Wagner College football opens the season with optimism

[Seahawks]

Walt Hameline’s first game as head coach at Wagner College didn’t exactly follow the script.

“Kickoff return … punt return … fumble leading to a field goal,” Hameline recalled this week. “We’re down 17-0 about seven minutes into the game.

“I’m asking myself, ‘What am I doing?’ Yeah, I remember that like it was yesterday.”

That was 1981, when the 28-year-old Hameline was taken to the woodshed in a 28-0 loss to NCAA Division III power Montclair State.

Hameline’s Seahawks won their next nine games, finishing 9-1. The coach still sounds irked that the Seahawks were bypassed for a spot in the national playoffs.

Wagner opens another season tomorrow night with a non-conference game against Division II Assumption College at Worcester, Mass. The Seahawks have long since departed the Division III ranks and now play limited-scholarship football in what formerly was called NCAA Division I-AA.

The NEC champion will earn an automatic bid into the national tournament — or more specifically the NCAA Division I FCS playoffs — for the first time.

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