THE INDEPENDENT STUDENT PUBL ICAT ION OF THE UN IVERS I TY AT BUFFALO , S INCE 1950

Friday, dECEmbEr 4, 2015ubspECtrum.Com VolumE 65 No. 38

THE INDEPENDENT STUDENT PUBL ICAT ION OF THE UN IVERS I TY AT BUFFALO , S INCE 1950

Muslim students feel effects of Islamophobia after Paris attacks

Jam Club and UB Improv come together

‘Creed’ movie review

TOM DINKIEDITOR IN CHIEF

A federal judge has recommended dismiss-ing a former UB law professor’s wrongful termination suit against former Law School Dean Makau Mutua.

The lawsuit, filed by Jeffrey Malkan in 2011, alleged that Mutua violated Malkan’s due process rights when the former dean fired him in 2009. U.S. Magistrate Judge H. Kenneth Schroeder also granted sanctions against Malkan and his attorney for claiming Mutua committed perjury in the case.

Malkan, who says he hasn’t been given a fair trial, will appeal the dismissal. He has 14 days to do so.

“I have to believe that I will eventually get a fair hearing,” Malkan said in an email. “The Magistrate’s decision to prevent my case from being heard on a record tainted by fraud and perjury is yet another miscarriage of justice.”

Judge recommends lawsuit against former law school dean be dismissed

TOM DINKI EDITOR IN CHIEF

Some UB students have lived in de-crepit houses susceptible to crime and with absentee landlords located in the University Heights for years. The neigh-borhood, located right off South Cam-pus, has been plagued with high crimes rates, absentee landlordism and tensions between residents and partying students.

A new multi-million dollar gated stu-dent housing community in the neighbor-hood could help change that.

Legacy Development, a Buffalo-based real estate developer, is currently con-structing the first student housing com-plex in the Heights, called Axis 360, with an initial opening of 532 bedrooms in Au-gust 2016. Campus Advantage, an Austin, Texas based student housing company, is managing the complex that will be locat-ed on LaSalle Avenue off of Main Street and in close proximity to the metro rail.

The complex will mostly market to UB students, but will also reach out to oth-er local universities, such as SUNY Buf-falo State, Canisius and Daemen College. The complex’s proximity to the metro rail, which travels to downtown Buffalo, could make it an ideal spot for UB med-ical students, as the medical school will move downtown in 2017.

Bryanna Hollis, the location’s floating lease manager, said students can start sign-ing leases in early 2016 once a temporary leasing office is constructed on the location.

Hollis said Legacy Development rec-ognized a lack of student housing near South Campus and engaged a student housing consulting group to confirm fea-sibility for the project. The results showed UB students desired to live at a profes-sionally managed student housing com-munity near South Campus, so Legacy hired the Campus Advantage, Hollis said.

She said the reason no one has built something similar in the neighborhood before is the difficulty assembling enough land. The property, owned by Legacy De-velopment and given site plan approval by the City of Buffalo in December of 2013, is off of LaSalle Avenue and is bor-dered by McCarthy Park.

“Legacy identified a unique opportu-nity to acquire the project site which al-lowed us to bring Axis 360 to the [Uni-versity Heights] District and UB South Campus,” Hollis said.

The new complex has the support of community leaders like Mickey Vertino, pres-ident of the University Heights Collabora-tive. Verinto said the complex will help give students more housing options than the old-er homes in the Heights and he hopes it will bring business to Main Street.

“I personally think it’s a good thing to give the students some other options other than 100-year homes in the Heights,” Ver-tino said.

Vertino said students with “neglect-ful landlords” may get the opportunity to inhabit quality living spaces with quality landlords with the new housing complex.

New student housing complex could change dynamic of Heights

Complex located off LaSalle Avenue to

open in August

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COURTESY OF DOUGLAS LEVERE, UB NEWS CENTER

A wrongful termination suit against former UB Law School Dean Makau Mutua (pictured) was recommended to be dismissed this week. The lawsuit, filed by former UB law professor Jeffrey Malkan, claims Mutua denied his due process rights when he fired him in 2009.

BRIAN WINDSCHITLSENIOR ARTS EDITOR

During February of 1994 in his small hometown of Springfield, Ohio, 15-year-old John Roger Stephens submitted an entry to McDonalds’ annual “Black History Makers of Tomorrow” essay contest.

Stephens wrote about how he truly be-lieved, one day, he would become a famous singer who would change the world with his not only voice, but with his actions as well.

Fast-forward 21 years, and John Roger Stephens from Springfield, Ohio, now 36, has become known worldwide as John Leg-end, a nine-time Grammy Award-winning musician who also has a Golden Globe and an Academy Award on his growing list of achievements.

But, more importantly, Legend has done everything he once said he would in that es-say contest all those years ago – he’s become a man and can say he changed the world for the better.

On Thursday, Legend spoke and per-

formed for a sold-out Alumni Arena as apart of UB’s third Distinguished Speakers Series event of the semester.

Over the course of an hour and a half, Legend talked to the crowd about taking control of fear in order to change oneself and the world, as well as self-empowerment and how believing in yourself can make all the difference.

“We may have more in common than you think,” he said.

What was different, he said, was how he looked at the world – with self-confidence and undying determination – a viewpoint he tried to explain to the audience his speech.

“I want you to leave this place with the ability to conquer your fears,” he said. “Be-lieve in yourself, be persistent and don’t take no for an answer.”

