Massachusetts Daily Collegian: Sept. 4, 2014 - Football Special Issue

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“It’s a challenge. I needed a challenge.”

By Peter Cappiello Collegian Staff

M

ark Whipple, on his way to a 10-year reunion in 2008 celebrating the Massachusetts football team he coached to an NCAA Division I-AA championship, saw things were a work in progress. He recalls passing a campus of newly finished buildings and ones under renovation, including the Campus Center.

“I was impressed with the things that were going on,” he said of the campus. “I had a good feeling. It was a good feeling in my gut.”

Whipple is back in his first year as coach since his original run from 1998-2003. This time, it’s the team that’s under construction.

The Minutemen went 2-22 overall with a 2-14 MidAmerican Conference record in their last two seasons, the program’s first since moving up to the Football Bowl Subdivision.

Then-coach Charley Molnar was fired about a month after the season ended.

Still, Whipple, who was hired

in mid-January, hasn’t lost his good feeling. He believes his coaching know-how and familiarity with the program will be an asset as the Minutemen continue their transition to the FBS. Whipple boasts 31 years of coaching experience between college and three NFL teams.

He won a Super Bowl in 2006 as quarterbacks coach for the Pittsburgh Steelers, where he coached Ben Roethlisberger.

He also worked with Donovan McNabb as an offensive assistant for the Philadelphia Eagles.

Whipple was most recently a quarterbacks coach for the Cleveland Browns from 20112012.

“The biggest difference is in college, when a player gets in trouble, then it’s the (fault of the) head coach,” Whipple said.

“In the NFL, when a player gets in trouble, it’s the player. I slept easier in the NFL than I do here.”

Whipple acknowledged that the UMass program has room to grow, but said he wants his players to carry themselves with pride and confidence.

That was the M.O. of

Whipple’s teams in the late 1990s, said his former quarterback Todd Bankhead. He credits Whipple with giving his team conviction.

“One of his biggest strengths is motivation,” Bankhead said in a phone interview. “Guys will run through a brick wall for that guy. His raw emotion and his fire … It’s the kind of attitude where you’re not going to back down from anybody. You couldn’t wait to play whoever you were facing that week.”

Bankhead, who won one NCAA title in his two years playing for Whipple, said the coach specializes in schemes and matchups. He believes Whipple will rigorously train today’s Minutemen like he did with the 1998 championship team, which went 2-9 a year before Whipple’s initial hiring.

“He expects a lot from his players,” Bankhead said. “I know for myself, I didn’t want to let him down, to be honest.

The team environment that he fosters, I don’t want to let him down or my teammates down.”

Bankhead, still a follower of see

ACT TWO on page A5

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Seeking an opportunity Quarterback Blake Frohnapfel took a chance.

Can he be the face of UMass football?

By Mark Chiarelli Collegian Staff

B

lake Frohnapfel stands several yards behind his center in the shotgun, as he’s done many times before.

Stationed directly to his left is a running back. To his far left are three receivers lined up in a trips formation, heads cocked and eyes peered directly into the backfield, almost beckoning for him to snap the ball. One receiver flanks to the right.

Marshall trails ECU 42-38 with 11 minutes, 22 seconds remaining. The season proverbially hangs in the balance as the Thundering Herd entered the final contest of 2012 needing just one more victory to become bowl eligible and prolong the season.

Frohnapfel calls for the snap and pivots, his running back shuffling right in preparation to take a handoff.

An ECU defensive lineman clad in all-purple eludes his blocker, eyes pinned to the exchange orchestrated by Frohnapfel. His stare never leaves this defender. He pauses, waiting, carrying out a textbook read-option handoff.

He pulls the football back, allowing his running back to slide by. The defender follows and the line crashes on the running back. The linebackers trail the running back, distracted. Frohnapfel, who is wearing all white with green trim, darts left – only it’s not so much a dart as it is a succession of choppy steps – and he takes off.

The television camera’s as fooled as the ECU defenders and pans toward a scrum of bodies at the line of scrimmage.

The ball isn’t there, it’s with Frohnapfel.

ROBERT RIGO/COLLEGIAN

Blake Frohnapfel transferred to UMass as a graduate student after spending three seasons at Marshall. Frohnapfel was named the Minutemen’s starting quarterback in August.

He’s 20 yards past the line by the time the camera recovers, Frohnapfel strides toward the end zone.

At about the 25-yard line his body lurches forward, his feet struggling to stay under his upper body. But he steadies, pushes on and isn’t touched. It’s a perfectly executed play, as if he’s done it countless times before.

Frohnapfel has just run for a 51-yard touchdown, the longest allowed by ECU that

season. He’s put his team ahead 44-42. He finished the game – one Marshall eventually lost 65-59 in doubleovertime – with 163 total yards. It’s his best performance to date as a college quarterback.

He celebrates in the end zone in a manner suggesting that end zone celebrations are uncharted territory. Frohnapfel scans his surroundings for others to take part in the fun as his arms move without any particular pattern, similar

to an inflatable mascot outside a car dealership.

It’s a moment that, two years later, Frohnapfel can laugh about after a Massachusetts football practice at McGuirk Stadium. He laughs because it’s an admittedly poor performance but laughs because he’ll hopefully have more chances to carry out more touchdown celebrations.

Something he couldn’t do at Marshall.

‘This kid’s got a pretty good arm’ Steve Frohnapfel knew exactly what his 2-year-old twin sons – Blake and Eric – would enjoy on Christmas morning – a small, soft baseball and baseball glove.

An avid sports fan – college football and, more specifically Notre Dame, hold a special place in his heart – he wasted little time introducing Blake and Eric to a variety of sports. Despite having baseball in mind, he

quickly discovered a potential quarterback living under his roof.

“Blake took the ball immediately,” Steve said.

“And he threw it the length of a 20-foot living room and hit me in the face. And I thought ‘this kid’s got a pretty good arm.’”

By the time Blake and Eric were 8 years old, their father knew he was blessed with two talented athletes.

Blake dabbled in other vensee

FROHNAPFEL on page A6

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WHIPPLE’S HISTORICAL SUCCESS

Transfer QBs a success for Whipple at UM

By Peter Cappiello Collegian Staff

Mark Whipple knows what he wants in a quarterback: a competitive, toughminded leader. And if he doesn’t have that player on the roster, he finds one.

Whipple, in his first year back as Massachusetts football coach after a run from 1998-2003, brought in Marshall quarterback Blake Frohnapfel, who won the starting job over incumbent junior A.J. Doyle.

Almost every starting quarterback for a Whippleled UMass team has been a transfer player or a junior college recruit. Frohnapfel, a graduate student with two years of eligibility left, is the fifth quarterback to start in Whipple’s seven years in Amherst, which includes an NCAA Div. I-AA championship in 1998.

All of Whipple’s starters threw for more than 2,000 yards in their first seasons. Todd Bankhead, who joined the Minutemen from Palomar Junior College, tops the list with 3,919 yards in 1998.

Whipple learned of those stats after a practice last Tuesday, and was quick to say he’s more interested

in wins than numbers. He believes Frohnapfel will help get those wins.

“I would hope he’d throw for more than 2,000 (yards) if he stays healthy,” Whipple said. “I would be disappointed if he didn’t.

Our receivers have stepped up and I think our line’s gotten better. We’re improving daily as an offense.”

Frohnapfel was 9-for-22 with 147 yards and a touchdown in his team’s season debut, a 30-7 loss to Boston College at Gillette Stadium on Saturday.

The 6-foot-6, 229-pound signal-caller said Whipple’s West Coast schemes are similar to the offense at Marshall. The main difference, he said, is the experience of the man in charge.

Whipple’s collegiate and professional coaching resume is 31 years long.

He previously served as quarterbacks coach for the Cleveland Browns and the Pittsburgh Steelers, where he won a Super Bowl while mentoring Ben Roethlisberger. He was also an offensive assistant for a Philadelphia Eagles team that featured Donovan McNabb.

“Someone like him has been around the best,”

Frohnapfel said of his new coach. “Having someone who’s done that stuff for so many years and knows a lot about the quarterback position can help lead us in the right direction.”

This season is Whipple’s first in the Mid-American Conference. UMass competed in the Atlantic-10 during his first stint with the program.

Whipple’s son, Austin, a transfer quarterback from Penn State, said his father is relatable to quarterbacks because that’s the position he played in college (Brown, class of ‘79). He said quarterbacks latch on to his father’s confidence and poise under pressure.

The redshirt freshman said his father quickly bonded with Frohnapfel, and added that the latter takes direction well.

“He’s new and Blake’s new,” Austin said. “Since my dad’s a new coach, he’s adjusting to (the program) too. I think their relationship has been good because of the amount of time they spend together.”

Austin sees Frohnapfel excelling in the pro-style offense, and predicts he will continue the streak of throwing for more than 2,000 yards in his first season wearing maroon and white.

Said Austin: “I’m sure he’ll keep that record alive. Watching him play at Marshall and what he’s already proved being a leader in the short few months he’s been here, he’s given everyone on the team a lot of confidence. We’re looking forward to watching him tear it up on the field.”

COLLEGIAN ARCHIVE

UMass coach Mark Whipple talks with Todd Bankhead during his first stint as coach of the Minutemen.

Peter Cappiello can be reached at pcappiel@umass.edu and followed on Twitter @petecapps..

SPECIAL TEAMS

Dudley-Giles offers another dimension as punt returner Daisher makes NFL comparisons

By Mark Chiarelli Collegian Staff

For Trey Dudley-Giles, his exceptional ability to return punts stems from experiences in a completely different sport.

The junior defensive back grew up in Dade City, Florida and excelled on the baseball field where he played centerfield. Manning the outfield taught him how to read fly balls and judge distance based off seeing balls hit off the bat. According to Dudley-Giles, the skill translates over to the gridiron.

“The reason why I can (return punts) better than most guys is I played baseball,” he said. “I could judge the ball really well and take the perfect step or the perfect direction back.”

As a sophomore, he averaged 12.3 yards per punt return in addition to his 22.3 yards per return average as a kick returner. He had a 77-yard punt return for a touchdown against Miami (Ohio) called back due to a holding penalty and became increasingly more confident and explosive as the season progressed last year.

“The first thing I think is to catch the ball and get vertical,” Dudley-Giles said.

“Make a guy miss and just hit the sideline.”

On a team desperate for offensive explosion, DudleyGiles represented a dynamic

threat every time he stepped on the field.

“Everyone senses it,” special teams coordinator Ted Daisher said. “He has the playmaking ability. If we give him a chance, he’ll make a play for us.”

down the field. He does a good job of making sure the ball is fair caught. If it’s not fair caught, he makes sure to alert the other people of the poison call which alerts everybody to get away from the ball.

Daisher noted that the ability to make sound decisions can be taught and was a process he went through with Cribbs. “(The Browns) weren’t sure if he was going to be a good punt returner so we drafted another guy to take that role,” Daisher said.

