Battell bathtubs idea.
(09/17/15 10:38pm)
Readers, it is with great pleasure that I welcome you to another year at Middlebury College. Do I really have any grounds to do this? No, not really. You’re back, I’m back, but I’m not your professor or anything, so do you really even care? Regardless, I’d still like to welcome all five of you to my column.
Welcoming aside, why this fine publication still allows me to write is beyond me; my last column was about driving people to McDonald’s. Like anything new, this year has brought about some changes. The car column is dead, and with it, so are the McDonalds runs. Long live the car column. So, I was tasked with coming up with a new column idea. Original and creative person that I am, I decided to take someone else’s idea. After another successful summer as a professional TV watcher and amateur microwave chef, I decided to shamelessly rip-off John Oliver’s Last Week Tonight. Hey, they say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. My dad says it’s because I’m lazy. He’s wrong; I’m just efficient.
Last Week Tonight runs a recurring segment descriptively titled “How Is This Still a Thing”, during which they question topics like daylight savings time (which is seriously the worst) and the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue. Here at Midd, I often find myself asking the same question. I could be asking this question about big things such as our ever-increasing tuition, but naw, I ask this question about vegan riblets. Why? Because vegan riblets are the worst, that’s why. Proctor’s fruit and cheese quesadillas? Hogging study rooms? Lack of Proctor bowls? Bannerweb crashing? How are these still a thing? I’m all about tackling the big issues here in this column. Buckle up; this is going to be hard-hitting investigative journalism. I binge-watched The Newsroom this summer. Don’t worry, I’ve got this under control.
For example, let’s go back to my good friends, vegan riblets. I remember it like it was yesterday, one fine day two years ago, after waiting in the Ross lunch line for probably the lifetime of three generations of gnats, I got to the food. #blessed. After grabbing enough sweet potato fries to feed a family of four, I glanced at the next tray. Sweet! Ribs!
Wrong. Riblets. Through the line, I sat down to eat. Finished with the fries, I went for a huge bite of the “ribs.” At that moment I think I saw death (no exaggeration). Vegan riblets have a taste profile that can be best described as dog-foody and a texture somewhere between cardboard and foam home insulation. After just one bite I got the sense that if an atomic bomb ever hit The College all that would be left would be the Freeman International Center and the leftover vegan riblets.
My lunch was ruined. Vegan riblets are the worst. I know there are at least 37 better vegan meat alternatives, so why in the name of Ron Liebowitz are riblets still being served in the dining halls? This is an institutional tragedy. Vegan riblets, how are they still a thing?
(05/06/15 6:58pm)
Do you beliebowitz? (I shall not shorten this to belieb because this column does not associate with overgrown babies who stage instagram videos of their basketball skills.) Because I beliebowitz. For whatever reason the Mr. President of this fine institution and the inspiration behind my top-secret automotive rating system agreed to take time out of his day to drive with some sophomore hacks to McDonalds. So, with both excitement and trepidation, Karlo the Bosnian back seat tester (BBST) and I arrived at 11:20 in Old Chapel for our scheduled 11:30 to 12:00 run to McDonalds (ladies and gentlemen, I have no shame, I did indeed contact the President of the College about driving to McDs. This is going on the highlight reel folks.) Without further ado, this is Broke College Students in Cars Getting McDonalds: Driving Mr. President Edition.
The Car: 2007 Gold Automatic
Toyota Camry
Car Name: Gerald
The Owner: Ron Liebowitz
Styling: He wore a classy suit and gave off an aura of power. Truly presidential looking. In terms of the car: well… It’s a Toyota Camry; it’s the most ubiquitous vehicle in America that’s not a pickup truck. It looks like a car. Four doors? Check. Trunk? Check. But what about windows? Oh don’t worry it has those too.
Liebowitz-o-Meter: 5/5 with Ron, 2.5/5 without Ron.