He spoke about his past upbringing, his current fight against poverty and education-al inequality and his vision for the future. And, at the end, Legend even took a seat at the Yamaha grand piano onstage to enter-tain the crowd with two of his songs: “Ordi-

nary People” and “All of Me.”Legend’s speech was as equally a call for

self-empowerment as it was a call to action.“What’s going to stop you?” Legend said.Throughout the night, Legend tried

to show that his own life and upbringing wasn’t special – that anyone could change the world.

“I’m excited by your potential,” Legend said to the crowd. “I’m excited by the power you have inside of you.”

Legend was homeschooled until high school and attended the University of Penn-sylvania on a scholarship to study English and African-American studies.

He said his most influential role models

CHANGE THE NARRATIVE

Award-winning singer-songwriter John Legend speaks about social activism and self-empowerment

ANGELA BARCA, THE SPECTRUM

Nine-time Grammy Award-winning sing-

er-songwriter John Legend came to speak

and perform in Alumni Arena for UB’s Distin-

guished Speaker Series Thursday. He spoke

about how he used self-empowerment as the

means to change the world.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 2

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Dan Ryan, UB director of Off-Campus Student Services, accompanies City of Buf-falo inspectors into students’ apartments on ‘housing blitzes.’ He’s seen students living in homes with faulty or absent smoke and car-bon monoxide detectors, faulty wiring and other violations.

Axis 360 will give students who want to live in the Heights, which can be attractive due to its close proximity to campus and a night-life scene, an alternative to leasing apartments, some of which are in poor condition.

Ryan said in order to create a functional living community within the Heights, land-lords and property owners need to make sure that they bring their properties up to code and make the right investments.

The housing complex could potentially help alleviate tensions between residents and students in the Heights. The private com-plex could take some students out of such close proximately to their nonstudent neigh-bors, who have complained about student drinking, loitering and littering in the neigh-borhood for years.

The tensions have reached a high this se-mester, forcing UB and Buffalo Police to take further action. During the first few weeks of the fall semester alone, UB disciplined 57 stu-dents that Buffalo Police arrested and ticket-ed for partying in the Heights.

The Heights are known for high crime rates and students have reported having their homes broken into and being mugged while walking the streets. In 2012, there were more than 500 major reported crimes in the Heights, including homicides, assaults, rapes, larcenies, robberies, burglaries and vehicle thefts.

Hollis said Axis 360 will be fully gated and extremely well lighted to help prevent crime. She said there will also be “courtesy officer patrols” during the evening hours.

“We will have comprehensive camera security throughout the property similar to the blue light cameras used by Buffalo Police,” she said.

But students may not be ready to leave their apartments for a gated housing com-munity, as students who live in the Heights often do so for the cheap rent. Campus Ad-vantage does not have set rates at this time,

but Hollis said they will be competitively priced with other student housing complex-es in the area. Rent for complexes surround-ing North Campus, such as Sweet Home Village and the Villas on Rensch, often dou-ble that of rent for homes in the Heights.

Ryan worries the pricing of the apartment complex may be unattractive to students, es-pecially considering the complex will be a 20-minute walk to South Campus. Campus Advantage plans to have a shuttle to take students to and from campus daily.

“But it may be attractive for students at Daemen College, Buffalo State or architec-ture students,” he said.

The first phase of Axis 360 will be open to new tenants as soon as August 2016. This phase includes the building of studio two- and three-bedroom apartments, each with a bathroom attached to the bedroom.

The furnished rooms will also be equipped with stackable washers and dryers, as well as granite countertops and laminate floor-ing. Phase Two of Axis 360 is expected to be completed by August 2017. Four bedroom apartments will be an option for students once this phase is finished.

Axis 360 will offer fitness centers, outdoor fitness areas as well as a swimming pool-sized hot tub and grilling stations.

“We will feature a huge clubhouse com-plete with a computer lab, juice bar, private study rooms, a recreation and gaming area,” Hollis said. “There will also be a complete fitness center with state of the art exercise equipment along with a training room with spinning bikes, TRX and video on-demand fitness programs.”

Sam Ackerman, a senior accounting major, currently lives in the University Heights area.

“I have lived on South for two years now and I like it here but I don’t know if I want to live so close to the rowdy nightlife,” Ack-erman said.

Campus Advantage manages 25,000 beds nationwide.

Editor’s note: Evan Schneider, Marlee Tuskes and Ashley Inkumsah contributed reporting on this piece

email: news@ubspectrum.com

NEWS2Friday, December 4, 2015THE SPECTRUM

New student housing complex could change dynamic of Heights

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

COURTESY OF CAMPUS ADVANTAGE

The constructing of a student housing complex, mostly targeted for UB students, located

off of LaSalle Avenue in the University Heights. The complex, Axis 360, will open in August

and could change some of the dynamics of the neighborhood.were his parents. “My parents taught me about character,”

he said. “About what it means to live a good life and what success is – not money or ma-terial things, but love and the people you are able to help and touch.”

When he was 10 years old, however, Leg-end’s grandmother died – a death that sent his family into turmoil. His mother became severely depressed and addicted to drugs and his parents divorced.

Despite that, the lessons his parents taught him as a child, Legend said, have guided him through his life to today. It was his parents’ teachings that helped him turn his hardships and self-doubt into motiva-tion and self-confidence.

“There is no excuse for inaction,” Leg-end said. “Everybody can be great because everybody can serve – think about what it means to love people you don’t even know.”