“And then we worked with (Cribbs) over the summer and a period of time in camp and he did a great job and ended up being third in the NFL in punt return that year. You can do that, but it just takes a lot of reps.

Trey (Dudley-Giles) is pretty natural at it.”

UMass will run a similar return scheme in 2014 as it did in 2013, making it a fairly comfortable process for Dudley-Giles. In 2012, he noted the scheme was significantly different and took time to adjust to.

In his case, he’s trying to simplify the position as much as possible.

“I just think ‘give the offense good field position,’” he said. “Do what I can do and not try to do more than I can. I just try to do the simple things and the big plays occur.

Daisher’s coached at both the collegiate and professional level dating back to 1979. He enters his third year at UMass — his second year as the special teams coordinator — and held the same position in the NFL with Philadelphia Eagles, Cleveland Browns and Oakland Raiders. He coached both Desean Jackson and Josh Cribbs, two receivers with prolific careers as returners. According to Daisher, Dudley-Giles possesses some of the same qualities as both Jackson and Cribbs.

“They’re fearless,” Daisher said “You’re back there and 11 guys are running at you.

(They have) The ability to make a good, correct decision whether to catch, let it go, or when you do catch to have the confidence to catch it on the move, make one good cut and make one guy miss and then get some yards after that.”

Decision-making is the main skill Daisher praised about Dudley-Giles in addition to his vision and ability to quickly find the seam.

“He makes good decisions,” Daisher said. “The number one thing about punt Mark Chiarelli can be reached at mchireturns is when your offense arel@umass.edu and followed on Twitter @ gets the ball, you progress Mark_Chiarelli.

ROBERT RIGO/COLLEGIAN

Mark Whipple (left) and Blake Frohnapfel (right) at UMass practice on Sept. 2, 2014.

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COLORADO PREVIEW

BATTLING THE BUFFS SATURDAY, SEPT. 6 GILLETTE STADIUM FOXBOROUGH, MASS.

Whipple seeks complementary play on both sides Offense, defense building trust

By Mark Chiarelli Collegian Staff

CADE BELISLE/COLLEGIAN

Tajae Sharpe (with ball) is the leading returning receiver on a UMass offense looking to make a larger impact against Colorado on Saturday.

UMass readies for Pac-12 foe

By Andrew Cyr Collegian Staff

If opening the season against an Athletic Coast Conference opponent wasn’t enough of a challenge for the Massachusetts football team, then a visit from a Pac12 opponent will certainly do the trick.

UMass (0-1) hosts Colorado this week as part of its gauntlet non-conference schedule that features four of the five “power” conference in college football. This time around, the Minutemen are prepared for what’s in store. “(Colorado) is much more of a lateral team as opposed to Boston College,” linebacker Stanley Andre said.

“They’re fast and they’re

just as good as BC so we will be prepared for that. … We prepare just as hard for any opponent we play though.”

UMass coach Mark Whipple preached all week to his team that they need to play more complementary football on both offense and defense. A week ago, the Minutemen allowed 511 total yards while their offense was only on the field for 17 minutes, 49 seconds.

Similar to UMass, Colorado (0-1) opened its season with a 30-17 loss against an in-state rival in Colorado State. The Buffs had three defensive ends that made their collegiate debuts in week one. The result was 266 rushing yards for the opposing Rams. Although the Minutemen picked up 55 rushing yards against

Boston College, the run game will be a crucial factor in UMass’ ability to move the ball, and more importantly keep its defense on the sideline.

Despite having just one game under his belt, true freshman J.T. Blyden might have his name called earlier than he anticipated. Blyden led the Minutemen in rushing last week, piling up 43 yards on nine carries after entering the game midway through the second quarter.

“You might see a little bit more of him,” Whipple said.

“We don’t have the same guys as Colorado State but we would like to be a balanced team.”

Another player looking for better results was quarterback Blake Frohnapfel.

Frohnapfel finished just

9-for-22 for 147 yards, 77 of which game on a touchdown toss to Tajae Sharpe.

Sharpe mentioned at practice on Wednesday that him and Frohnapfel already feel more confident and comfortable throwing to each other and expect to have another big day on Saturday.

“Last week was just a case of some fundamental things,” Sharpe said. “We just need to get on the same page and continue to work to get better. We’ll just keep working on our timing and hopefully it will all be solved

by Saturday.”

Last week UMass faced a dual-threat quarterback in Tyler Murphy that was primarily a run-first player. This week, however, see

BUFFS on page A5

Massachusetts football coach Mark Whipple spent time poring through film following his team’s season-opening loss to Boston College.

All the usual suspects made the list – he looked at offense, defense and special teams execution as well as individual performances – but he was also keeping tabs on his own sideline as well. Whipple checked for accountability, for enthusiasm and even for respect between players on his team.

It’s all part of building continuity and trust. And after just a single game, he’s seeing both the positives and the negatives.

“I didn’t see any finger pointing, that’s one good thing,” Whipple said. “I didn’t see the enthusiasm and excitement I needed to see on the sideline when some big plays happen, I pointed that out.”

Part of Whipple’s mantra throughout training camp centered on building trust between the different facets of the team.

When he arrived last spring, he believed the offense didn’t trust the defense and vice versa.

Whipple believes it’s important for both sides to understand what the other is doing. Without trust, it’s difficult to play as a cohesive unit and ultimately affects production on the field.

Going about building that trust is much more difficult. Unless wins and losses are the only baseline, it’s difficult to tangibly evaluate improvements through trust.

According to Whipple, it’s something that develops over time in practice, especially when the starting offense practices against the starting defense and increases the speed element of practice.

Against Boston College, the Minutemen struggled to complement each other as a team.

“I just didn’t think we played well helping one another out,” Whipple said. “When the highs were highs, everybody celebrated and then forgot to play. So we have to work on that, that’s just a mindset. That’s just a team thing.”

Linebacker Jovan Santos-Knox also recognized the lack of cohesiveness.

“I think it was a lot to do with trust,” he said.

“We can’t overcompensate for one part of the team, you just have to do your job and that’s it.

I think if everyone does their job, they play complementary football.”

The most jarring sequence of events came when UMass failed to capitalize on a Randall Jette interception, losing

11 yards on the ensuing possession. Kicker Blake Lucas missed a 47-yard field goal attempt and the Minutemen walked away with no points.

“I was disappointed in the complementary offense, defense,” Whipple said.

“When the defense had a big stop or held them to a field goal, the offense just didn’t get a first down and try to give them some wind. When the offense finally scored a touchdown, the special teams gave up a longer kickoff return and three plays later or four plays later they’re in the end zone.”

Scouting Colorado The first thing Whipple pointed out about Colorado is its overall team speed, which is a significant step up over Boston College’s.

The Buffs faced Colorado State a week ago and carried a 17-7 lead into the third quarter before giving up 24 points in the final 21 minutes to lose 31-17. Colorado rushed for 134 yards in the game, which could be an area to watch against UMass as the Minutemen struggled to stop the run against Boston College.

Sefo Liufau starts at quarterback for Colorado.

The 6-foot-4 sophomore completed 24-of-39 passes for 241 yards and two touchdowns a week ago.

Last season, the Buffs compiled a record of 4-8 and lost every game it played on the road.

Ryan Johnson returns While it’s unclear what his role is moving forward, UMass offensive lineman Ryan Johnson will suit up against Colorado without any restrictions.

Johnson awaited an eligibility ruling from the NCAA clearinghouse throughout the summer and could not participate in training camp after transferring to UMass from Garden City Community College.

Johnson took summer classes and finally earned clearance last week, but technically could not play until five days after his clearance per NCAA rules.

Whipple acknowledged that Johnson would be added to the two-deep depth chart and there’s a possibility he could earn immediate playing time.

At 6-foot-5, 320 pounds, Johnson offers mammoth size at the offensive line position.

Johnson – who paid for all his schooling expenses on his own while waiting for clearance – is relieved and excited to finally get on the field.

“There were a lot of sacrifices I had to make to become eligible, but it was worth it,” Johnson said.”

Mark Chiarelli can be reached at mchiarel@umass.edu and followed on Twitter @Mark_Chiarelli.

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COLLEGE FOOTBALL’S FUTURE

Minutemen are the future of college football in New England

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t’s a typical fall Saturday in New England, and the Massachusetts football team waits to take the field at Gillette Stadium.

Temperature in the mid60s with a slight breeze makes it your stereotypical “perfect” day for football.

As the Minutemen Andrew run through the tunnel Cyr and take the field, the sites and sounds are all the same.

They look up at the Super Bowl banners from the New England Patriots; occasionally you might be able to see the faint outline of the Patriots logo at midfield and in the end zone.

The average fan would have no idea that UMass was the home team unless they noticed the small banners hanging along the bottom of the stands.

The stands are partially filled, many of which are dedicated alumni from the Boston area that traveled down either I-95 or I- 495 to get to Gillette. The student section, however, is vastly empty. There are small groups of people scattered throughout the stands, but not nearly enough to give UMass the home field advantaged it hopes for.

Can you really blame the students for not showing up to these games, though?

They’re asked to drive

How cool would it be for 60,000 fans – half wearing marron and white, the other wearing maroon and gold – to pack Gillette to the rafters? two hours each way to watch a struggling team in transition into FBS football. After back-to-back 1-11 seasons, it’s clear that the younger demographic of fans isn’t committed to the program quite yet.

But with Mark Whipple back as the head coach, that all can change, very quickly.

The change, and the future, took its first step in the right direction last Saturday, when the Minutemen hosted Boston College in the first annual Battle of the Bay State in front of 30,409 fans. It was the most fans UMass has ever had at an FBS home game.

Was it as big as, say, Alabama vs. Auburn, or Florida vs. Florida State?

No. But was it a step in the right direction for college football in the northeast? Absolutely.

The tailgate scene at Gillete was legit. There were UMass flags, there were Boston College flags.

There was drinking and grilling and there was plenty of buzz in the air in preparation for kickoff.

And that’s what college football is all about: the environment.

Sure, there were still plenty of empty seats at Gillette and the top level was completely vacant, but would anyone really

be opposed to an annual game at Gillette? It’s not only great for both programs to get publicity, but more importantly it’s great for the fans. Yes, college football in New England will never get as big as it is in the South or Midwest. But for that one Saturday a year, fans should get to experience that atmosphere.

Boston College has done its part in building a football tradition. From Doug Flutie to Matt Ryan, the Eagles have had success in their program’s history.

It’s UMass’ turn to gain some street credit now.

The new performance center and improvements to McGuirk Stadium will likely lure in new recruits, but it’s what the Minutemen do on the field that will determine how invested the fans will become.

How cool would it be for 60,000 fans – half wearing maroon and white, the other wearing maroon and gold – to pack Gillette to the rafters?

That’s still many years away from happening, but we can all dream, can’t we?

Andrew Cyr can be reached at arcyr@ umass.edu, and can be followed on Twitter @Andrew_Cyr.

ACT TWO

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UMass football, said he believes team unity is necessary this year against a “loaded” schedule, which includes Penn State, Colorado and Vanderbilt.