Interior: Honestly I was just a little too intimidated by power to give the Camry the full interior analysis. What I can say is that it was comfortable and felt like the inside of a car. The interior color scheme of this particular Camry can only be described as the Sahara option. Seriously, everything was tan, I’m pretty sure there was an oasis in the front of the dash. No reports on the speakers because I brought my mixtape to show President Liebowitz and it immediately set the sound system on fire (sorry about that, Ron, I know a guy who can fix that for you and I’ll spot you my Papercut money.) The BBST claims that he had a spiritual experience riding in the backseat of the Liebowitzmobile.
Liebowitz-o-Meter: 5/5 with Ron, 3.5/5 without Ron.
Handling and Performance: Well, so here’s the deal; I didn’t actually drive the sacred Liebowitzmobile. What I can say is that President Liebowitz is a master of the McDs run. Seriously, he handles the roundabout like a true professional.
Liebowitz-o-Meter: 5/5 for Ron’s driving skillz, ?/5 for the actual car, but it’s a Camry, so to be totally honest, it’s probably a snoozefest (drowsy driving is no joke, everyone).
Drive-through-ability: The Camry is the best selling car in America; you’d better bet your lucky stars it’s a drive-through queen. This baby is ready to get fries stuck in all the seams of the seats. Have no shame, fearless McDonalds goer; the Camry has space for whatever non-sustainably sourced food your heart desires.
Liebowitz-o-Meter: 5/5 Rons.
The Drive: So to be totally honest, I was pretty surprised and excited that I was even able to do this. Karlo and I were originally planning on asking a bunch of ridiculous binary questions and then filming it, but then we realized we didn’t have a car mount for a camera, and then we realized on top of that that we probably didn’t want to come off as buffoons in front of the most powerful person on this campus. So we ended up just having a conversation. Seriously though, ask President Liebowitz about his travels in communist Eastern Europe and the files those governments had on him (was he a secret agent? We’ll never know) or why the Middlebury McDonald’s has no golden arches. In case you were wondering, we all got milkshakes, Karlo and I got chocolate and President Liebowitz got vanilla. Good stuff.
On another note, President Liebowitz is just very clearly a genuine guy who cares about this school. He’s an institution and we truly appreciate all that he’s done. Best of luck President Liebowitz, and thanks again for driving to McDonald’s with some random sophomores. By the way, you seem like you’re a killer dad.
Liebowitz-o-Meter: 5/5 Rons, would ride to McDonalds with President Liebowitz again.
(04/22/15 10:40pm)
Loyal readers (Hi Mom!), before diving into this week’s column, I would like to give you a heads up. This campus’s very own bastion of automotive journalism (yours truly), has been in contact with the inspiration behind my incredibly complicated reviewing system, the Liebowitz-o-Meter. That’s right, Ron might just end his illustrious career on a high note, by letting a random sophomore drive him to McDonalds. But the Liebowitzmobile is another story for another column. This week features a T-Pain recovery drive. This is Broke College Students in Cars Getting McDonalds: Buy U a McFlurry edition.
The Car: Black, Automatic Transmission, 1996 Audi A6 Quattro Wagon
Car Name: Hans
The Owner: Otto Nagengast ’17
Styling: Mmm so much Germanic wildness here. Look how big the taillights are! It’s a styling revolution! Seriously, it feels like the only thing management told the designers of this car was to “make it look competent.” This ride is more Middlebury Bach Festival than it is MCAB presents T-Pain featuring 2000 sweaty college students with short-term memory loss and a dream. In all honesty the A6’s complete lack of risk-taking has resulted in a car that still looks handsome (and competent!) almost 20 years later.
Liebowitz-o-Meter: 4.5/5 Rons
Interior: Not one for surprises, the A6 delivers more competence on the inside too. For whatever reason the interior featured a slight hint of the distinct smell of old people (for real Otto, how old are you actually?) but it was kept clean and pristine. The front seats are comfortable and supportive and everything in front of the driver is very logically laid out. Unfortunately I, the world’s only road licensed baboon, was unable to figure out how to make the stereo work; the car would have none of that silly blasting music nonsense because operating a motor vehicle is a serious endeavor (big shout out to Mr. Guetti, my driver’s ed instructor, for making me remember this important fact. I wouldn’t be where I am today without you, sir). Our Bosnian back seat tester was unavailable for this drive so we had to make do with John the Wisconsin back seat tester (WBST.) The WBST gave good reviews, complimenting the abundance of space.