Nowadays, Legend honors his parents by trying to spread the same self-respect and self-belief that they instilled in him, through music, philanthropy and social change.

Legend, when not writing award-wining

music, is a heavily-involved philanthropist who devotes his time developing education policy and combating poverty as national board member for Teach for America, Ed-ucation Equality Project, Harlem Village Academies, PopTech and Stand for Chil-dren. He also is heavily involved in reform-ing the judicial and prison systems, which are heavily abusive and racist, he said.

Fighting against education, poverty and racism are his passions outside of music.

He asked the audience to find within themselves something they are as passion-ate about.

“Whatever your passion is I want you to follow it,” he said. “To empower yourself to make a change.”

email: arts@ubspectrum.com

ANGELA BARCA, THE SPECTRUM

Legend is a heavily-involved philanthropist

who splits his time between music-making

and working for one of the many national

philanthropic organizations. He is on the

national boards for Teach for America, the

Education Equality Project and more.

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

CHANGE THE NARRATIVE

Oklahoma Wesleyan Universi-ty President Everett Piper penned an open letter titled “This Is Not A Daycare! It’s a University!” in re-gard to political correctness of stu-dents on his campus and on oth-er campuses across the country. He calls out students for acting as “victims” and for complaining when their “feelings are hurt.”

The letter comes in the wake of what some perceive as a rise in po-litical correctness at college cam-puses across the country. There have been multiple protests over racial tensions, including at Yale University where there was a de-bate over whether certain Hallow-een customs were offensive. Uni-versity of Missouri President Tim Wolfe was forced to resign over the racial tension.

Piper referred to an incident in which one of his students told him he felt victimized by a sermon giv-en at the university. Oklahoma Wesleyan is an evangelical Chris-tian university.

He wrote in the letter that college students are self-absorbed, and told TODAY that our generation has a mentality of forcing everyone to comply with the majority’s opinion.

The letter split our editorial board. Some of us, while disagree-ing with his brashness, agree with Piper’s core argument that col-lege is meant to challenge one’s ideas and beliefs. We also feel Pip-er, a white male, and presumably wealthy one at that as a univer-sity president, may not have the right to tell certain groups of peo-ple how to deal with oppression he has likely never faced.

It’s surprising he was able to pen

the letter at all and that his public re-lations team didn’t stop him from submitting such an honest, open and not so gently worded letter. At the same time, his letter points out an issue that many are discussing, in-cluding President Barrack Obama and several comics who are now re-fusing to perform on college campuses for the per-ceived over-the-top political cor-rectness.

College is for exploring, and as long as those ideas are not based in bigotry and meant to cause phys-ical harm to others, it’s important for students to have an open mind.

College should be an open learn-ing experience – one in which we deal with the uncomfortable or the vague and discuss it in a manner that’s productive and educational. It should act as a space to discuss topics that are difficult or contro-versial. Without this space, there’s no room for opinions or ideology, just mere straightforward learning like high school.

OK, so the elephant in the room. The “White Only” art proj-ect here at UB. Graduate fine art student Ashley Powell’s project has challenged our ideas of what art is, and overall, seems to have creat-ed good discussion about diversi-ty at UB. Student leaders are meet-ing with President Tripathi. There is a task force of students meeting

with University Police. These are good things.

But we’re not willing to com-pletely agree with Powell’s meth-ods. While we are for challeng-ing our ideas, we still stand by our stance from the beginning that Powell should have labeled the signs as an art project because stu-dents feared her project was a hate crime.

We want students to challenge each other’s ideas and go outside their comfort zone, not frightened and thinking they are hated.

But back to Piper.At the same time, Piper’s letter

is very brash and straightforward. There’s little sensitivity to the op-pression of others. His comments about our generation’s complain-ing seem a little out of place. He cannot truly relate to the oppres-sion that some of these students are feeling.

He cannot empathize with stu-dents who are suffering from these social tragedies and because he can’t relate, perhaps it’s not his place to comment on the protests.

We also have to remember that he is complaining about a gener-ation of kids that his generation helped raise. It’s true, we did grow up in a generation where everyone wins and everyone gets a trophy, but it was the adults who were giv-ing us those trophies and that en-couragement.

It’s fair for him to express his opinion – in fact to say he shouldn’t have made his comments at all would be hypocritical of us.

We instead believe Piper should have redirected his approach. He should not have come off as so absolute. And while making the point that college students are playing the victim, he should have considered, in some cases, they are victims.

There are some students fac-ing discrimination for their race, sex and orientation. Let’s not for-get that.

This harsh letter may not have been the best way to open up the discussion.

email: eic@ubspectrum.com

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The Spectrum offices are located in 132 Student Union,

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THE SPECTRUM

Editorial BoardEditorial Board

Friday, December 4, 2015Volume 65 Number 38

Circulation 7,000

3OPINION Friday, December 4, 2015

THE SPECTRUM

EDITOR IN CHIEF Tom Dinki

MANAGING EDITOR

Alyssa McClure

COPY EDITORS

Kayla Menes Renée Staples

NEWS EDITORSGabriela Julia, Senior

Ashley InkumsahMarlee Tuskes

FEATURES EDITORSTori Roseman, Senior

Dani Guglielmo

ARTS EDITORSBrian Windschitl, SeniorKenneth Kashif Thomas

Tomas Olivier, Asst.

SPORTS EDITORSJordan Grossman, Co-seniorQuentin Haynes, Co-senior

PHOTO EDITORSYusong Shi, Co-seniorKainan Guo, Co-senior

Angela Barca .