The Minutemen lost their season opener, a 30-7 beating by Boston College at Gillette Stadium on Saturday.

Whipple’s son, Austin, a redshirt freshman, said players have quickly bought in to his father’s philosophy.

“The success he’s had in the past speaks volumes with all of us and we’re learning a lot,” said Austin, a transfer quarterback from Penn State. “He knows we can win and be successful.

Obviously the past couple years haven’t been great winning-wise, so I think the biggest thing is everyone has more confidence in each other about the ability to win.”

Whipple said he is

BUFFS

Thursday, September 4, 2014

ROBERT RIGO/COLLEGIAN

Mark Whipple on the sideline against Boston College on Aug. 30, 2014. keeping the larger picture in mind. The goal is to win games, but he is equally concerned with making a positive impact on the life of a student athlete. It’s why he took the UMass job.

“I’m a teacher, that’s why I got into this thing,” he said. “I think you can

do a lot more teaching here – not just football wise, but life skills – than you do at some other places. That was intriguing.

“And it’s a challenge. I needed a challenge.”

Peter Cappiello can be reached at pcappiel@umass.edu and followed on Twitter @petecapps.

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Colorado’s quarterback Sefo Liufau is a dualthreat quarterback that has a pass-first mentality.

Liufau threw for 241 yards and a pair of touchdowns as well as ran for 47 yards on seven carries.

Although only a sophomore, Whipple was impressed with Liufau’s poise and wasn’t surprised that he was named

a team captain.

The biggest aspect of Colorado’s game that the Minutemen will need to prepare for is its team speed. The Pac-12 is known for its up-tempo style of play and the Buffaloes have built their team with that principle in mind.

“People say that the Pac-12 is fast,” Andre

said. “(Colorado) is a lateral team. They’re fast and just as good as Boston College so this time we’ll be ready for anything they throw at us.”

Kickoff from Gillette is at 3 p.m. and can be seen on ESPN3.com.

Andrew Cyr can be reached at arcyr@ umass.edu, and can be followed @ Andrew_Cyr on Twitter.

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FROHNAPFEL tures – he was a pitcher and a point guard on his peewee basketball team – but football quickly became the favorite.

Steve would return home from work and throw passes in the front yard of his Stafford, Virginia, home to both Blake and Eric to “wear them out.”

The trio returned to their own personal gridiron on Saturdays too, sneaking out at halftime to throw the ball while whatever college football game that happened to be on television was at commercial.

Occasionally, Steve would match Blake and Eric up one-on-one.

According to Blake, it was those sessions in the yard that spurred his football career.

“That’s actually probably why we’re so competitive,” he said. “It’s where I learned to love the game, during those times in the front yard.”

Soon, Blake would be the one throwing the passes.

And quickly thereafter, he was doing it on a much larger stage.

Help is on the way Bill Brown entered his first season as coach at Colonial Forge High School in 2007 with an array of experience – he’s inducted into the Virginia High School Hall of Fame – and a vague understanding that help was on the way.

“We had been told that (Blake) was a good junior high player, that he and his brother were talented kids,” Brown said. “We did not anticipate them being varsity players.”

The Frohnapfel brothers and fellow freshman receiver Tim Scott, who now plays at North Carolina, all arrived together and quickly found playing time.

Blake was so impressive that he supplanted a talented senior starting quarterback after just four games.

Under Brown, Colonial Forge operated a modified version of the Wing-T offense, which is a popular style of football at that level predicated on running and using misdirection. Rarely does an offense operating the Wing-T throw the football. But because of the talent at quarterback, Scott at receiver and Eric Frohnapfel at tight end, Brown threw the ball 12-to14 times a game.

It was an offense conducive to winning – Colonial Forge made the playoffs during the Frohnapfel’s junior season and lost in the regional championship the following year – but it wasn’t the best for showcasing quarterback talent.

“It wasn’t really too great to be a quarterback (in the offense) but we won so I enjoyed it,” Blake said. “(Blake) wasn’t getting to chuck the ball all over the yard like some kids get to do,” his father said.

The limited exposure only magnified his sophomore season, when Blake broke a bone in his ankle three games into the season. He missed the rest of the season and had virtually no recruiting footage from his first two years of school.

‘It was really stressful’ If it was up to Wake Forest, Blake Frohnapfel would be a scholarship player on its defensive line.

It didn’t need hours of footage to project him at the next level.

“I went to a camp and (the defensive end coach) who recruited me at Wake Forest was like, ‘can you do some defensive end drills just so I can see how you do?’ “I was like ‘okay’ and I just did some drills and I guess I did well enough and he was like ‘we’re going to offer you,’ Frohnapfel said.

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“I was like, ‘what?’”

Brown said Frohnapfel possessed the physical stature and athletic abilities in high school that intrigued college coaches despite never playing a down at the position. According to Brown, “Blake could do everything his brother could do.” All coaches had to do was look at the Colonial Forge defense to see the twin Frohnapfel, Eric, excelling at defensive end.

It was an idea even Blake’s father fancied as West Virginia and Vanderbilt also wanted to convert his son to defensive end.

“I was sort of pushing Blake toward Wake Forest,” he added later. “(Blake) said ‘nope, I’m going to play quarterback and Marshall wants me to play quarterback and that’s where I’m going.’”

Brown always believed Blake was capable of playing quarterback in college.

“I really did because of two things,” Brown said.

“One, he was talented. And two, his work ethic was so good. He and his brother were committed. His brother played lacrosse, so in the spring he and his brother came in and met with me at 6 a.m. and lifted weights because his brother couldn’t get it after school.”

Marshall was the only FBS program to show heavy interest in Blake as a quarterback, while the rest of his offers came from FCS programs. Marshall was one of three teams (James Madison, West Virginia) to offer both Blake and Eric. Blake adored the interest Marshall showed him and was sold early.

But his brother originally committed to West Virginia, posing a significant problem. Neither had ever played organized football without the other. Combine that with the fluid process that is college football recruiting and the stretch leading up to both brothers making a decision was a stressful time.

“I thought when I was earlier in high school that I would enjoy (recruiting) a lot and it would be a lot of fun, but it was really stressful,” Blake said.

“It was really stressful because a lot of coaches were like ‘Well, here’s an offer and you have until tomorrow night to decide.’

Some teams would do that…my brother faced the same situation when a team was like, ‘If you don’t take the scholarship in two days, it’s gone.’ So we’re sitting there with our family kind of stressed out trying to figure out what school.”

Late in the process, Eric reversed commitments and joined Blake in pledging allegiance to Marshall, much to the delight of Blake, who was dead-set on wearing green and white.

Taking a gamble Blake knew he wasn’t the only quarterback who committed to Marshall entering 2011, but he didn’t know much about the other guy.

“I knew there was another guy that was in my class,” Frohnapfel said.

“And when I got there, I kind of realized this kid’s the real deal.

That kid was Rakeem Cato, a 6-foot-1 quarterback who wasted little time finding the field at Marshall, starting 10 games as a freshman. In 2012, he was named Conference USA MVP. He followed that up by winning C-USA Offensive Player of

the Year in 2013.

In other words, Frohnapfel was stuck.

“It was frustrating because I knew I could play,” he said. “I felt like I did all the things I had to do off the field and I was working out hard and doing all that stuff and I still wasn’t getting a chance. Rakeem Cato is just really a once in a generation player at Marshall. I got sick of going to games and not playing.”

Despite the lack of playing time, those around the program held Frohnapfel in high regard.

In a game against We s t e r n C a ro l i n a , Frohnapfel said he “ran over” a Catamount defender, which caught the attention of a group of middle school fans who attended every game. Quickly, the “Frohnies Crohnies” were born.

“They just loved it,” Frohnapfel said. “They would just sit in the stands and yell at coach (Doc) Holliday and tell him to put me in. They had signs that said ‘Frohnapfel for Heisman’ and, plus, I was a holder there so they made signs like ‘Frohnapfel’s the best holder in America.’

The group of kids humored Frohnapfel, who

kept a collection of their signs in his apartment. He said the running joke on the team was to wonder what type of material the “Crohnies” would deliver.

Marshall offensive coordinator Bill Legg also lauded Frohnapfel, although the forceful suggestion from the teenagers didn’t persuade Legg to find more playing time for Frohnapfel.

“Even though he was a backup quarterback, he was still one of the leaders on our football team,” Legg said.

“How often does that happen? Your starting quarterback you expect that from, but your backup quarterback? I mean that shows how much respect our coaching staff and our football team had for that kid. Even though he wasn’t a starter, he was an integral part of our football team.”

Frohnapfel grew frustrated watching games from the sidelines. Outside of his performance against ECU, Frohnapfel was relegated to strictly mop-up duty. As his sophomore season progressed, he knew a change was necessary, he knew he had to take a gamble.

“It was over the course of the season,” Frohnapfel said of his decision to transfer from Marshall.

“I’d be sitting on the sideline kind of mad during games thinking, ‘Man, I wish I could play. I’m doing all this work and I don’t get to play in this game.’”

“Oh, it’s heartbreaking,” said his father, who spent hours on the couch discussing a variety of options with Blake.

“You see kids who have a lot of talent and, for whatever reason, the football

CADE BELISLE/COLLEGIAN

Blake Frohnapfel (with ball) went 9for-22 against Boston College and compiled 147 yards. gods don’t smile upon them and events can transpire and nothing happens. And I thought he could end up being one of those kids.”

Dinner for three Within two weeks of hearing Frohnapfel was available, UMass coach Mark Whipple and quarterbacks coach Liam Coen jetted to Huntington, West Virginia, to meet with him

face-to-face.

Whipple was tipped off

by Legg that he had a quarterback looking to transfer that might fit Whipple’s pro-style system. He and Coen met with Frohnapfel over dinner to discuss their options.

As Frohnapfel arrived at the restaurant, he already faced an issue. Who was Mark Whipple, anyway?

“At the time I didn’t really know,” he said. “I knew about Coach Whipple and what he did but I wasn’t even sure what he looked like. So I walked into the restaurant and I walked up to the hostess and I was like, ‘Have you seen an older gentleman walking in with a UMass shirt?’ And she was like, ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

“So I was like, ‘I’m just going to stay in here and hope a guy with a UMass shirt walks by,’ Frohnapfel said with a laugh.

Whipple did eventually walk by and the three met for about an hour.

Frohnapfel entered with a cursory knowledge of Whipple’s past endeavors – he’s coached in both the NFL and college ranks – but never felt like he fit the traditional style of offense Whipple employed.

Nonetheless, he was receptive to the message Whipple preached “It wasn’t like he was saying, ‘You’re going to be a starter,’ Frohnapfel said. “It was, ‘You’ll have a chance to come here and play and do these things.’

And that’s what I really liked because I wasn’t asking for him to say I’d be the starter, I didn’t want that.”

Blake’s father said the dinner was the primary factor in helping Blake make up his mind. Within a week,

Blake was in Amherst on an official visit. He desperately wanted the trip to work out, for UMass to be the one.

