by Connor Owens | Aug 22, 2020 | Galleries, News Slider, Sports
Lipscomb Academy football finally returned Friday night, but the weather and the outcome didn’t go as the Mustangs had desired. The visiting Mustangs fell to Brentwood Academy 29-19. Three minutes into the game, Mother Nature paid a little visit to Brentwood, resulting in a 30-minute lightning delay. Once given the all-clear, both sides were hoping for calmer weather for the remainder of the night, but once again lightning struck. After two lightning delays and an hour-and-a-half of waiting, the game resumed. Brentwood Academy drew first blood on a 23-yard touchdown run. Both sides were silent for the remainder of the half. With little action and a lot of punting on both sides, Brentwood Academy went into halftime with only a 7-3 lead. When the second half began and the rain cleared, both sides were able to focus more on their passing game. The Eagles struck once again early in the second with a four-yard touchdown run to increase the lead to 14-3. A couple of minutes later, a bad snap got away from Mustang quarterback Luther Richesson deep into the Eagles’ endzone, resulting in a safety. Later in the third quarter, a 59-yard touchdown pass from quarterback Tyler Monteil increased the Eagles’ lead to 22-3. Once the fourth quarter got underway, the Eagles saw their lead slowly begin to slip away, but the Mustang comeback was too little, too late. The Mustangs travel to Pope John Paul II High School next Friday...
by Connor Owens | Aug 20, 2020 | News, News Slider
The Lipscomb Academy football program will not have as many changes as it did a season ago, but there are some noticeable differences. Coming off of a transformation season with a new coach, the Mustangs are facing a season no one expected. Due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, Metro schools will not be allowed to compete until after Labor Day, causing the Mustangs to make a sudden schedule change. Instead of hosting the Glencliff Colts to open year two under Trent Dilfer, the program was forced to drop the Colts and will now travel to Brentwood Academy to open the 2020 campaign. “Cody White [Brentwood Academy’s head football coach] and BA had the same situation where they had an opening,” Dilfer said. “We scrimmaged last year and talked about playing each other in future years. BA had an opening week one, so it was a natural fit.” When asked about the level of competition BA will bring his team, Dilfer said, “My goal is to build a premier program in Tennessee and one day the country. So, you have to play teams better than you, teams that have ‘been there done that’, and you have to play the standard. I’d say BA is the standard. They’ve done it all as a school and as a football program as well as anybody.” Another major change for the Mustang football program is the installment of their new turf field. “I don’t think our challenges are any greater than everyone else,” Dilfer said. “I think how our turf fits into those challenges has to do with timelines, which I think we’re good...
by Camryn Given | Aug 18, 2020 | News, News Slider
Lipscomb President Randy Lowry said he “was a little bit surprised” by the interest in the summer class “Surviving and Thriving in Uncertain Times.” “We had about 200 students who took the course,” said Lowry about the new class he, with the aid of nine faculty members, taught online to incoming freshmen. Of course, due to the pandemic, the class was offered online and free of charge. The students gathered virtually to listen to the speaker, ask questions, engage in small-group discussions and take part in other activities. Lowry said the course, offered July 6-17, filled a need that he thought must exist. Knowing most of these freshmen have not had classes since around March when schools and universities nationwide shut down due to the pandemic, Lowry correctly predicted that some incoming freshmen might be anxious to get tastes of the Lipscomb educational experience. “I just had an idea that our incoming freshmen … must be bored and must want to get started,” said Lowry. The class was structured so that for the first part of the day students would have two 15- to 20-minute mini-lectures — or, as Lowry described them, “TED Talks” — from either himself or from another one of Lipscomb’s educators. A 15-minute video created by the College of Entertainment & the Arts was inserted into the programming for a change of pace. After the presentations from the faculty, there would be a live chat that allowed students to ask questions. Lowry described the Q&A sessions as very popular and said there were more than 100 questions. He said the students seemed “to be absolutely...