Liebowitz-o-Meter: 4.5/5 Rons
Handling and Performance: Imagine that you’re on a boat and it’s going fast and you’ve got a nautical themed pashmina afghan. Yeah, that’s a bit like what driving the A6 is like. The shocks were getting old so the A6 basically slowly wallowed over bumps, making me feel like I indeed was on a boat. The steering was a bit light for a car this size, but it got the job done. There was plenty of power to get us to McDonalds in a hurry, though the A6 is no speed demon.
Liebowitz-o-Meter: 3.5/5 Rons
Drive-through-ability: It’s got automatic windows, it’s got an automatic transmission, and it’s almost at ideal drive through window height. It’s got the convenience features you need to get your totally unnecessary meal with as little hassle as possible. The A6 does, however, feature one massive drawback: it only has two cupholders in the front, and those two are only can sized and covered by the armrest. This is a problem. The cupholder design is essentially an attempt (as I see it) by Audi to force drinking habits on you, the freedom loving ‘Murican. The Constitution explicitly states that I can purchase whatever sized drink I desire, and therefore these cupholders violate my Constitutional rights as an American. Big Gulp, Big Freedom – vote Ascher 2016.
Liebowitz-o-Meter: 4/5 Rons
Final Verdict: The Audi A6 is an incredibly competent ride. It is a vehicle capable of carrying you, your beloved bag of McDonalds, and some other people comfortably. It’s not the sportiest thing you’ll ever drive and the cupholders are anti-freedom, but all in all it’s a pretty great ride.
Liebowitz-o-Meter: 4.13/5 Rons
Essential Stats:
Carrying capacity of 5 adults or 6 college students.
Trunk space for approximately 58 30-racks of Natty Ice
McDonalds order: 2 M&M McFlurries, McChicken, McDouble, large Fries.
(04/08/15 10:06pm)
“Fart” in Swedish means speed. Just thought I’d give you all the heads up on that because I’m six and because Broke College Students in Cars Getting McDonalds would like to welcome another Swedish vehicle to its illustrious list of tested cars. So, without further ado, let’s go full fart ahead into this latest review. (Ok, I swear I’m done; might as well just get it out of the way now. I restate: I’m six.)
The Car: Black, Manual Transmission, 1st Generation 2001 Saab 9-3 Hatchback
Car Name: Tha Carter VI
The Owner: Jeremy Carter
Styling: Are you an architecture major? Because if your answer is yes then you should totally drive one of these things. This is not because the 9-3 was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright or someone like that, nor because it looks like it features dynamic living spaces (is that an architecture term? Because that should totally be an architecture term.) No, it’s just because architects seem to just really dig driving Saabs. The styling itself is honestly a bit of a weird confluence of different shapes thrown together and then rounded because apparently straight lines are just not allowed. It works for the most part – especially if you’re an architecture major.
Liebowitz-o-Meter: 3.5/5 Rons
Interior: The oval is a shape. The oval is a shape that Saab designers apparently had a cult-like obsession with when they designed the interior of the 9-3. Every designer who even tried to include a squared-off part was immediately fired. Also, do you want to roll down the windows? The usual answer to this question is to just push the window switch on the door panel. The Saab designers decided that this location was just too logical, so the switches are in the middle of the center console. Why? I have no idea. The seats are great, though, and comforted me as I spiraled into the mental instability brought on by Pink Floyd’s “Brain Damage” playing for the majority of the drive. There’s not a ton of rear legroom but there’s enough space to hold you, a friend, and a medium sized deer. Pro tip: you won’t be able to get the keys out of the ignition unless you shut the car off in reverse. Again, I have no idea why this is a thing. Swedes are weird, man.
Liebowitz-o-Meter: 3.5/5 Rons
Handling and Performance: This Swedish rounded wedge of weirdness drives pretty well. It has good, nicely weighted steering and acceleration quicker than your power walk when you try to beat the 12:15 p.m. rush on burger day. A rare beast in this great nation of laziness, this particular 9-3 comes equipped with a manual transmission. (OMG what’s that other pedal do?!) The manual is easy and the shifter has nice, medium length throws. The clutch is a little bit vague with longer than usual travel, but it’s easy to get used to and it gets the job done.