Of course, other factors were in play.

Taking his own path Frohnapfel’s leaning comfortably to his left, one arm propped up on the arm of a couch. He sits in a cluttered media relations office, a coffee table-turned-storage desk at his feet. He’s envisioning life after football, perhaps even life in his own office, perhaps even overlooking his own football facility.

Perhaps even running a professional football team.

“I always say my dream job is to be the (general manager) of an NFL team,” Frohnapfel said.

“All these years I’ve learned so much about football. … I’d like to use it in a way. If I can add the whole business side as well, I feel like having that combination will set me up to possibly work my way up to one of those jobs.”

Frohnapfel frantically spent the weeks following his redshirt sophomore season scouring the Internet for top business programs with an MBA. If the program was suitable, he’d check to see if the school even had a football team. If that team didn’t already have two quarterbacks vying for playing time, he’d add them to the list.

UMass sat perched atop the list, followed by Eastern Kentucky and William & Mary. The UMass sport management program’s reputation combined with turnover in the football program made it the ideal landing spot for Frohnapfel.

Whipple agreed, offering Frohnapfel a scholarship and a chance to compete. Frohnapfel loaded up with 19 credits worth of business classes in his first semester on campus. He’ll take all business classes this year and all sport management classes next year while pursuing a dual master’s degree.

Considering the combination of his course load and his football schedule, the department didn’t initially advise that path.

“When he initially spoke to the program they said, ‘You have to pick,’” Steve Frohnapfel said. “(They said) you can get the MBA or get the sports management graduate degree but don’t try to do both, that will be overwhelming to you.

Eventually, the department relented and told Blake he could try it.

Armed with a scholarship offer, a chance to pursue his academic dreams and

the allure of consistent playing time, Frohnapfel arrived on campus in May. Without any immediate family, barely any students on campus and a brief understanding of who was and wasn’t on the football team, Frohnapfel moved away from his comfort zone for the first time.

‘Obviously, it’s very exciting’

Turning Amherst into his own personal comfort zone is a day-by-day process, one that initially began in May to lukewarm results.

“I came in here in May and I was one of the only guys here,” Frohnapfel said.

“And I’d see people walking around and I’m like, ‘I don’t know if he’s a football player or not.’

It’s like you have to walk up to them and ask, ‘Hey, are you a football player?’

So it was a weird situation because I’m in my dorm room like, ‘What am I doing?’”

But he slowly eased into life in the Pioneer Valley.

It started with a permanent housing situation.

As Frohnapfel fretted over where to live, he received a text from teammate Matt Sparks asking if he needed a place to live. Now, he’s settling into life as the roommate of three offensive linemen in Sparks, Josh Bruns and Fabian Hoeller.

Even the football field brought along change.

Frohnapfel learned a brand new pro-style offense under Whipple.

Even taking standard drops from under center were new for Frohnapfel, who took snaps in the shotgun at Marshall. He says he’s getting better each day but needs to play better – he went 9-for-22 for 147 yards, a touchdown and an interception in the season-opening 30-7 loss to Boston College – as the season progresses.

But the addition of Frohnapfel – the ushering in of a new era and an air of change – brings hope back to McGuirk Stadium.

There’s a leader at the top now and if Frohnapfel can continue to inspire optimism and deliver results on the field, he’s destined to be the face of UMass football.

“With Coach Whipple coming back and coming in with a change of culture, I just happen to be the new guy,” Frohnapfel said. “I’ll be the one that was the quarterback at that time when we helped get UMass back to where it was. Obviously, it’s very exciting.”

Perhaps one day, if he does bring UMass back to where it was, he’ll have a better celebration planned too.

Mark Chiarelli can be reached at mchiarel@umass.edu and followed on Twitter @Mark_Chiarelli.

THE MASSACHUSETTS DAILY COLLEGIAN

Tuesday, September 4, 2014

News@DailyCollegian.com

UM hosts Iraqi students for Civic Initiative Program Foreign students study public policy

By Jaclyn Bryson Collegian Staff

To many students, the University of Massachusetts campus may be thought of as a quiet, relaxed space during the summer, lacking the normal hustle and bustle of everyday life during the semester.

However, 147 foreign students and visitors with the UMass Civic Initiative called the University their home throughout the course of the summer, taking part in programs such as the Iraqi Young Leaders Exchange Program and the Pakistani Young Leaders Program.

According to Michael Hannahan, UMass Civic Initiative director, the University hosted students from across the globe, including 25 students from Pakistan, 25 from Iraq and 18 professors from various international countries.

“They are just like you,” Hannahan said.

“Why would you want to go to another country?

All the answers going through your head are the same ones that go through theirs: It can be fun. It could be interesting to see a new place. This could help my career, be a good resume builder.”

These international programs, which varied between four and six weeks, focused mainly on public policy. Students from Iraq, according to the Civic Initiative website, studied public leadership and how to get things done in their community – a lesson, the students said, is priceless.

“The study of public policy is very interesting,” said Hanin Mohammed, 21, of Baghdad, Iraq.

“This program is a once in a lifetime chance for me.”

Amer Manssor, 22, of Babylon, Iraq‫‏‬, added, “I want to gain all the knowledge that America can give me. Iraqi colleges are not that excited about teaching.”

The program also required students to

checkmate

“We live in a country which is the top country for corruption. We will try to implement what we have learned and try to develop our community through what we have learned here and try to be the future leaders of Iraq.”

Shkar Nazdar, Iraqi student get involved in a community service project.

The Pakistani students, according to Hannahan, collected food and funds to donate to the Amherst Survival Center, and the Iraqi students delivered Meals on Wheels to the elderly and held a fundraiser for the Amherst Senior Center, helping them find a place in the local community.

“It’s one thing to talk about what the impact of all this is on them, but they kind of have a big impact on us, too,” Hannahan said.

Along with their studies, these international students were also given the chance to experience the American culture many of them said they had only seen fabricated in movies and television.

The students took trips to see Harvard University, experience Six Flags, hike the local Sugarloaf Mountain and visit New York City for the first time.

“It’s amazing really, like heaven,” Muthana Alrfsh, 23, of Al-Muthana City, Iraq, said of the Big Apple.

However, despite the educational and cultural opportunities that awaited these students, many admitted they were afraid of how other would react.

“I expected a little racism, but this was not true,” said Soran Ismael, 20, of Erbil, Kurdistan see

EXCHANGE on page b3

CADE BELISLE/COLLEGIAN

Students participate in various activities on Goodell Lawn on Sunday afternoon.

UMass Old Chapel to be renovated Building receives historic nomination

By Catherine Ferris Collegian Staff

The iconic Old Chapel at the University of Massachusetts is not only on the brink of a major renovation, but the building was also recently nominated for listing on the National Register of Historic Places.

The nomination proposal was written by private advocacy group Preserve UMass, according to a University press release. On its Facebook page, the group describes itself as “a private group of alumni, active and retired faculty and staff of UMass Amherst and friends on campus that promotes the appreciation, preservation and professional management of the historic assets of the Amherst campus.”

The Massachusetts Historical Commission will edit the nomination proposal to meet National Register standards, according to

the release. It will then be returned to Preserve UMass for review. Once complete, the proposal will be voted on by MHC’s State Review Board. If approved at the state level, it will be sent to the National Park Service for final approval, according to the release.

Currently, the building does not meet proper building codes, but there is hope that a listing on the National Register would help support the funding of the restoration, which is estimated to cost between $18 million and $20 million.

While many details of the restoration are still being sorted out, some plans have been made.

Joseph Larson, professor emeritus and member of Preserve UMass, said the upper level, which has a large auditorium containing historical material, would be restored as closely to the original as possible.

The lower level will be open to the public with flexible use, and the kitchen area will contain a small kitchen.

Although Preserve UMass was formed in 2007, resto-

Currently, the building does not meet proper building codes, but there is hope that a listing on the National Register would help support the funding of the restoration, which is estimated to cost between $18 million and $20 million. rations to the Old Chapel began when the inside of the building began to fail in the 1990s. According to the release, the unstable clock tower was rebuilt, with the original stones anchored to a new concrete frame.

In 2009, there was an examination of all buildings on campus to see which were historically significant, and the nomination process began not long after Chancellor Subbaswamy came to UMass in 2013.

“It was Subbawamy who began initiating the renovation when he first came to campus,” Larson said.

Material for the nomination process was put together about a year ago, and the state will hold a review meeting this fall. Not long

after that, the decision of whether or not to include the chapel on the National Register will be made.

The chapel was built in 1885, and served as a classroom building, library, auditorium, museum and chapel, according to the release.

The building was also home to the UMass Minuteman Marching Band until 1996, when it was deemed unsafe.

It has been unused as of recently, though it houses the University’s 42-bell carillon.

Donations to support the renovations can be made through the UMass Rising campaign.

Catherine Ferris can be reached at caferris@umass.edu and followed on Twitter @Ca_Ferris2.

Faculty, administration await decision on right to unionize Dept. of Labor offers no outcome

By Marie MacCune Collegian Staff

The University of Massachusetts administration, Massachusetts Society of Professors, and Continuing and Professional Education faculty are awaiting a decision from the Massachusetts Department of Labor Relations after a springtime hearing and negotiations.

According to John Bryan, associate provost for academic personnel, “The union filed a petition with DLR, asking whether currently unrepresented instructors in Continuing and Professional Education should be automatically absorbed into the same

unit as other faculty. In the spring, DLR conducted a hearing and asked for additional information from both the University and the union. We are waiting for DLR’s assessment of the situation.”

He added, “The primary question before DLR is whether those faculty share a ‘community of interest’ with our other faculty.”

MSP, whose contract expired July 31, is currently in negotiations with UMass to establish a new one.

Bryan said, “Friday was our 18th day of bargaining with the faculty union over a new three-year contract. The negotiations have been productive and respectful, and we look forward to finishing them soon.”

While MSP was “hoping to include protection for CPE instructors,” said Eve

Weinbaum, an MSP officer involved on the campaign to unionize CPE faculty, they “will not wait for the outcome of the hearings to sign a contract,” she said.

Ferd Wulkan, a staffer with MSP, said, “It’s a funny situation with the labor relations decision looming in the background, a decision which could affect all others.”

According to Wulkan, “The decision will happen in two parts. First, the hearing officer will come out with a statement of facts that she will then base her decision on. Then, the University and MSP have the right to dispute any of the facts. Once the statement of facts is agreed upon by both parties, she can make her decision.”

Weinbaum said that waiting for the decision is not the only option. “At any time

the University could decide that these people deserve a minimum wage. They could let them unionize. We don’t have to wait for the hearing officer,” she said.

Wulkan explained that CPE instructors fall into three categories.

“There are graduate students who have their own union and faculty who teach regular classes on campus and also teach through Continuing Education who are part of MSP, so there are no disputes there,” he said. “But the third category is people who teach only through CPE, and they are the group in question.”

Weinbaum said CPE faculty is one of the only groups on campus that doesn’t have the right to represent itself.