CARTOONISTS Joshua Bodah

Michael Perlman

CREATIVE DIRECTORSKenneth Cruz

Pierce Strudler, Asst.

Professional Staff

OFFICE ADMINISTRATOR Helene Polley

ADVERTISING MANAGER

Nicole DominguezLee Stoeckel, Asst.

Zach Hilderbrandt, Asst.

ADVERTISING DESIGNERDerek Hosken

AUBREY MCLAUGHLINSTAFF WRITER

Film: “Creed”Release Date: Nov. 25Studio: Warner Bros. Grade: A+

In the weeks before “Creed” was released, my little brothers and I would talk about the new “Rocky” movie, then quickly correct our-selves: “It’s not a Rocky movie, it’s a Creed movie.”

This type of film, I might say, has a devoted fan base.

From 1976 to 2006, six movies traced the story of Rocky Balboa, the Philadelphia boxer who start-ed with nothing but grit and luck to capture the world heavyweight championship.

I believe that the whole se-ries is worth your time, except for “Rocky V” – if you want to argue, watch it for yourself – because even though they might cheese up and take some wrong turns, Rocky is the story of all of us. It’s about how we go through tough times but manage to get through them and fight for what we believe in.

I might not blame you for ignor-ing “Creed” as another imposter trying to make a buck off of our sentimentality.

But before you disregard the movie completely – consider this.

Director Ryan Coogler, who also co-wrote the film, isn’t trying to make a buck off you. His main goal is to inspire and you’ll feel it through every piece of this film, especially in the detail of the char-acters.

Michael B. Jordan shines in the lead as Adonis Johnson, son of Apollo Creed, the fictional boxing champ Balboa had to take out in the first two films.

Johnson’s younger years are spent in juvenile detention lunch-room brawls while his 20-some-thing years are spent fighting un-derground in Mexico and waking up to do some terrible financial job in Los Angeles.

He goes home to his family’s mansion in a vintage car to watch old reels of Creed vs. Balboa. He’s playing Balboa’s role, the under-dog, not his father’s.

To help Adonis make it through, we’ve got Tessa Thompson as Bi-anca, the singer-songwriter blast-ing music below his apartment – but she isn’t a mousey girl next door at all.

Her own struggle is every bit as powerful as her male counterpart.

It doesn’t take a genius to fig-ure the rest – of course, he’s going to quit his job, move to Philly and convince Balboa to train him to be the best. You came to see that.

I’ll bet you didn’t expect the ex-pert storytelling, as Adonis’s life is

a terribly complex teeter-totter be-tween privilege and shame, hon-or and abandonment on his way to earning respect from what, at a point, Rocky calls his “toughest opponent” – himself.

What we end up with has to be at least as good as the old “Rocky” films. The hero’s journey has been refashioned for our millennial mindset.

Now, more than ever, we need this film.

You’ll make your own conclu-sions as to the race allegory here, but “Creed” doesn’t pull a single punch. Embrace them all: the un-derdog will be on your mind for a long, long time after, no matter what you call it.

email: features@ubspectrum.com

‘Creed’ is even better than ‘Rocky’ fans could have hoped

COURTESY OF WARNER BROS.

‘Creed’ is not a ‘Rocky’ movie, rather, a new iteration of Rocky altogether. Micheal B. Jordan who plays the title character, shines in his role as the son of a famous boxer who is trying to carve his own path in the industry.

Fighting words Oklahoma Wesleyan

University president slams students for playing the victim

ILLUSTRATION BY MICHAEL PERLMAN

JESSICA BAINSTAFF WRITER

Saba AL-Maani was stopped walking and

stood still in Alumni Area three weeks ago when she overheard a comment from an older man.

“There’s no such thing as a good Mus-lim,” said the man said to his wife, accord-ing to AL-Maani.

AL-Maani, a junior psychology major, felt it was her duty to speak up to the man, especial-ly because she knows people cannot automati-cally identify her as a Muslim due to her choice not to wear a hijab and traditional attire.

She said although she tried to defend of her religion, the man would not budge from his original statement.

“He said, ‘You hate me and you’re taught to want to kill me,’” AL-Maani said. “I said, ‘I’m not taught that and right now you’re being very hostile because of my beliefs and yet I have nothing against you and yours.

You’re blinded by hatred and anger and fear.’ And I told him, ‘God bless you.’”

And during Thanksgiving weekend, AL-Maani’s friend told her about her family’s store in Buffalo being vandalized with a de-rogatory mark toward Arabs on the window.

AL-Maani’s personal account is just one lo-cal reflection of what some consider a grow-ing sense of Anti-Muslim bigotry and Islam-ophobia in the United States in the aftermath of the Islamic State’s recent terror attacks in Paris, France. Some Muslims fear the situation might only get worse after the mass shoot-ing in San Bernardino, California, Wednesday, which was a carried out by a Muslim couple.

Nihad Awad, the executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, spoke in New Jersey and condemned the attacks and urged people not to assume that the couple was motivated by radical Islamic terrorism.

According to a recent nationwide poll conducted by the Public Religion Research Institute, 56 percent of Americans feel the values of Islam are at odds with the country.

Members of the Muslim Student Associ-ation (MSA) have served as a support sys-tem for Muslim students at UB. MSA put up a poster on campus with excerpts from the Quran to show what Muslims believe and show a message of prayer for those affected by the attacks in Paris, Beirut and Iraq.