Liebowitz-o-Meter: 4.5/5 Rons
Drive-through-ability: “A manual transmission does not a great drive-through vehicle make.” – Ronald McDonald. If you’re looking for minimal effort in the drive through, pay attention to Mr. McDonald’s wise words. When there’s a long line, you’re going to have to work that clutch. On a positive note, you’ll get a killer left calf workout. While the switches are strangely placed, the windows are powered, a necessity. A big deal breaker for the 9-3 is its lack of cup holders. Seriously, when are those Europeans going to realize that there needs to be at least 2 cup holders to every passenger?
Liebowitz-o-Meter: 3/5 Rons
Final Verdict: The Saab 9-3 is the perfect vehicle for the budding architect in you. While not the ideal McDonalds chariot thanks to certain design choices, it’s fun to drive and pretty practical (see, you’re getting solid consumer advice in this column!). As long as you’re down to deal with an interior designed by an oval-obsessed madman, you could do a lot worse.
Liebowitz-o-Meter: 3.62/5 Rons
Essential Stats: Carrying capacity of 4 adults or 5 college students. Approximate 24 mpg average. Trunk space for approximately 28 30-racks of Natty Ice.
McDonalds order: Bacon Clubhouse sandwich, medium fry, medium Coke.
(03/12/15 12:00am)
Ladies and Gentleman, fret not, the Campus’s greatest car column is back (yes, I know you don’t care, but I care, so show some respect). I assure you that I used my time off wisely. Over the course of J-Term, I dedicated myself to the grueling and complicated task of figuring out the conversion of the Liebowitz-o-Meter to the Patton-o-Meter due to the upcoming presidential switch. Currently, by my calculations, the conversion from Rons to Lauries is roughly 2.45 to 1, but I will have a definite final calculation by the end of the semester. Anyway, it’s time to get back to it with the next edition of Broke College Students in Cars Getting McDonalds.
The Car: Grey, Automatic Transmission, 3rd Generation Audi A4 Wagon
Car Name: Kurt
The Owner: John “from Wisconsin” Geilfuss ’17
Styling: “Real wagons have curves” is the slogan of this Teutonic beast. It’s like your standard boxy wagon, but … curvier. It looks a bit like a bar of chocolate that you’ve held just a bit too long in your hand as you debate with yourself whether or not to eat it (spoiler alert: you’re going to eat it, your self-control sucks). It’s an all around good-looking wagon. Personally, I think that the headlights and taillights are a little bit droopy looking, like they’re trying desperately to stay awake after a rough night in Bi-Hall but it just isn’t working too well. It looks solid though with nice strong character lines on either side. Bonus points because it’s a wagon.
Liebowitz-o-Meter: 4.5/5 Rons
Interior: Let’s just say that John Geilfuss thinks of a car’s floor as a storage zone for empty seltzer cans. The floor of this German beast holds perhaps the country’s greatest mobile collection of 20th-century seltzer cans, covering a whole range of years and flavors! (Seriously John, clean up your car!) Other than that, the front seats are super comfortable and supportive. The steering wheel feels nicely weighted and is at least 100x more confidence inspiring than Atwater tongs in your hands, which, considering that it’s designed to drive a car rather than pick up chicken Caesar salad, is a good thing. Our official Bosnian back seat tester (BBST for short,) Karlo Škarica ’17, gave mixed reviews. The BBST cited a lack of behind padding as a flaw of the A4’s back seat. The stereo played the only CD available, Lupe Fiasco’s Food and Liquor, very well.
Liebowitz-o-Meter: 3/5 Rons because of the can collection, 4.5/5 Rons without
Handling and Performance: TURRRRBOOOOO. It honestly surprised me when I first touched the gas; this Audi is powerful. After ripping up the Ridgeline lot we screamed out at a totally reasonable and safe 25 miles per hour. The Audi drives really well with nice solid steering feel and plenty of power. The brakes are a bit touchy, but it stops well. The engine does have some turbo lag, but once it gets spooled up there’s plenty of power for whatever you would possibly need to do.