During the hearing, Wulkan said the union argued that CPE faculty

does the same kind of work as other instructors and deserves the same rights to negotiate legal protection and salaries.

In terms of the University’s stance, Wulkan said, “They were arguing that Continuing Education is this really different creature than education on campus. They agree that MSP members who also teach CPE have rights, but they don’t want to extend that to the third category. They don’t believe that there is a community of interest.”

“Right now, the University has a big incentive to push work off campus into CPE, away from the unionized sector,” Wulkan said. “I make the analogy to a clothing company moving factories to Bangladesh where there is cheaper labor.”

Wulkan said this has a significant impact on students, who cannot always find classes on campus and often have to enroll online.

“For a student on financial aid, who is already struggling to pay for the fall and spring, that all gets very expensive very quickly,” he said. “It makes it less accessible.”

Unionizing off-campus instructors alongside regular faculty is not unprecedented, and Wulkan remains optimistic.

“MSP contracts also cover UMass Boston where all faculty, both Continuing Education and regular, is represented,” he explained.

“We’re trying to mimic that.”

Marie MacCune can be reached at mmaccune@umass.edu and followed on Twitter @MarieMacCune.

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Missouri governor lifts state Over 100 Americans of emergency in Ferguson fighting with Islamic

By Kevin McDermott and Joe Holleman St. Louis Post-Dispatch

CLAYTON, Mo. — Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon on Wednesday lifted the state of emergency he declared in riot-torn Ferguson almost three weeks ago – a move that effectively ends the possibility of a special prosecutor in the investigation of Michael Brown’s death.

But that didn’t stop a protest by about 40 people, representing dozens of organizations, to continue demanding that St. Louis County Prosecutor Robert McCulloch be replaced in the investigation, on the allegation that he is biased in favor of the police.

McCulloch has “lost the faith of our community,” Montague Simmons of the Organization of Black Struggle said during the demonstration outside McCulloch’s Clayton office.

Brown, 18 and unarmed, was shot and killed on Aug. 9 by Ferguson Police Officer Darren Wilson. A St. Louis County grand jury began hearing evidence in the matter two weeks ago.

In the protests, rioting and looting that followed, Nixon on Aug. 16 issued Executive Order 14-08, which declared a state of emergency on grounds that “the rule of law must be maintained” in Ferguson.

It allowed Nixon to bring in the Missouri National Guard to secure a police command center.

The emergency order also invoked a power Nixon ultimately chose not to use, in defiance of strong pressure from Brown’s advocates: the authority to replace McCulloch with a special prosecutor to lead the grand jury investigation into Brown’s death.

Despite clear tension between the two men – including public statements like “man up” from McCulloch, who all but dared Nixon to remove him –Nixon consistently declined, saying he had faith in the standing legal system.

“You have a democratically elected prosecutor,” Nixon said in an interview with the Post-Dispatch on Aug. 19, as strife in Ferguson continued. “At times of stress to democracy, you need to look at the process that has served our state and country well.”

While supporting the “process,” Nixon had notably withheld specific support for McCulloch, to the point of hinting that he wouldn’t mind if McCulloch decided on his own to step down. “If he thinks that he wants to do that, certainly. That’s his call,” Nixon said during that interview.

Wednesday’s demonstration outside McCulloch’s office was in progress as news spread that Nixon had lifted the state of emergency.

Spokespeople for Nixon’s office and for Missouri Attorney General Chris

Koster confirmed the move eliminates Nixon’s legal authority to remove McCulloch from the case.

Some of the participants responded by insisting that, even if Nixon no longer has the legal power to take McCulloch off the investigation, he could still pressure him to leave.

That appears unlikely.

McCulloch has acknowledged Nixon’s authority to remove him during a state of emergency, but he has consistently said he won’t step down on his own.

“I certainly have no intention of walking away from the responsibilities that the people have entrusted me with, but I also understand if the governor were to do that, he has that right,” McCulloch told KMOX Radio in midAugust.

Democratic state Sen. Jamilah Nasheed, talking to the media after Wednesday’s demonstration, alleged that Nixon and McCulloch have been “playing ping pong on the back of a dead man.” She warned that if McCulloch remains on the case, acts of civil disobedience will continue.

The demonstrators announced the formation of the “Don’t Shoot Coalition.”

The Rev. Rebecca Turner of Faith Aloud said that the coalition represents an agreement among diverse groups to “come together over the basics of what is right and what is wrong.”

State, Sec. Hagel says

By James Rosen McClatchy Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON —Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said Wednesday that more than 100 Americans are fighting with Islamic State militants, the first time the Pentagon chief has put a number on U.S. citizens aiding the terrorists.

Hagel cited the Americans aiding the jihadists to illustrate the threat that the Islamic State poses to the United States.

“We are aware of over 100 U.S. citizens who have U.S. passports who are fighting in the Middle East with ISIL forces,” Hagel told CNN, using the U.S. government’s preferred acronym for the Islamic State. “There may be more. We don’t know.”

U.S. intelligence officials have said that as many as 300 Americans may have joined forces with the Islamic State.

They are among thousands of Westerners believed to be fighting alongside the militants.

Hagel spoke after U.S. analysts verified as real a video released Tuesday showing the beheading of reporter Steven Sotloff, the second American journalist slain in such a gruesome manner, following the slaying of James Foley, a video of which was posted Aug. 19.

“It makes you sick to your stomach, but it again reminds you of the brutality and barbarism that is afoot in some places in the world,”

Hagel said.

Vice President Joe Biden used stronger words Wednesday during a speech in Portsmouth, N.H. “When people harm Americans, we don’t retreat, we don’t forget,” Biden said.

“We take care of those who are grieving.”

His voice rising to almost a shout, Biden added: “And when that’s finished, they should know we will follow them to the gates of hell until they are brought to justice _ because hell is where they will reside. Hell is where they will reside.”

President Barack Obama employed more restrained language in making a similar point.

“Those who make the mistake of harming Americans will learn that we will not forget ... that our reach is long and that justice will be served,” Obama told reporters in the Estonian capital of Tallinn.

Obama was to join other allied leaders Thursday and Friday at a NATO summit in Wales.

In the videos released by the Islamic State, the black-shrouded figures who beheaded Foley and Sotloff spoke with a British accent.

About 500 Brits are believed to be fighting with the group, along with hundreds more from France, Russia and other European countries.

The Islamic State militants have said the beheadings are their response to

U.S. airstrikes that Obama launched against them in Iraq almost four weeks ago.

Hagel made his remarks during an interview at the U.S. Naval War College in Newport, R.I. He said extending the bombing campaign to Syria, the terror group’s hub, is among a number of military options he and other national security leaders are considering, though he ruled out sending U.S. combat troops to the region.

Since the Islamic State fighters began sweeping across Iraq almost three months ago, Obama has dispatched 760 American troops to advise Iraqi forces, set up joint operations centers in Baghdad and Irbil, and to assess the threat.

Under the War Powers Act, Obama is asking Congress for authorization to send 405 more troops to Iraq, with 55 to be pulled out for a net increase of 350.

Obama has faced criticism in recent weeks for taking too long to come up with a strategy to counter the militants.

“They control half of Iraq today,” Hagel said Wednesday. “They control half of Syria today. We better take them seriously.”

Hagel urged Congress to approve Obama’s request for $500 million to equip and train moderate Syrian rebels who are combating both the Islamic State fighters and Syrian forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar Assad.

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EXCHANGE

Los Angeles Times

COURTESY OF PETER FENTON

Iraqi exchange students bond with students from UMass at Harvard University in Cambridge. new family here.”

“I have read many American novels and I have watched many movies so it was like I had experienced (America) before,” added Shkar Nazdar, 23, of Halabja, Iraq. “But interacting with the people was something different.”

And while they were only on campus for six weeks, many students were confident that this experience, both inside and outside of the classroom, would give them the tools necessary to make changes in their home

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Writer Chales Bowden, who chronicled border drug violence, dies at 69

continued from page b1

By Steve Chawkins

region of Iraq. “There is war between Iraq and the U.S., a lot of terrorism problems, so I was expecting it to be like this, but it wasn’t true.”

And what many students said attributed to this welcoming atmosphere was the American students who worked with them throughout the program.

“It’s my first time being alone, traveling outside of Iraq on my own, without my family,” Mohammed said. “But now I’m comfortable with it, I found a

Thursday, September 4, 2014

country.

“We have a lack of this environment and health care in Iraq. Public Policy is the solution,” Manssor said.

“We live in a country which is the top country for corruption,” Nazdar added. “We will try to implement what we have learned and try to develop our community through what we have learned here and try to be the future leaders of Iraq.”

Jaclyn Bryson can be reached at jbryson@umass.edu.

LOS ANGELES — Charles Bowden, a chronicler of the Southwest who started as a nature writer but became known for his gritty yet lyrical nonfiction narratives of drug violence and hopelessness on the U.S.-Mexico border, has died. He was 69.

Bowden, who had been complaining of fatigue for several weeks, died during a nap Saturday afternoon at his home in Las Cruces, N.M., his friend Ray Carroll said. The cause of death has yet to be determined.

While his early books were compared to those of the iconoclastic environmental writer Edward Abbey, a friend of his, Bowden was more famous for his unsparing descriptions of life and death on the border.

“Probably more than any other U.S. author, he has revealed the intricacies of the violence haunting Ciudad Juarez,” the Texas Tribune said in 2010. “He’s swatted at flies swarming fresh bloodstains and reported from a house where bodies were drenched in acid before burial.”

Bowden’s Mexican saga started innocuously in 1995, when he read a brief news account about a 13-year-old illegal immigrant in El Paso using an Uzi to fatally shoot a 27-year-old suit salesman.

It was only the latest in a lengthy torrent of similar news items _ and, for that reason, it struck Bowden hard.

“My God,” he recalled in an interview years later, “we’re killing people like it was Vietnam and nobody’s doing anything.”

In 2002, Bowden released “Down by the River,” a complex tale of drugs and despair

that lay behind the news brief about the salesman’s death seven years earlier.

Other books on border turmoil followed.

In “Murder City: Ciudad Juarez and the Global Economy’s New Killing Fields,” Bowden wrote of two Mexicos: “There is the one reported by the U.S. press, a place where the Mexican president is fighting a valiant war against the evil forces of the drug world. ... This Mexico has newspapers, courts, the laws and is seen by the U.S. government as a sister republic. It does not exist.”

Bowden’s other Mexico was a brutal free-for-all “where the line between government and the drug world has never existed.”

In 2011, he and New Mexico State University research librarian Molly Molloy co-edited “El Sicario: The Autobiography of a Mexican Assassin,” the story of a contrite hit man. It also appeared as the documentary film “El Sicario: Room 164.”

When “El Sicario” was screened at the 2010 Venice Film Festival, about 50 critics walked out, Bowden told the Santa Fean magazine.

“People left when he began describing how he’d boil people alive,” Bowden said. “Apparently people can’t handle Mexican reality.”