“Instead of this world of negativity where we constantly have to backpedal and apologize, why not instead of apologizing, we demonstrate what Islam actually is, who we actually are?” said Samiha Islam, a soph-omore psychology major and vice president of MSA. “We’re not responsible for terror-ism and Islam doesn’t support terrorism.”

At the World Bazaar, a multicultural event sponsored by the Intercultural Diversity Cen-ter, which took place the week after the Paris attacks, the UB Muslim Women’s Council al-lowed women the opportunity to try on a hi-jab and write down how they felt afterwards.

“After the Paris incidents, when we came to World Bazaar, we had it in our minds that maybe there would be more negative re-

actions to consider but overall I think UB proved us proud,” Islam said.

The was met by some people asking why they hadn’t been more vocal or created an event in response to the Paris attacks.

“I feel like our club isn’t political so we shouldn’t have to respond to politics or ex-plain current events to anyone,” said Hafsa Zubairi, a senior biomedical sciences major and secretary of Muslim Women’s Council.

Next semester, MSA plans on holding Is-lamic Awareness Week at the end of Febru-ary based on the responses they got from its activities at the World Bazaar.

email: features@ubspectrum.com

FEATURES4Friday, December 4, 2015THE SPECTRUM

Combating negativity with knowledgeMuslim students feel effects of Islamophobia after Paris attacks

COURTESY OF SAMIHA ISLAM

Muslim students participate in the World

Bazzar in the Student Union. The Muslim

Student Association has served as a

support system for Muslim students who

feel like targets of Islamophobia.

TORI ROSEMANSENIOR FEATURES EDITOR

Holiday spending can be tricky – maybe you picked up a part-time gig so you can af-ford better presents for friends and loved ones this year. Maybe you’ve been saving money for the last six months in prepara-tion for the season.

No matter what your game plan may be, it’s not hard to find cool, unique gifts that won’t totally break the bank. Don’t worry, we did the work for you – here’s a list of gadgets and trinkets that are both cheap and trendy.

ROLLUP KEYBOARD $15 (AMAZON)

Everybody uses their laptops around school, but this rollup keyboard could be perfect for anyone who uses their tablets regularly. It’s convenient, portable and of course, a little squishy and fun to play with.

They’re also a perfect gift for anyone at home that regularly uses a desktop and is sick of the click-clack of the hard keyboard. The gift is cheap but also a nice piece of technology that can improve the computer experience.

L5 UNIVERSAL REMOTE CONTROL FOR IOS $70 (AMAZON)

Universal remotes were the coolest piece

of technology circa 10 years ago, and it’s time to bring that back. Let’s just admit it what we know to be true – it’s always ideal to find the easiest way to do things. We’re in college, we’re lazy and the best option is the easiest option.

This remote would make your access to television, your computer and any other piece of technology easy to access at the palm of your hand. Though it’s the most expen-sive item on this list, it’s worth the money to save the time.

PRINTSTAGRAM$25 (SOCIAL PRINT STUDIO)

For all of those who are insta-famous, or aspire to be, this is the perfect gift to a friend or anyone else who loves that form of social media.

It’s a simple project – you go onto their website, submit 100 photos of your choice and then they make it into a cute little book. It’s a personal gift too, which makes it that much more meaningful.

YANKEE CANDLE$27 (YANKEE CAN-DLE)

People like candles for various reasons – whether it’s for the scent or just the appear-ance, a candle is a great gift.

Yankee Candle in particular is a good buy

because they constantly have sales and cou-pons. For this holiday season, Yankee Can-dle is offering a buy-one-get-one half off sale on its products. This means that you can buy either multiple candles for a few people or even better, treat yourself to your favorite scent. Yankee Candle also has such variety in scents so it’s easy to find the right one for any friends.

CHROMECAST$35 (GOOGLE)

For those who don’t know what this is, it’s just one of the latest pieces of technology that is replacing cable boxes everywhere.

The chromecast is basically a USB that plugs into your television that you can add subscriptions, such as Netflix, to. You can upload a variety of subscriptions to this chromecast, or connect your computer to it. It’s a cheap investment into the new age,

and a perfect gift to ask for when your par-ents ask you what you want.

Shatterproof Wine Glasses$29

This is the best deal and easily most ef-ficient gift on this list. Four glasses – one for each bestie, roommate or family mem-ber – that are shatterproof, no matter how much you drink. To take the extra step, you can paint them, since paint isn’t too expen-sive either, and customize them for whom-ever your gift will be going to.

If you’re not looking to go that extra step, the glasses themselves are a perfect give-away for a Secret Santa or any other holi-day exchange.

email: features@ubspectrum.com

Cheap cheer

COURTESY OF FLICKR USER MANDY JANSEN

Yankee Candles are just one of the few perfect gifts that won’t break your bank during the holidays. It works for friends or family and comes in a variety of scents, which is perfect for personalization.

Holiday gifts you can actually afford

5ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT Friday, December 4, 2015

THE SPECTRUM

LUKE HEUSKINSTAFF WRITER

Jamprov Rising knows how to get the cre-

ative juices flowing.Jamprov Rising, a collaboration between

Jam Club and UB Improv, took to the Stu-dent Union Theater Wednesday night for a joint variety show that featured two sets of alternating performances combining the musical and comedic talents of the two Stu-dent Association clubs.

“It all comes together when you’re jiving with people, when you get the juices flow-ing, and there’s no negativity around,” said Jerasak Manivong, a sophomore mechanical engineering major.