Liebowitz-o-Meter: 5/5 Rons
Drive-through-ability: Truth be told, we were in a formal mood today and all had on our best polar fleeces, so we opted for the McDonalds dine-in experience. Have no fear though; the A4 has every sign of a true drive-through beast. It’s got automatic power windows, there are plenty of cupholders for your extra large diet Coke (I totally get that you’re watching your calories), and the window lines up almost perfectly with the drive through window. Unfortunately, the center armrest does not feature a dedicated McNugget pocket.
Liebowitz-o-Meter: 4.5/5 Rons
Final Verdict: Kurt the Audi A4 Wagon absolutely crushed Middlebury’s most grueling automotive test. Kurt handled exceptionally well with plenty of power and great steering. The Audi has ample space for even the vastest of empty seltzer can collections, and the front seats are great, even if the BBST felt the back seats left something to be desired. All-in-all Kurt is just a really solid McDonalds chariot.
Liebowitz-o-Meter: 4.75/5 Rons
(03/05/15 1:04am)
The Middlebury men’s hockey team’s season ended this past Saturday, Feb. 28 in the NESCAC quarterfinals. The seventh-seeded Panthers were shut out on the road by second-seeded Amherst 3-0.
After they were shut out by Amherst 4-0 the week before, Middlebury came out strong and dictated play for much of the first period. The Panthers outshot the Jeffs 11-2 in the opening frame, but were unable to get anything past the Amherst goaltender, who at one point in the period made six rapid fire saves on quality Middlebury stuff-in attempts to keep the game scoreless.
Despite the dominant period, Middlebury was unable to get on the board and the score remained 0-0 going into the first intermission.
The second period provided a drastic change in momentum. Amherst took control of the period and scored 15:56 in when one of their forwards managed to find the puck in a scrum in front of the Middlebury goal and got it past Middlebury goaltender Mike Peters ’15. Peters stood strong for the remainder of the second and kept Middlebury in the game despite some heavy Amherst pressure.
After the second intermission Amherst found the back of the net once again. 5:34 into the third period, a minute after Peters stopped an Amherst 2-1, the Jeffs went up 2-0 on a well-placed shot. Despite going on the power play twice in a row, Middlebury was unable to find the back of the net due to some solid Amherst goaltending. Middlebury pulled Peters for the extra attacker with two minutes remaining but were unable to capitalize and Amherst sealed the victory with an empty net goal with a second remaining in the game.
Middlebury outshot Amherst 28-25 in the loss and goaltender Peters made 22 saves on 24 shots faced.
With the defeat on Saturday the Panthers’ quest for the NESCAC title, and consequently their season, ended. The team finished with an overall record of 10-12-3, with a 6-4-2 home record, a 3-7-1 away record, and a 1-1 record on neutral ice. They finish seventh in the NESCAC with a 7-8-3 conference record.
Middlebury’s offense finished the season ninth in the NESCAC, averaging 2.16 goals per game while the defense finished fifth, allowing an average 2.52 goals per contest. Both the power play and the penalty kill finished mid-table, with the team scoring at a 21.8 percent clip with the man-advantage – good for fifth in the NESCAC, and killing off 83 percent of opponents’ power plays – good for fourth in the NESCAC.
Jake Charles ’16, Middlebury’s top point-scorer, finished 20th in the NESCAC scoring race with 20 points in 24 games. Despite the relatively underwhelming season, the team’s future is bright.
While it is always tough to replace the departing Seniors, this year the team will only lose three players. There are 10 juniors currently on the team and five of the team’s top six scorers are juniors, giving the team a strong senior class next year. The team’s core should only continue to get stronger as the underclassmen continue to develop.
(02/25/15 3:03pm)
The Middlebury men’s hockey team finished the regular season by going .500 in back-to-back away NESCAC games. The Panthers were shut out by 10th-ranked Amherst 4-0 on Friday, Feb 20 and then turned around to beat Hamilton 3-1. Middlebury’s final regular season record sits at 10-11-3 and 7-8-3 in the NESCAC, putting them in the seventh seed for the NESCAC playoffs.