His other books include “Killing the Hidden Waters” (1977) ; “Blue Desert” (1986); and “Blood Orchid: An Unnatural History of America” (1995), a road story that weaves together the tales of convicted swindler Charles Keating and dying Native American man Robert Sundance.

Over the years, critics

were impressed by Bowden’s writing, but some also felt it could be over the top.

At times, “he sounds like Walt Whitman in a very bad mood,” David Kipen wrote in the San Francisco Chronicle in 2002.

Writing in the Washington Monthly in 2010, Andres Martinez said that Bowden, while excelling as “Juarez’s chronicler of death,” presented a distorted view of the city.

“There are plenty of civil society groups, businesspeople, politicians and even security units that are clean and trying to do what is right,” Martinez wrote, “even if they are currently overwhelmed and outgunned.”

Born in Joliet, Ill., on July 20, 1945, Bowden spent his boyhood in Chicago. At 12, his family moved to Tucson for his asthmatic sister’s health.

Bowden graduated from the University of Arizona and received a master’s degree in American intellectual history from the University of Wisconsin. He taught history briefly at the University of Illinois-Chicago Circle.

In the early 1980s, he was down on his luck back in Tucson. Lying about his experience, he became a crime reporter on the now-defunct Tucson Citizen newspaper. In 1984, he was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in feature writing.

Bowden was married twice.

Five years ago, he moved from Tucson to Las Cruces to live with Molly Molloy, his co-editor on “El Sicario” and founder of a website _ www. fronteralist.org _ that tracks violent deaths in Juarez.

In addition to Molloy, his survivors include his son, Jesse.

Merkel loses patience as NATO talks draw near Chancellor fed up with Putin talks

By Robyn Dixon Los Angeles Times

GROSSOSTHEIM, Germany — As Russia has expanded its military footprint in neighboring Ukraine, German Chancellor Angela Merkel has held repeated consultations with Russian P re s i d e n t Vladimir Putin, so numerous that the German magazine Der Spiegel recently tried to count the phone calls between Berlin and Moscow since November.

At least 25, it concluded. Or possibly 35.

As the only top Western leader who still talks frequently to Putin, German Chancellor Angela Merkel has played a pivotal role in efforts to curb Russian aggression in Ukraine through sanctions while seeking to bridge a rift between NATO and Russia that threatens a new Cold War. So far, the Russian leader hasn’t bent, and Merkel’s patience appears to be wearing thin. What more she and her Western colleagues can do is a frustrating question that Merkel and her allies must finally try to answer.

NATO leaders meet in Wales on Thursday with the alliance facing perhaps its greatest challenge since the collapse of the Soviet Union. They are expected to show a united front, imposing yet more sanctions on Moscow and approving a

force that could rapidly deploy to Europe’s borders with Russia.

Merkel and her fellow Western leaders are angered by Russia’s actions in Ukraine, especially its seizure of Crimea, support for pro-Russia separatists in eastern Ukraine and fresh military incursion. Moscow’s denial that it has any involvement in Ukraine’s blood conflict only irks them more.

The German chancellor has signaled a tougher stance toward Russia, spelling out her willingness to sacrifice German economic interests and further boost sanctions to send a strong message that Moscow’s actions are unacceptable.

“Being able to change borders in Europe without consequences, and attacking other countries with troops, is in my view a far greater danger than having to accept certain disadvantages for the economy,” she said Monday after delivering an address to the German Parliament.

But with military support for Ukraine ruled out, and Germany firmly opposed to anything but a negotiated political solution, many worry that NATO’s actions will sting but not deter Russia from its military incursion in Ukraine. With both sides hardening their positions, their relations are in the deep freeze, and getting colder.

“She’s balancing all sides, with no real success, quite honestly,” said analyst Stefan Kornelius,

author of Merkel’s authorized biography. “She has not managed to move Putin one inch.”

Merkel’s central role in maintaining a united European front faced with the Ukraine crisis - and her country’s influence with Putin - are partly a reflection of German economic power in Europe, analysts say. Germany has significant economic links with Russia: It imports nearly a third of its energy from and is the biggest European exporter to Russia.

Merkel has never had the cozy relationship that her predecessor, Gerhard Schroeder, cultivated with Putin. But she gets the Russian leader, his background and his geopolitical concerns in a way that eludes other Western leaders, according to analysts.

Raised in East Germany, she speaks Russian; Putin, formerly stationed as a KGB officer in East Germany, is fluent in German.

Since the fall of the Soviet Union, Germany has been understanding of Russia’s prickly hypersensitivity over its loss of its superpower status.

After NATO’s expansion to include Poland in 1999 and the Baltic states in 2004, Moscow viewed efforts to bring Ukraine and Georgia into the alliance as a provocative threat to its interests. Merkel opposed the move, seeking to not antagonize Russia.

Putin has fostered the economic links with Germany and played on tension between NATO partners, hoping to divide

Europe. Russia offered asylum to Edward Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor who revealed the extent of American Internet and cellphone surveillance, including his allegation that the United States tapped Merkel’s cellphone, a revelation that deeply angered the German leader.

But lately, Merkel has grown impatient with Putin’s denials of Russian support for eastern Ukraine’s separatists, even as NATO offers evidence of a growing Russian troop presence in the east.

“I think what’s interesting about Merkel is that she has overcome some initial caution on how to handle the crisis and her view is that sanctions are needed as part of the effort to dissuade Russia from its current course,” said John Lough, associate fellow with London-based think tank Chatham House.

“The German government placed a good deal of trust in Mr. Putin, and his government embar rassed Germany.”

Kornelius, the biographer, said Merkel now sees Putin as an unreliable figure, out of touch with reality.

“Her basic view on Putin is we keep on talking, but he’s not to be trusted,” Kornelius said in a telephone interview.

“He can reverse everything he says within minutes, pretty much saying he’s a liar. She never expected too much, but he’s disappointed her so much. She’s

given up hoping that he can be encamped somewhere within our system of democratic, law-based countries.

“Russia’s relations with the West have really unraveled fully. We can’t really think how to renew them.

This fire has to blow out before you can assess the damage.”

There are significant business interests and political forces in Germany opposed to tough action against Moscow, including leading members of the Social Democratic Party.

But as Merkel’s position on Russia has changed, their influence has waned.

Merkel hardened her stance when Putin grabbed the Crimean peninsula in March, and more so after Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 was shot down in July by separatists using a missile that Russia was accused of supplying.

“You have a huge faction of society which is sympathetic to Putin and Russia,” said Kornelius, citing a public opinion poll in March in which most Germans supported a more neutral stance in the conflict. But “what Putin did reversed public opinion here” with the pro-Russia camp “losing influence every day.”

On Monday, Merkel made it clear that she rejected Putin’s characterization of the Ukraine crisis as a civil war, calling it a conflict between Moscow and Kiev. But she strongly opposes military support or the supply of arms to Ukraine, insisting that the

only solution is a negotiated political settlement.

The escalating sanctions aim to make it so expensive for Russia that Putin will quietly abandon the separatists. But they’ve had the opposite effect, according to some analysts, with Russia continuing its wellworn path of supporting the opposition in neighboring states to keep those countries weak and fearful.

Lough said Germany was “signaling to Russia that if you do this, a very bad situation is going to get worse, and it’s going to be worse for you than it is for us. So far the Russians haven’t heeded those warnings. We are getting into something of a downward spiral that it’s difficult to see a way out of.”

Despite Merkel’s search for a political solution, so far there has been no final deal that would stabilize Ukraine, end Russian interference and allay Western concerns.

Putin has suggested Kiev offer the separatists some form of autonomy or independence, a proposal that seems to reward Russia’s intervention and give it indefinite leverage in eastern Ukraine. Putin has made it clear that he’s unwilling to give up Crimea.

“NATO is not prepared to fight a war with Russia over Ukraine, and he’s prepared to fight a war,” said Kornelius. “Since no one is prepared to fight for Ukraine or deliver weapons to Ukraine, there’s not much for him to lose.”

Opinion Editorial THE MASSACHUSETTS DAILY COLLEGIAN

“I’m an ordinary guy burning down the house.” - Talking Heads

Thursday, September 4, 2014

‘Let’s keep the summer attitude’

Market Basket’s socialist values When Athanasios (Arthur) and Efrosini Demoulas opened a neighborhood grocery store in

Zac Bears 1916, they could not have imagined it would tear their family apart or that its struggle to survive almost a century later would exemplify the power of American workers.

Last Thursday, Arthur S. Demoulas agreed to sell his 50.5 percent share of Market Basket – the now 71 store chain – to his cousin, rival and beloved Market Basket CEO Arthur T. Demoulas.

Both grandchildren of the original Arthur and Efrosini, the two Demoulas have been locked in a power struggle for control of Market Basket for nearly

New Englanders have and might always be known for their less

Market Basket is a nonunion shop. Its workers do not have the protection of a labor union or collective bargaining agreement. But what they did have was a CEO who ran a company on the principle of social responsibility. By providing good compensation, he created livelihoods for thousands of people. By providing low prices, he made it easier for penny-pinching Bay Staters to buy milk and bread. Shareholder capitalism, personified by Arthur S., thought that was a mistake.

Thomas Kochan wrote in the Boston Globe that Market Basket workers “asserted an implicit right of ‘ownership’ of what they believe to be their company.” There is awesome power when workers feel a sense of

“Most workers and firms are not lucky enough to have a CEO raised by his family with an innate sense of social responsibility.”

20 years, after Arthur T.’s father stole a majority of the company’s shares from the family of Arthur S. An early 1990s court settlement left Arthur S. and his allies with majority control.

While the family of Arthur S. controlled a majority share, his sisterin-law, Rafaela Evans, continued to vote with Arthur T. until this spring, keeping him in control of the company.

When Evans switched sides, the board of directors voted to oust CEO Arthur T. That’s when the trouble started.

Within hours, workers, both on the floor and in management, had stopped ordering and restocking stores and encouraged customers to boycott the store. Why would workers show such passion for their CEO? Because, even though Market Basket is renowned for its low prices, it pays workers good wages with benefits, invests them in a profit sharing plan and provides ample room for upward advancement.

So why would Arthur S. want to oust a successful CEO who is respected by the workers and creates an exceptional customer experience? There are two reasons: the first is familial animosity. The second? Profits.

Market Basket is a privately-held company, meaning its profits are split between a small group of family shareholders, like Arthur T., Arthur S. and Rafaela Evans. When prices are low and wages are high, profits are squeezed, which means less money flowing into shareholder pockets.

When Arthur S. convinced Evans to switch her vote, part of his argument was that a new CEO could maximize profits by lowering compensation and/or raising prices.

Evans bought it. The workers didn’t.

Editorial@DailyCollegiancom

ownership over their corporation. Although they were not given a ballot, they voted for their boss. That sounds a lot like socialism to me.

Again and again in this country we are instilled with the idea that socialism is “bad,” clearly a vestige of Cold War propaganda campaigns. But socialism is not bad. In fact, socialism is what played out during this Market Basket standoff.