Jam Club warmed up the crowd at 6 p.m. with an energizing set of three jams, draw-ing curious spectators into the theater as groove-based music drifted through the Student Union. Next, members of UB Im-prov took the stage, looking to the crowd for topics that would form the basis of ad-lib comedic improvisational skits.

They pieced together the audience’s high-ly varied suggestions into absurdly comical plots involving such characters like super-heroes endowed with strange powers, lizard babies and FBI agents.

Following another strong set from Jam Club, UB Improv’s second set of skits took place in a mock funeral setting, as friends of the deceased took turns re-enacting hilari-ous memories of their late friend in flash-back style.

The concept for the collaborative perfor-mance came about from the friendship be-tween Jam Club President Jeremy Landau and his roommate, who served as treasurer of UB Improv.

The collaboration made sense because both clubs are dedicated to spontaneous performance art.

Manivong said his introduction to impro-visation as a “quiet kid” in his freshman year of high school helped him develop confi-dence. Now a sophomore in college, Ma-nivong has brought his passion for perfor-mance into the leadership of UB Improv.

“Anyone can do improv,” he said. “It just

takes effort and willingness to practice.” Students who want to develop their im-

prov skills can join UB Improv on Monday nights in the Student Union Theater from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m.

A successful improvisation, Manivong said, involves the establishment of three el-ements: character, location and action. Co-operation and sensitivity to what the other performers are doing is vital to an act.

“The trick is to not think about it at all,” said Keith Pomana, a junior media study major that performed at the event. “You can’t plan. You just have to react and stay in the moment.”

The same principle of cooperation ex-tends to jam music.

A jam starts when one musician lays down a foundation, like a guitar riff or a drum groove and the other players build on it.

Each musician must pay close attention to the subtle cues of the other parts, locking in with and playing off the other musicians to keep performances dynamic and cohesive.

“The most important thing is listening and knowing the chemistry you have with the guys you’re playing with,” Landau, a se-nior business major, said. “Once there’s chemistry it just clicks and works out real-ly well.”

Landau comes from a family of musicians. His grandfather played trumpet and his fa-

ther is a drummer. Jeremy joined that tradition when he started playing guitar at 8 years old.

“At that point I took guitar lessons but I never practiced,” Landau said. “But sports were never my thing so when I was 12 I started playing guitar again.”

On any given Sunday afternoon, the Jam Club holds meetings in Room 330 of the Student Union, where a rotation of guitar-ists, bassists and drummers collaborate to practice their instruments and improvise in extended jams. Jam Club is set to perform at Late Night UB this Friday night.

Jamprov Rising kept the entertainment flowing with strong performances through-out the evening and both clubs are looking forward to future collaborations.

email: arts@ubspectrum.com

Jam Club and UB Improv showcase spontaneous performance art

Jamprov Rising brings collaboration of music and comedy

JAMES CORRA, THE SPECTRUM

Jeremy Landau, a senior business major, pictured with other members of UB Jam Club, warms up his guitar at Jamprov Rising on Wednesday in the Student Union Theater.

GIOVANNI GAGLIANESESTAFF WRITER

With SoundCloud’s former Chief Busi-ness Officer Jeff Toig as the new CEO of TIDAL, the company looks to advance in a highly competitive market.

Since Jay-Z took over the company, it has had difficulty keeping a CEO to lead, which has impeded the company’s growth into something more sensational.

TIDAL is a new addition to the mu-sic streaming industry. Much like Spotify, Pandora and other services, it offers mu-sic and playlists based on moods, activities and genres. The company has recently made Jeff Toig, former chief business officer of SoundCloud, its CEO in the hopes of be-coming a stronger company

What makes TIDAL stand out is its qual-ity of sound and amount of music content.

Subscribers to TIDAL can expect artist and musician interviews, among other nuanced media access not given on other platforms.

With one million subscribers, TIDAL of-fers an ample amount of exclusive content and show access, including the recent TID-AL 10/20 concert.

The platform seeks to offer both artist loy-alty and customer loyalty by paying artists 75 percent of it’s revenue, as well as those in-volved in the musical process, like artists and labels, while also giving subscribers some-thing special, according to a tweet by Jay Z.

“For a company to want to give more back to an artist money-wise is great and it might mean well, however it will be fascinat-ing to see if this will plan out the way they want it to plan out in this competitive mu-sic-streaming,” said Mike Pietrantoni, a se-nior civil engineer major. “I think at the cost of a TIDAL subscription right now they

will need to offer something with value.”While many do not believe it will last

long in the music streaming industry, Toig believes he could transform TIDAL into a strong and unique music streaming service.

Earlier in his career, Toig co-founded a music streaming service called Muve Music, a platform attached to the plans of 2.5 mil-lion Cricket Wireless customers.

Toig said that he believes a strategy based on handling costs and being different from the bigger music streaming services is what will work.

This includes some of the things TIDAL has already been doing, including the pro-motion of TIDAL events and concerts, ex-clusive live streaming of shows and meet and greets for subscribers.

These exclusivities were embraced by Coldplay, who streamed songs from their new album a month before the release. Ri-hanna invited 80 Tidal subscribers to her vid-eo-premiere party this summer and giving all Tidal subscribers pre-sale access to her com-ing tour, according to The Wall Street Journal.

In the university community, a common consensus seems to be that TIDAL’s unpop-ularity is because it lacks a free subscription.