The Panthers drew a tough matchup for the first game of the crucial final regular-season weekend as they were tasked with playing the Lord Jeffs on the road.
Amherst scored the first goal of the game 9:32 in and did not look back. Amherst’s goalie made several incredible saves to keep the Panthers off of the scoreboard. It was 2-0 Amherst at the end of the second as the Jeffs got another puck past Middlebury goaltender Stephen Klein ’18. One minute into the third Amherst struck again, prompting Middlebury Head Coach Bill Beaney to pull Klein in favor of Mike Peters ’15.
Despite some good pressure in the third, Middlebury was unable to get on the scoreboard while Amherst notched one more goal to make it a 4-0 final score. Middlebury was unable to convert on five power play opportunities in the game and were outshot 28 to 25.
After the difficult loss to Amherst the Panthers traveled to Clinton, NY for a 3:00 p.m. faceoff against Hamilton on Saturday. The game against Hamilton started off much better for Middlebury. The Panthers were able to put on sustained pressure in the Hamilton zone and finally broke through on the power play 13:20 into the first period. After the Hamilton goaltender stopped a long shot from Terrance Goguen ’16, Brendan McGovern ’16 managed to scoop up the rebound and slip it inside the near post. The goal was the first Middlebury goal of the weekend and the start of a very good night for McGovern.
Hamilton equalized 6:10 into the second period as they got a shot past Middlebury goaltender Liam Moorfield-Yee ’16. Middlebury continued to press after the Hamilton equalizer and were rewarded with two McGovern goals in a two-minute span. McGovern hounded the slot area and was rewarded when he picked up rebounds off of Evan Neugold ’16 and Jake Charles ’16 shots and put both away, one at the 11:23 mark of the second and the next at the 13:13 mark to complete the hat trick and double his season goal total.
16:13 into the second a bit of a tussle occurred as both Cameron Romoff ’17 and a Hamilton player were sent off with game misconducts for facemasking. The Middlebury penalty kill was strong all game as they killed off all six Hamilton power plays. The Panthers were able to hold on for the 3-1 win as Moorfield-Yee picked up his second win of the season despite having to be replaced by Peters a little more than halfway through the second period.
With their final regular season record of 10-11-3, the Panthers have secured the seventh seed in the NESCAC playoffs. Middlebury now faces the tough task of playing the same Amherst team that just beat them 4-0, this time in an away quarterfinal matchup on Saturday, Feb. 28.
McGovern commented on the team’s prospects in the Amherst game.
“We need to go over the video from [this past weekend’s] game,” McGovern said. “This will definitely bring to light some of the issues we had. I’m sure we’ll see a lot of uncharacteristically bad plays. We need to play a smarter game with more energy. Fortunately, we have a week to correct those issues.”
(02/19/15 12:30am)
The Middlebury men’s hockey team went .500 in a pivotal rivalry home-and-home against Williams this past weekend, picking up the victory at home on Friday, Feb. 13, 2-0 before losing on the road 5-4 on Saturday, Feb. 14.
The Panthers started off the weekend on a positive note. Coming off a 3-0 shutout win over Wesleyan the weekend before, Middlebury prepared to square off against the 12th-ranked Williams College Ephs. Following an early Williams’ opportunity that was denied by Middlebury goaltender Stephen Klein ’18, the Panthers took control of the period. Less than two minutes after the Williams opportunity, the Panthers were on the board. At 5:57 into the first period Evan Neugold ’16 fired a shot from the crease that was denied, but stuck with the play and slipped in the rebound for his seventh goal of the season. Just 30 seconds into the second period it looked as if Williams would tie the game as a shot dribbled past Klein, but a rapid reaction from Panther defender Terrance Goguen ’16 cleared the puck off the goal line and kept Williams off of the scoreboard. Three minutes later and the Panthers struck again with another goal off of a rebound 4:21 into the second. After Mike Najjar’s ’17 initial shot was saved, Ronald Fishman ’16 picked up the rebound in the slot and put it away. Fishman’s goal was the end of the scoring for the game as both teams clamped down and both goalies came up with some incredible saves. Middlebury managed to end their home season on a good note as they won 2-0 and outshot the Ephs 39 to 22. Klein picked up his third shutout of the season with the victory.