by Erika Plunkett | Aug 14, 2020 | COVID-19, News, News Slider, Sports
Lipscomb volleyball head coach Brandon Rosenthal was being hopeful that a season on the brink of COVID extinction would be rescued when he was interviewed recently. Now that the season has been postponed — the ASUN on Friday announced it was halting all fall sports because of the COVID epidemic and hoping to reschedule them for the spring — his and his players’ hopes have been dashed. Or at least delayed. In the interview prior to Friday’s news, Rosenthal said being “resilient” is a key factor for the team because the pandemic already had thrown the games and even practice into an uproar. At the time, possibilities being tossed around included playing only in-conference or moving the season into the spring. In making Friday’s announcement, ASUN Commissioner Ted Gumbart, called it “a huge disappointment.” “Anyone who follows college sports understands the dynamics that brought us to this decision, but that doesn’t mean we like it. My feelings right now? COVID stinks. If you weren’t putting my words into a public release, I might put it another way.” The postponement of competition in conference-sponsored fall semester sports includes men’s and women’s cross country, men’s and women’s soccer and volleyball. So far, the basketball seasons for men and women remain unaffected, at least in terms of scheduling games. Scheduling will be a big issue for the fall sports, though, now that they have to wait until spring, if the disease allows for play then. “We will make every effort to provide a quality competitive experience for our fall student-athletes during the spring semester,” Gumbart said in the conference press release. “We’re...
by Mckenzi Harris | Aug 13, 2020 | Galleries, News, News Slider
While the focus has been on adapting to the challenges brought on by COVID-19, Lipscomb also has been plenty busy this summer with more construction than in the last 15 years. The campus has a new parking garage, updated residence halls, a new turf football field at the Academy, updates to academic buildings and there’s even a new Chick-fil-A. August 2020 was the deadline for a new “200-spot parking garage,” announced by President Randy Lowry in the 2018-19 convocation. “The parking garage will be finished on time,” said President Lowry in a recent interview with Lumination. And no only will it be done in time, but it has 400 spaces instead of the previously mentioned 200 spaces. “Most of the parking done by residential students in the Stokes area, behind Stokes School will be able to happen on campus,” said Lowry. “That’s a huge step forward in convenience and also maybe in security, although we don’t have major problems over there (at Stokes). “I hope that people like the looks of it, and if you don’t look twice, it looks like an academic building,” said Lowry. The outdated freshman women’s dorm, Elam, has been updated to bring it up to modern times. “It was built about 60 years ago. It was in need of not just a little fix-up, but we took it down to the concrete and built the entire thing back,” Lowry said. Students living in Elam will no longer have the traditionally styled community bathrooms but now have private communal baths. “We built back a series of private baths,” said Lowry. “You’ll have your own shower, sink,...
by Gunnar Eng | Aug 10, 2020 | News, News Slider
Lipscomb is responding to the COVID pandemic by instituting LipscombFLEX, a classroom model that will accommodate health protocols and still allow students and faculty to interact. “The goal of the LipscombFLEX method is that students should receive an equivalent experience whether they are physically in the classroom or learning online,” said Andy Borchers, Lipscomb University professor and coordinator for fall classroom accommodations. LipscombFLEX will use video conferencing, new cameras, microphones, and online platforms to allow faculty to teach both students in the classroom and remotely online. Instruction has the option to be either all at the same class time or in asynchronous methods such as online written discussion groups or collaborative web platforms. “The new LipscombFLEX model essentially has every professor preparing for face-to-face class, but also fully preparing to be remote and online if they need to be,” said Lipscomb President Randy Lowry. Borchers describes a three-part plan for applying this modified Hyflex (short for “hybrid’’ and ‘‘flexible’’) model in education for the fall semester. “First, we inventoried all of the classrooms, to see how many students we could seat following the 6-feet limitations, which came out to about 30 percent to 50 percent capacity,” said Borchers. “Then we identified 40 classrooms across the campus that are going to receive a ‘Zoom Room’ installation,” Borchers said. “It will mean having a camera mounted typically on the ceiling with microphones, allowing teachers a mixture of students either physically in the room or remote.” More than 60 percent of students enrolled in classes will be in one of the “Zoom Rooms’’ on campus, while the other 40 percent will be divided...