“They will need to have something to differentiate themselves to the people that they are targeting. They need brand loyal-ty from both the consumer and the artist, but more so the consumer,” said Pietranto-ni. “Perhaps, their artists will be fine work-ing at these TIDAL events but will money ever become an issue for these artists? We will have to see.”

Take Pandora for instance. This music streaming service offers listeners a free sub-scription accompanied by advertisements.

While this may be a pain for some, to get interrupted mid-listen, others find it afford-able and enjoy how easy it is to listen.

“I’m not really sure what TIDAL is,” said Anita Levine, a junior accounting ma-jor. Levine is a YouTube and Pandora user who uses her free subscription for stream-ing to jump from genre to genre through-out the day.

A good amount of people don’t even

know what TIDAL is and without their use of advertisements, they fail to accomplish a branding.

“I predominantly listen to Spotify. Al-though the 30-second ads are reoccurring, I’m overall satisfied with it,” said Giselle Santiago, a junior business major. “I really enjoy how specific the genres are within a certain category, so I can chose to only lis-ten to bachata within the Latin section.”

With TIDAL being among so many mu-sic-streaming platforms available for con-sumption, do the features of Jay-Z’s nu-anced music streaming platform peak your musical curiosity?

email: arts@ubspectrum.com

Jay Z’s Tidal announces new CEO-Jeff ToigIs TIDAL

making the right moves?

COURTESY OF TIDAL.COM

Jay-Z’s third CEO for Tidal, Jeff Toig, is set to takeover the company in January. Toig, the former chief business office of Soundcloud

has the challenge of turning Tidal into a serious competitor against industry giants

Spotify and Apple Music.

JORDAN GROSSMAN SENIOR SPORTS EDITOR

Head coach Felisha Legette-Jack didn’t exactly plan for her return to Hofstra to transpire like it did.

The women’s basketball team was ranked No. 26 in the RPI nationally and was yield-ing an undefeated start. But a sluggish game all around on Thursday night put an end to the impressive streak to open the season – and left many question marks for a young team.

Hofstra (6-1) defeated the Bulls (6-1) 79-36 in Hempstead, New York Thurs-day, which ends Buffalo’s six-game winning streak to start the season. It was Legette-Jack’s first game against her former team, which she coached from 2002 to 2006, since coming to UB in 2012.

“It just wasn’t our game,” Legette-Jack said. “From beginning to the end, we didn’t play the basketball I thought we could play.”

The Bulls, who had been impressive on offense and defense nearly every game this season, were outmatched by the Pride, who held Buffalo to a season-low 36 points and forced them to shoot just 23.4 percent from the field.

It was evident from the first quarter that the Bulls were overmatched. Hofstra got out to a 10-point lead and held Buffalo to just 12 shots in the 10-minute timeframe. The Pride began the game on an 8-0 run. Buffa-lo only got within seven points throughout the entire night.

The Bulls came out sluggish with more turnovers in the first quarter than made shots (five turnovers to four made baskets).

The only positive during the first quarter was the play of junior guard Joanna Smith. She scored five of Buffalo’s nine points in the quarter and connected on a deep three-pointer.

But that was nearly the only positive on offense for Smith and the rest of the team. Smith only scored four points for the re-mainder of the game and the three-pointer was the team’s only make from three for the night. The Bulls shot a dismal 1-of-19 from three-point range.

Senior guard Karin Moss hit the first six points – both three-pointers – for Buffalo in the fourth quarter, trying to get a spark go-ing on the court.

The Bulls’ offense would end with Moss’ last three-pointer.

The Pride went on a 23-0 run to end the game, providing Hofstra a statement victory over its former coach.

In her final season at Hofstra, Legette-Jack guided the Pride to a 19-12 record and

made it to the second round of the Women’s National Invitational Tournament (WNIT).

Legette-Jack said the Bulls made it a point to secure a victory for her in her return, but the team was unable to get anything going.

“This team is really close and I feel like I’m a part of the team,” Legette-Jack said of her connection to the Bulls’ players. “I think they tried to play hard for me, coming back to Hofstra for the first time in 10 years. It just didn’t work out. We don’t want to play like this anymore.”

The loss ends Buffalo’s historic run to be-gin a season. The Bulls’ 6-0 start was their best start to a season since the 2000-01 sea-son, where they started 8-0 to begin the year.

Legette-Jack has been preaching team-

work basketball since the offseason, but was upset it was not present during Thursday’s loss. She said in order to return to winning ways, the Bulls must return to playing “Buf-falo basketball” and forget about the tough loss.

“We’re not going to even talk about Hofs-tra anymore,” Legette-Jack said. “They beat us. They won the game. Let’s win the war by bouncing back against Duquesne.”

Buffalo will return home on Sunday after a three-game road trip to face Duquesne (6-1) before hitting the road once again to take on Big 4 opponent St. Bonaventure (4-2) on Wednesday night.

Tipoff for Sunday is set for 2 p.m.

email: sports@ubspectrum.com

U.S. District Judge Richard J. Arcara must now approve Schroeder’s recommenda-tion to dismiss the case. Malkan said dis-trict judges usually write an opinion on the case within two to three months and that he doesn’t believe Arcara will endorse Schroed-er’s ruling.

Mutua, who resigned amid the lawsuit in September of 2014, said in a statement that he was pleased with the magistrate’s deci-sion.

“I am glad that the court not only af-firmed the falsity of the charges, but has also sanctioned Mr. Malkan and his lawyer for their reckless behavior,” Mutua said.

