1996-1997 Hodags
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With a full returning team from 1996 semifinals, and with the addition of Grady Hannah from Maclackluster as well as some other new talent, the Hodags of 1997 looked to be the team to beat. However, as common with "top heavy" teams, they failed to gel to the degree that they had the year before. Ben Jamin suffered a critical injury late in the season in a way which once again proved the accuracy of the eternal rooky moniker. Nonetheless, they were a team to be feared, evidenced by their utter destruction of CUT at Sectionals and Regionals. They bent over and took it on their home turf with graduates on hand watching. Alas, at Nationals the Hodags lost to UCSB in a blow out and choked away the end of a close game versus ECU. Talent alone had gotten them far, almost to semis, but without that elusive component the Hodag Love, they couldn't cash in on their assets. Once eliminated, the team played in a pants-off game of disc versus LSU. They all checked out Brian Harriford's package! The season did feature the rookie years of Wei Lu, Matt Anderson and soon-to-be eternal rookie Eric Moore.