Socialism means that workers help to select their leaders, no more and no less. It is not a government takeover of private business. It is not President Barack Obama riding an undead steed to murder your grandmother.

It is when workers help to select their leaders.

This shows us that, even behind the propaganda, both workers and consumers fundamentally believe in the tenets of socialism.

Socialism helps to give corporations a sense of social responsibility, represented

by Arthur T.’s management style. Most workers and firms are not lucky enough to have a CEO raised by his family with an innate sense of social responsibility. In fact, we can see from Arthur S. that corporate decisionmaking is more often based on profit motive.

“Words cannot express how much I appreciate each and every one of you,” Arthur T. said at his press conference announcing the purchase of his cousins’ shares. “We are equal.

Everyone here has a purpose. ... No one person is better or more important than another.”

“Respect and honor and dignity is a way of life,” Arthur T. concluded. “In this organization ... everyone is special.”

I guess that’s what it was really about all along.

Zac Bears is the Opinion & Editorial Editor. He can be reached at ibears@ umass.edu.

Ian Hagerty than welcoming demeanor. We all know it. It’s that look –well rather lack of a look– that you get from a stranger when walking by them on the street. With the University of Massachusetts situated in the center of New England, it is easy to imagine that this attitude, be it a cliché or not, is very prevalent on campus.

I could be wrong about the reasons for this generally unwelcoming attitude on campus, but in my personal experience, it does exist.

I thought, maybe it’s just the cold weather or the pressure of school, but after attending a music festival, the Gathering of the Vibes, over the summer, I thought again.

Immediately upon entering Vibes this summer, it felt like an entirely different world. Strangers were introducing themselves to other strangers as far as the eye could see. People wore the clothes that they loved, not the ones their peers approved of. You couldn’t walk for more than a couple of minutes without meeting someone new or sharing something, anything, with a completely previously unknown human being. There was a feeling of community, deeply rooted amongst the festival goers that felt much like what you might experience in a small town less touched by the outside world. You could tell another that they were beautiful as casually as discussing the weather. There was a general feeling of mutual trust.

Now I know this was a music

festival and therefore it can’t be compared to life exactly. After all, people are almost exclusively at music festivals for pleasure, while school can cause any number of different emotional reactions from the people attending it. School stresses people out. It is fair to say that this makes school and music festivals very different. However, I still think that we can learn something from the communal nature of a music festival.

“You couldn’t walk for more than a couple of minutes without meeting someone new or sharing something, anything, with a completely, previously unknown human being.”

People really need to let their guard down a little bit on campus.

This isn’t to say that you shouldn’t be cautious, especially when walking around alone at night, but rather that people should be more welcoming to their fellow students. Have you ever sat in a lecture hall and found it awkward to even ask someone sitting directly next to you a question?

Or have you ever needed to find a class or office around campus, only to have trouble making eye contact with those around you?

An easy way to picture this is to imagine how many people you see on campus every day with their headphones in as they walk around.

There isn’t anything wrong with listening to some good music, especially if you need to relax or concentrate, but I honestly think that we foster a community of unfriendliness around UMass.

Of course, there are exceptions.

Certainly there are many friendly and welcoming people all around campus that make this school the wonderful place that it is. I just can’t help but think that it could be much better. Sometimes, when I walk around campus, it just reminds me of New York City. New York is a vibrant and wonderful place, filled with culture and educated people, striving for something better. I see this in both the city as well as UMass. At the same time, though, New Yorkers are hard pressed to make eye contact with a stranger walking by. This body language and the mentality associated with it are often created to serve as a safety bubble. You can understand this attitude in a place like the city. After all, crime has often run rampant in the history of New York. UMass, at least to me, seems less menacing.

The message I am trying to convey is just that we should all enter the new school year with open arms and an open mind. If you had any summer fun at a festival like I did, help spread that joy and sense of mutual love and respect to all of those around you. This is already our home and school– let’s treat everyone like family.

Ian Hagerty is a Collegian columnist. He can be reached at ihagerty@umass.edu.

Tips for freshman (and future) success

Freshman year of college is the first taste of adulthood for many. For nine months of the year, you’re on your own. You can go out on the

Steve Gillard weekend and you don’t have to text your mom to let her know where you are. You can eat pizza for dinner every night. And that 8 a.m. class? Nobody is making you go to it.

The freedom of college, as awesome as it is, can also be a difficult transition for many. The absolute autonomy, coupled with being thrust into a brand new environment in which you are essentially friendless, can prove to be a challenge to even the most social and motivated people.

Here are some tips to make the transition to college easier:

Leave your door open I can’t stress this enough.

Freshmen year of college, I looked at all the people on my floor meeting and assumed we would never be friends because I wouldn’t see them in class every day. Twenty minutes later, when the meeting ended, a few of my neighbors walked into my room to see what a triple looked like, and I made friends who I still talk to this day. It’s as simple as that. The people living on your floor or in your hallway are in the same situation as you. They have no friends. They want to meet people. The college atmosphere is even more conducive to making friends than high school because you’re living with them. Leave your door open, introduce yourself to your neighbors and let people know that you’re not some loner who would prefer to sit in his room alone playing Call of Duty.

Get involved

I’ve noticed in my two years of college that those who are involved in clubs and intramurals are almost always more satisfied with living at school than those who aren’t. Not only do clubs provide you with a way to meet people, but they also give you something to do. If you spend your free time watching television or napping, your college experience is guaranteed to get really dull, really fast. Play an intramural, write for the newspaper or rush a fraternity or sorority. Do something.

“While you’re at school, your only responsibility is to learn, but it shouldn’t be a full time job.”

Go to class I’m not going to sit here and say that the occasional skipped class used to catch up on sleep or homework isn’t beneficial—that would be an idealized portrait of college life.

With that being said—make an effort to go to class. I’ve witnessed numerous people who were chronic skippers, sleeping through their 8 a.m. classes every day or only showing up to a class for the midterm and final.

Although there are many distractions that come with living at college, keep in mind that you are there for an education and that you are paying thousands of dollars for it. Plus, no matter how much of the course content you think you can learn from reading the textbook or viewing the Powerpoint online, going to class and listening to a professor teach it helps.

Communicate with your professors

In every piece of college advice, communication with professors is always stressed, but it’s easier said than done. Professors can often be intimidating, and you spend enough time with them in the classroom, why would you want to talk with them one-on-one? Professors are required to have office hours. They want to talk to you one-on-one. If you’re in a big lecture, meeting with the professor one-on-one can do wonders to help you understand a lesson you might have not fully understood. If you’re in a smaller class, meeting with a professor to discuss a paper can prove invaluable, and the benefit is twofold: you receive specific feedback and insight into what the professor wants, and you become a name to them.

A lot of people in larger universities complain of anonymity, but that doesn’t have to be the case. From personal experience, all of my one-onone interactions with professors have been turned out to be overwhelmingly positive.

Have fun While you’re at school, your only responsibility is to learn, but it shouldn’t be a full time job. Don’t spend your four years as an undergrad wasting away in front of a laptop writing lab reports or 12-page papers.

Take a break. Have some fun. Spend all night playing Xbox. Go to football games. Order calzones at 2 a.m. Go to parties (but don’t get arrested).

You’re at college to work, but you will be working for the rest of your life, so make sure you have fun too.

Steven Gillard is a Collegian columnist. He can be reached at sgillard@umass.edu.

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The Massachusetts Daily Collegian is published Monday through Thursday during the University of Massachusetts calendar semester. The Collegian is independently funded, operating on advertising revenue. Founded in 1890, the paper began as Aggie Life, became the College Signal in 1901, the Weekly Collegian in 1914 and the Tri–Weekly Collegian in 1956. Published daily from 1967 to 2013, The Collegian has been broadsheet since January 1994. For advertising rates and information, call 413-545-3500.

WEB PRODUCTION MANAGER - Conor Snell NEWS DESK EDITOR - Katrina Borofski O p /E d DESK EDITOR - Ian Hagerty | Zac Bears ARTS DESK EDITOR - Alex Frail SPORTS DESK EDITOR - Sports Staff COMICS DESK EDITOR - Tracy Krug GRAPHICS DESK EDITOR - James Desjardin | Randy Crandon

Arts Living THE MASSACHUSETTS DAILY COLLEGIAN

“They call it a Royale with Cheese.” - Vincent Vega

Thursday, September 4, 2014

Arts@DailyCollegian.com

FILM REVIEW

‘Under the Skin’ an entrancing avant-garde experience Glazer’s new gem beautiful but alien

By Nathan Frontiero Collegian Staff

It is a warm Friday afternoon in late April. I am sitting in a coffee shop having a conversation with an excellent teacher. He tells me to see a film called “Under the Skin” that’s just opened at the local Cinemark. I add it to the top of my ever-lengthening mental list, and on the following Wednesday, after finishing my last day of classes before break, I catch a bus to the theater. Two hours later I leave that dark room and step outside. Rain starts to fall as a fog rolls in. I’m waiting for the bus back to campus, my hair slowly dampening on my forehead and I realize something is off. Nothing outside the theater has changed, but the world itself seems different somehow.

For the first few minutes of “Under the Skin,” I had no idea what I was looking at or what was happening. Bursts of light and indecipherable imagery filled the frame as a voice practiced consonants over the score. As an opening sequence, this sets a structural precedent for the rest of the film. You won’t necessarily understand everything that happens in “Under the Skin,” and that’s okay. It is

clear that the movie exists within director Jonathan Glazer’s striking surrealistic imagination.

Everything that transpires in “Under the Skin” is left unexplained. Glazer makes the daring choice to disguise much of the story, never fully revealing which events are to be interpreted literally. Like the subjects of his occasional Kubrickian tracking shots, certain subtle storytelling threads effuse naturally into clarity while others defy comprehension. Mica Levi’s glowing, alien score, a mix of viola and synth that can be both beautiful and beautifully cacophonous, perfectly immerses the audience in the film’s initial moments. The music then acts as an omniscient narrator, abstractly vocalizing the main character’s thoughts. Organic and artificial strings swell in and out to match the sincerity of the mysterious protagonist’s emotions. Drums resound with an unnerving quietness at each sinister turn.

Daniel Landin’s gorgeous cinematography and Paul Watts’ razor sharp editing keep the more overt narrative breaks visually compelling. The screen is sometimes bathed entirely in red, or stripped down to chilling blue on black. Bookending these color stabs are simpler scenes that are just as evocative. Some of the film’s most

disturbing images are also its simplest and briefest. Barely lingering shots of an overwhelming sprawl of forest, or an abandoned baby screaming on a lonely beach, are utterly terrifying.

More shocking still are those moments captured unbeknownst to the public.

Multiple scenes were filmed with hidden cameras and Glazer maintains an objective gaze through every lens.

The entire production underlines the film’s voyeuristic feel. Witnessing the day to day activity of an unscripted environment, when juxtaposed with the darkness of the written subject matter, is especially jarring. This secretive approach makes every shot feel thrillingly alive.