The next day the Panthers looked to continue the positive momentum as they traveled to Williamstown to complete the second half of the home-and-home. It became clear after the first period that Saturday’s game would not be the low-scoring affair that Friday’s was. The Panthers took the lead 12:06 into the first period when Brendan McGovern ’16 picked up the rebound off of a Cameron Romoff ’17 shot and put it past the Williams’ goaltender for his third of the season. Four minutes later, Williams answered to make it a 1-1 game. The tie did not last long however, as the Panthers scored again at the 18:20 mark. Jake Charles ’16 found a rebound in front of the Williams net and backhanded it in to give the Panthers the 2-1 lead going into the second. Six minutes and 24 seconds into the second period Neugold increased the Middlebury lead to two. Neugold managed to get around both Williams defensemen and then shot it in glove side for a pretty goal. Unfortunately, Middlebury was unable to hold the lead in the high scoring second period and after forty minutes of play the game was tied 3-3. Charles struck once again for his team-leading 10th goal of the season 2:31 into the third. While on the power play Charles deflected a Romoff shot from the point past the Williams goaltender to give Middlebury the 4-3 lead. The lead would not hold, however, as Williams managed to get two more pucks past Klein to give them the 5-4 lead with only 3:48 remaining in the third period. The Panthers went on the power play at the 17:18 mark but were unable to convert and the Ephs picked up the 5-4 victory. Middlebury outshot Williams 39-25 in the loss.
This coming weekend marks the final two regular season games for the Panthers as they jostle for position in the playoff bracket. Currently sitting just under .500 at 9-10-3 overall and 6-7-3 in the NESCAC, the Panthers will look to end the season with a winning record and victories in two key NESCAC away games. The Panthers will square off against Amherst on Friday, Feb. 20 and then play Hamilton Saturday, Feb. 21. While Middlebury has already secured a NESCAC playoff berth, the Panthers have an opportunity to improve their seeding with a good showing this weekend.
(02/11/15 10:26pm)
The Middlebury men’s hockey team have had a tough past two weeks that ended in a milestone achievement. The Panthers lost to Tufts 2-1 and were shut out by Connecticut College 3-0 in two away games on Jan. 30 and 31 before returning to Kenyon Arena the next week and losing to fourth-ranked Trinity in overtime 2-1 and then beating Wesleyan 3-0 for Head Coach Bill Beaney’s 600th career victory.
Bowdoin took the 1-0 lead just 15 seconds into the game when a Bowdoin pass took a weird bounce off of a Middlebury defender and landed right on the stick of a Bowdoin forward, who managed to snap a shot past Stephen Klein ’18. Middlebury answered just over two minutes later on the power play when Evan Neugold ’16 picked up his third of the season. After the quick flurry of goals to start the game the two teams locked down as the game evolved into a defensive showcase. Middlebury had a couple of stellar chances in the second but were unable to put any past the Bowdoin goaltender.
The Panthers were able to take the 2-1 lead early in the third period when Mike Najjar ’17 put home the rebound from a shot from Cameron Romoff ’17. Middlebury was then granted an opportunity to put the game away when a Bowdoin player boarded a Panther resulting in a five-minute boarding major and a game-misconduct 11:49 into the third. It seemed as if Middlebury had cashed in on the extended power play when it appeared as if Mark McLellan ’18 was able to put in a rebound off a David Belluche ’18 shot from the point, the red light went off and the fans cheered, but the ref made a controversial no-goal call, claiming that the puck had never completely crossed the line. Bowdoin was then able to equalize with 1:22 left in the third when they pulled their goalie for an extra attacker.
The game then went to overtime where, despite having an early power play, the Panthers were unable to pot the game winner, ending the game as a 2-2 tie. Middlebury outshot Bowdoin 36-19 in the contest.
After their frustrating tie to Bowdoin the day before Middlebury had to quickly turn around and face off against Colby in an afternoon game in Kenyon Arena.
