Okay, TOC Nation. It is great to see that you are all enjoying our new writer Lucas’s film breakdowns each week. I know that Mike, Steve, and I have all been learning a lot from these articles. We also know that there has not been much interest in the updates on the other Spartan teams from across the country. So we have come up with something new for this column. We are going to take even more advantage of having a student-athlete on staff.
Lucas has been gracious enough to offer us a glimpse into
the day-to-day of being a member of the Case Western Reserve Spartans football team. Moving forward, rather than tell you about Norfolk State and San Jose State, we are going to get even more details of Case Western’s program. This will not just be information on their game, but also will let you see some behind-the-scenes stuff. I will let Lucas take it from here:
Hey everyone, Lucas here. I hope you all enjoyed the MSU bye week. For this version of the “Spartan-Verse”, we are going to be taking a deeper dive into what the bye week looked like for me: a day in the life of a D3 Spartan student-athlete (who also happens to be a TOC writer for the D1 Spartans). I hope you guys enjoy this quick peek into my life as a college football player; at a level where the effects of NIL, the transfer portal, conference realignment, and TV deals are much less of a concern than just good old-fashioned football.
CWRU traveled to West Virginia to take on conference opponent Bethany College this past Saturday, and picked up a much-needed 55-0 victory on the road. Bethany was an inexperienced team with several young starters on both sides of the ball, and finally everything came together for Case as we took care of business.
Friday
Campus of Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH
8:30 AM- wake up, breakfast, stretch, check TOC Twitter account for any new MSU updates or headlines to cover.
9:30AM-12:45PM: Class. Business Statistics, followed by a discussion section for my History class.
1-2:PM: Football Meetings. Discuss the final playcall sheet with the rest of the offense, watch some last minute film on the Bethany Bison. Decide on which plays to run through one last time on Friday afternoon at practice. Once the important matters are out of the way, continue our Friday tradition of solving the New York Times Wordle and Connections on the projector as an entire offense.
2-3:30PM: Head home for lunch and prep for practice.
3:45-5PM: Practice. Highlighted by reviewing key plays, red zone 7on7 drill, talking through pre-snap checks and identifying certain tells we expect from the Bison defense. Final prep for the game.
6PM: Starting 22 Spartans and a few more, along with most of the coaching staff boards the first bus headed to hotel near Bethany, WV.
9PM: Watch former MSU Spartan Sam Leavitt get a win for Arizona State over TCU before getting some much needed rest.
Saturday
8:30AM: Bus carrying remaining 45ish members of the CWRU travel squad departs from Cleveland for Bethany. (Headphones on for pregame music and live streaming ESPN’s College Gameday) Athletics Department provides Chick-FIl-A breakfast sandwiches! (2 for linemen, 1 for skill position players).
11:30AM: Arrive and meet the first bus at Bethany College’s Bison Stadium.
12PM: On field warm-ups and stretching. Quick walk through of special teams. A few rowdy Bison fans tailgating, celebrating their homecoming just beyond the fence behind our bench
1PM: CWRU Spartans take the field. (Cue Thunderstruck)
2PM: Kickoff. Spartans vs Bison.
About 4:30PM: Celebrate 55-0 win to spoil Bethany’s homecoming. Hit the showers, postgame meal, before heading out to thank the small group of Case fans (mostly parents) who made the trip.
5:30PM: Board buses for the return to Cleveland. Knock out some Accounting homework, stream the Ole Miss vs LSU game, and remind all my OSU fan teammates about what happened in the Horseshoe in 2015, while the rolling West Virginia hills fade into the cornfields of Northeast Ohio.
8:30PM: Arrive back in Cleveland. Celebrate a great weekend with a CWRU Spartan win and no MSU Spartan loss. Can’t complain!
Hopefully this quick look at a weekend in my life was interesting for you all. Here’s to a successful rest of the 2025 campaign for all kinds of Spartans.
TOC thanks Lucas for this inside look. We will be running this article earlier in the week moving forward. Oh, and by the way, last weekend San Jose State lost to Stanford 30-29 to fall to 1-3, and Norfolk State fell to Wagner 18-13 to move to 1-4. At least we had CWRU to rep the Spartan name with a win.