The camera seats the viewer behind the eyes of another.

The audience becomes vicariously extraterrestrial.

It helps to have an actress at the helm who can carry such avant-garde trappings with subtlety. Scarlett Johansson does just that, delivering the finest performance of her career. As the only Hollywood player in the film (the rest of the cast are non-actors), she is always under the spotlight.

And she astounds as she captures every nuance of the outsider she portrays. She skitters effortlessly across the emotional spectrum; try not to feel chills when her

FILM REVIEW

Scarlett Johansson shines in the indie gem “Under the Skin.” face melts from seductively feigned friendliness to hungry frustration. Her eyes will pierce your skin.

Johansson’s unnamed alien drives around Scotland in search of lonely men. The cameras follow her focus as she offers passing glances to random pedestrians.

In a deeply affecting character arc, this mysterious gaze shifts from predatory to empathetic as the alien stranger begins to understand and assimilate with humanity.

Perhaps the most heart-

breaking facet of “Under the Skin” is its sub-textual treatment of the female experience. More than just revealing humanity from an inhuman gaze, Glazer reflects on an unfortunate truth of modern society. As an alien begins to assume her humanity, and especially her femininity, she is forcefully robbed of her agency. The inclusion of that subtle commentary adds a sobering emotional gravity.

“Under the Skin” is an entrancing film. Glazer fills his canvas with often purposefully bizarre composi-

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tions, but the film always feels achingly organic. This is an enlightening work of art. For 108 minutes, my eyes were fused to the screen, my mind and soul arrested, frightened and awakened. I walked out of the theater in sheer awe.

It has taken me months to process this film, and I am ecstatic to finally return to it.

“Under the Skin” hasn’t just stayed with me. The film is in me. It has changed me.

Nathan Frontiero can be reached at nfrontiero@umass.edu.

FILM REVIEW

‘Snowpiercer’ fights to front ‘Boyhood’ earns its place amongst cinema’s finest

By Nathan Frontiero Collegian Staff

“Snowpiercer” is a bullet train. The film, like its titular locomotive, races along at breakneck speed. It blitzes through its two hours and bursts through the earthly obstacles in its path. Director Bong Joon-ho packs a striking brutality into his Englishlanguage debut. The result is a unique and darkly compelling piece of speculative filmmaking.

Crackling radio clips introduce the audience to Bong’s world. The inevitability of climate change has inspired an environmental experiment that sends the world into a new ice age. We flash forward 17 years as a black screen gives way to a shot of a massive train racing through the snowy night. This is the Snowpiercer, an engineering marvel that now houses all the remaining life on earth.

Bong holds nothing back in his vision of the near future. Classism takes the fore, embodied and organized by the cars of the train.

The director first seats us in the caboose, where the poor struggle for breathing room.

Wealthy passengers live in florid decadence in the front.

On the Snowpiercer, everyone is kept firmly in place; the doors between cars serve as literal socioeconomic barriers. Armed guards beat anyone who dares to attempt to move beyond his or her car.

Railroad aristocrats periodically steal children from the back for a particularly appalling purpose. They gorge themselves on fine cuisine while the poor are fed slimy protein blocks made from ground insects. Towards the front, a drugged out nightclub serves as an explicit display of the disgusting decadence.

This social divide is embodied in Bong’s use of color. A grimy palette of black, dim brown and grey establishes

A visionary film 12 years in the making

By Alex Frail Collegian Staff

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Society has devolved into a ruthless class system on the Snowpiercer. the tail inhabitants’ suffering even before some mild exposition confirms it. And when a member of the upper crust steps into the back, the resulting splash of bright fabric further emphasizes the segregation. Later, Bong frames an especially violent sequence in a sauna with a yellow haze. We see careless bathers wrapped in towels as guards attempt to bury the rebels in bullets. Witnessing these echelons steeped in blood is powerfully disturbing.

The propaganda surrounding the train and its factions adds to the film’s chilling immersion. Rapid tone shifts are wonderfully jarring. At one point, a pregnant teacher performs a saccharine song praising Wilford, the train’s mysterious creator and the keeper of the engine, to her students from atop a rotating organ platform. Bong seamlessly transitions that overblown visual sweetness into something far more sinister and the effect is devastating.

Bong hides Chris Evans’ impressive Captain America physique under cleverly placed clothing and uses makeup to hollow his cheeks.

Tilda Swinton’s twitchy Minister Mason spouts cultish praise for Wilford. The characters extend beyond the cast; even the engine itself is

described as a type of deity by the wealthier passengers.

Unlike the train, “Snowpiercer” is not a film powered by a perpetual motion engine. Bong presents a collection of bold ideas and exciting aesthetics, but it doesn’t fully coalesce into a whole. The director seems to be missing that one masterstroke that cements his artistic thesis. Dystopian genre tropes become more noticeable in the film’s final act. There’s a hint of “Brave New World” as the philosophy of social stratification is once again explained in an endgame sequence, and the culmination of the “fight to the front” rebellion can’t help but feel like trite déjà vu.

Chris Evans remains committed even through the film’s rustier tracks. The star delivers a performance with enough emotional depth to save the slightly heavyhanded finale. When Curtis breaks, I broke with him.

Bong uses our last moments with the character to bolt down the bizarre, painful truths of this world. It works.

“Snowpiercer” eventually runs off the rails, but the film leaves a mark.

Nathan Frontiero can be reached at nfrontiero@umass.edu.

When I sat down to write this review, I could think of nothing but praise for Richard Linklater’s “Boyhood,” a 12 year project that follows a six-year-old until he graduates from high school. I also thought that anything I could write would be cliché. “Boyhood” has been called a classic, a landmark, and one of the greatest films ever made – and all that before its release. Once you see it, you will realize that these are no hyperboles.

Linklater’s film defies our idea of what a movie can be.

Linklater began filming “Boyhood” in 2002 and picked Ellar Coltrane to portray Mason Jr., the son of a divorced couple, Olivia (Patricia Arquette) and Mason Sr. (Ethan Hawke).

The director, who has already proved himself a visionary with the “Before…” trilogy, sculpted the film over time with a general vision of the narrative’s conclusion.

Some scenes, he has said in interviews, were written just before shooting.

The film benefits from its narrative’s elasticity. Rather than conceive a conclusion years in advance, “Boyhood” allows Mason to live without foreshadowing what follows the next year. As a result, Linklater’s film feels more genuine than a documentary might.

The film’s incorporation of soundtrack and events in real time bolster this authenticity. Linklater deftly works in notable moments, from the Iraq War to the midnight release of the sixth Harry

Potter book, while signaling the passage of years with music like Arcade Fire and Gotye. In effect, “Boyhood” is a time capsule, and an especially nostalgic one for young adults who grew up these past 12 years.

As Mason Jr. ages, you can see how Coltrane matures as well. At first a mischievous boy, Mason gradually grows into a thoughtful, rebellious teen and becomes a far more interesting character as Coltrane’s acting improves.

Early on, he can’t live up to the stellar supporting cast, but by his teenage years, his character becomes well defined as Coltrane simultaneously holds his own with Hawke and Arquette.

The real revelation here is Lorelei Linklater, the director’s daughter, who plays Mason’s sister, Samantha.

She leaps off the screen with the manic energy of a sister intent on annoying her brother. Linklater offers scenes that are both hilarious and moving. Watching her and Coltrane mature together is one of the film’s most beautiful aspects.

Together, Mason and Samantha face the dreaded talks about contraception, the marital troubles of their mother and the challenge of rebuilding their relationship with their absent father.

These are moments almost every child faces, but they’re never overwrought. They never try to be more than part of a greater masterpiece, like how subtle strokes in a painting can enhance its beauty rather than undermine its message.

The film’s modesty belies its own accomplishments.

Unlike the aging makeup in films like “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,” you actually watch these charac-

ters age 12 years. Secondly, because of Hollywood’s focus on profit, assembling a cast for twelve years is nothing short of a miracle. Even “The Lord of the Rings” took only 14 months to film.

Furthermore, its narrative intimacy (it’s really just about a boy) couples wonderfully with its epic scale.

Every day after you watch it, you’ll appreciate this film more and more.

The narrative also leaves some things unexplained, like Mason Sr.’s real activities when absent from Mason Jr.’s life. We get a peek into his life, but only so much as the boy does.

Similarly, Mason slowly grasps the dark side of his stepfather without the perspective of another adult. In a way, we’re living Mason’s life with him.

Linklater reserves the most moving scenes for Hawke. Hawke and Coltrane connect like real father and son from the start, and in the most complex role of his career, Hawke turns a troubled loner into a sympathetic parent. Despite missing years of his son’s life, he teaches credible life lessons and playful memories. As the film’s arbiter of wisdom, he offers understated lines like, “Life doesn’t give you bumpers.”

No film could do 12 years justice in a normal film’s running time. “Boyhood” runs nearly three hours, but I felt as if the lights flicked back on in less than one hour. Before you know it, Mason is no longer a shy six-year-old, and his boyhood vanishes in the blink of an eye. And that, I believe, is the film’s most lifelike quality of all.

Alex Frail can be reached at afrail@ umass.edu.

B6

Thursday, September 4, 2014

THE MASSACHUSETTS DAILY COLLEGIAN

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four day weeks are so much longer than regular five day weeks.

B y R andall M unroe

Weekend tips!

P oorly D rawn L ines

B y R eza F arazmand

aquarius

HOROSCOPES Jan. 20 - Feb. 18

Sadly, the bars are not supported by your meal plan.

pisces

Feb. 19 - Mar. 20

leo

Jul. 23 - Aug. 22

It’s a tried and true fact that if you don’t leave campus this weekend, you will never leave campus again.

virgo

Aug. 23 - Sept. 22

Gloriously, UMass does have a wings and pizza delivery service for all this weekends needs. Sadly, it is still not on your meal plan.

Make friends this weekend by walking into people’s rooms to introduce yourself. The one’s with the lights out are typically the best.

aries

Mar. 21 - Apr. 19

libra

Sept. 23 - Oct. 22

taurus

Apr. 20 - May. 20

scorpio

Oct. 23 - Nov. 21

gemini

May. 21 - Jun. 21

Going for a night on the town typically starts with at least leaving your dorm room.

Don’t make a fool out of yourself on Friday.

Summer shandies are so last summer. Think ahead and bring only egg nog to the party.

UMass Night Out hack: Late night swimming races in the Campus Pond start at 11 p.m. and are extremely competitive. See you there!

The campus ducks don’t want your Bud Light. No one wants your Bud Light.

sagittarius

Nov. 22 - Dec. 21

As a freshman, make sure to stay up really late this weekend. It’s the last time that action will ever be considered fun again.

It’s important to understand that making jungle juice for one is a depressing representation of our society as a whole.

cancer

capricorn

Jun. 22 - Jul. 22

Though tempting, pancakes never, ever taste good broken up onto a pizza.

Dec. 22 - Jan. 19

Contrary to popular belief, you can indeed win Late Night Berk. Just give it the ol’ college try.