After a closely contested first period Middlebury was able to take the lead on a goal from Neugold. After two successive Middlebury penalties just under halfway through the second Colby was able to cash in on a five on three power play to tie it up. Five minutes later Middlebury responded with a power play goal of their own. After setting up in the offensive zone Middlebury cycled the puck around before Romoff found an opening and shot it into the top left corner of the Colby net. Once again, Colby was able to equalize as they managed to put a wrap-around past Klein 1:17 into the third period. The back-and-forth game continued as Middlebury took the lead on the power play 12:09 into the third. Charles tipped in a Max Greenwald ’16 shot for his team pacing seventh goal of the year.
The Panthers were once again unable to hold on to the lead as Colby equalized with 1:58 left in the third, forcing a second game in a row into overtime. This time, however, the Panthers were able to convert. 59 seconds into the five-minute overtime period Charles scooped up the rebound from a Brendan McGovern ’16 shot and put the game away with a quick shot into the back of the Colby net. Klein stopped 19 of 22 Colby shots in the win as Middlebury outshot the Mules 35 to 22. Middlebury started off the February break away at Tufts. By the midway point of the game Tufts managed to squeak the puck by Middlebury goaltender Liam Moorfield-Yee ’16 twice, putting the Panthers into a two-goal deficit. Middlebury got on the board just four minutes after the second Tufts goal when captain Derek Pimentel ’15 put home the rebound off a Zach Haggerty ’16 shot. Despite continued pressure for the remainder of the game, the Panthers were unable to get any more pucks past the Tufts goaltender. Middlebury outshot Tufts 32-22 in the 2-1 loss.
The next away game, a day later, did not go any better for the Panthers. After the tough loss to Tufts, Middlebury faced off against Connecticut College. After a closely contested first period during which the Middlebury penalty kill stood on its head, Connecticut College got one by Middlebury goaltender Klein with 1:32 remaining in the first. From then on the Camels dominated the game and Middlebury ended up losing 3-0 as they were outshot 35-16.
After the tough weekend, Middlebury had to regroup as they prepared to host the fourth-ranked Trinity Bantams. After a closely contested first period it was 1-0 Trinity as the Bantams managed to get one by Middlebury goalie Klein with 50 seconds remaining. The second period featured plenty of excitement but no change in the scoreline.Both teams’ goaltenders made key stops, with Trinity getting a little help from their left post as McGovern’s shot made it past the goalie but hit iron and bounced away.
The Panthers went into the third looking to equalize. Middlebury poured on the pressure, playing the majority of the period in Trinity’s defensive zone. After a number of good chances, including another shot which rang off the pipe, Middlebury was able to equalize with their goaltender pulled and just 14 seconds remaining in the period. Neugold collected the rebound off a Ronald Fishman ’16 blast from the point, skated around the goal, and stuffed home the wraparound to tie the game at 1-1. However Trinity was able to come away with the victory as they scored just 47 seconds into the sudden death overtime period. Middlebury outshot Trinity 34-15 in the contest.
Middlebury was finally able to get a win in their next game. Hosting Wesleyan, the Panthers put pressure on early, with the hard work finally paying off 16:35 into the first period. Neugold picked up the rebound off a Greg Conrad ’17 drive to the net and shot it top shelf for his sixth of the season. Middlebury then doubled their lead on the power play 2:22 into the second period when Pimentel scored off the rebound from a Romoff shot from the point. Continuing to dominate play, the Panthers took a dominant 3-0 lead 14 minutes later. Fishman skated into the slot and then dropped the puck back to Najjar who made no mistake in rifling it home. Middlebury outshot Wesleyan 37-13 and Klein picked up his second shutout of the year.
Overshadowing all other achievements from the game, however, was what the victory represented for Beaney. Now in his 35th season as a head coach and his 28th year leading the Panthers, Beaney picked up his 600th career victory, making him the 12th coach in NCAA history to reach the milestone as well as the NCAA leader in Division-III victories.
The Panthers are now gearing up for the final stretch. This Friday, Feb. 13 marks the last home game of the season as Middlebury squares off against Williams in a pivotal home-and-home series. Middlebury completes the series away at Williams on Saturday. Puck drop for both games is at 7:00pm.