The lawsuit stems from Mutua’s firing of Malkan despite Malkan having signed a clinical professor contract in November of 2006 that stated he could only be fired for cause in accordance with the law school ac-creditation standard.

Schroeder granted Mutua’s motion that sanctions be brought against Malkan and his former attorney Rick Ostrove for claim-ing Mutua committed perjury in the case. Schroeder said in his decision that there was no evidence that Mutua testified false-ly and that Malkan and Ostrove made the allegations to harass Mutua, needlessly in-crease the cost of the litigation and burden the court.

Malkan claims Mutua lied under oath when the dean testified at a Public Employ-ee Relations Boarding hearing that a vote to promote Malkan to full clinical professor in 2006 was actually just a vote to retain Mal-kan as a director of the Research and Writ-ing program. Several faculty members have testified the vote to make Malkan a clinical professor did take place.

“I don’t know how the Magistrate con-cluded that there wasn’t sufficient evidence of Makau Mutua’s perjury,” Malkan said.

Schroeder fined Ostrove $10,000 for

pursing the perjury allegations against Mu-tua. Ostrove will object the sanctions.

Schroeder, who graduated from the UB Law School, also denied Malkan’s motion for sanctions against Mutua and David Sleight, the assistant attorney general that has represented Mutua.

In a separate ruling on Wednesday, the New York State Supreme Court also dis-missed Malkan’s defamation suit against In-terim Law School Dean James Gardner. The defamation suit came after UB banned Mal-kan from campus in October for referenc-ing mass shootings in emails to faculty.

University Police determined Malkan did not present a threat to campus, but UB of-ficials decided to ban Malkan anyway, saying Malkan’s emails frightened faculty and incit-ed worry the former professor could cause harm to individuals at the university.

Malkan said he only referenced the shoot-ings because Mutua and Gardner had previ-ously spread rumors that he could be a mass

shooter one day. “We could not be happier with these re-

sults,” Gardner said in a statement. “It is no surprise that Mr. Malkan, having filed three different losing lawsuits against the former dean, finally went ahead and filed a losing suit against me. I am gratified that the court recognized that this action, like its predeces-sors, is completely devoid of merit.”

Malkan has been without work since his firing, which he says is due to Mutua’s refus-al to write him a letter of recommendation, which has consequently blacklisted him in the profession, he said. He said he now rep-resents himself in the lawsuit because he can no longer afford an attorney.

Mutua resigned amid the lawsuit, perju-ry allegations and divide among law school faculty about his leadership in September of 2014. He has been on sabbatical for almost a year.

email: tom.dinki@ubspectrum.com

The trio of seniors Nick Gilbo and Okezie Alozie and junior Brandon Berry was Buffalo’s most impressive unit on the defensive side of the ball. Gilbo finished with a team-high 113 tackles, 3.5 sacks and 12 tackles for losses, while Berry had 104 tackles and 11.5 tackles for losses.

Alozie showed his ability as a tackler and a playmaker in his final season, finishing with 85 tackles on the season, five sacks, 10.5 tackles for losses, two forced fumbles and two interceptions. Secondary: C

After a strong start, the Buffalo secondary had a weak finish to the season. Overall, the team finished right in the middle of the confer-ence, sixth, in pass defense. But several players return in 2016, making it one of the more expe-rienced units on the defensive side of the ball.

Senior cornerback Marqus Baker ends his ca-reer with 71 tackles and 12 pass breakups. Ju-nior cornerback Boise Ross finished with 52 tackles, two interceptions and a team-high 18 pass breakups, but those two interceptions and 10 of his breakups came in the first four games.

The biggest question mark for Buffa-lo secondary heading into the season was the safeties. But overall sophomore safeties Ryan Williamson and Andrews Dadeboe well

enough. Williamson had 83 tackles, two inter-ceptions and one forced fumble and Dade-boe finished with 36 tackles and two picks.

The Bulls have a spot open at one of its two outside cornerback positions, but the other three positions appear to be locked in heading into spring ball. Special teams: A-

Buffalo’s special teams may be the biggest improvement from last year’s squad.

A freshman kicker and a senior punt-er were the faces of this unit, and excelled doing so. Freshman Adam Mitcheson went 13-of-19 in field goal kicking during his first season with Buffalo, while senior Tyler Grassman proved to be one of the best all-around kickers in the conference.

He was responsible for 25 touchbacks and averaged 41 yards per punt this season while talking home multiple Player of the Weeks honors. Coaching: B

For his first season as a Division-I head coach, Leipold did a great job of getting several underclassmen playing time and in-corporating them into future roles. The Bulls had a combined 32 freshmen and sophomores get playing time this season, setting up for future success.

Buffalo also impressed in wins over Ohio and Kent State and even in a loss to Penn

State in Happy Valley. As for the negatives, the Bulls had sever-

al gaffs and questionable play calls throughout conference play. It was also telling that the Bulls often struggled in the first half and had to re-cover in the second half. They made great half-

time adjustments, but had several slow starts. Still, Leipold showed why he was a great

coach in Division III and why he may be the one to turn the Bulls around.

email: sports@ubspectrum.com

6

DAILY DELIGHTS

NEWS | SPORTS6Friday, December 4, 2015THE SPECTRUM

Gridiron season report cardCONTINUED FROM PAGE 8

YUSONG SHI, THE SPECTRUM

Senior quarterback Joe Licata gets a pass off as he’s hit in Buffalo’s 31-26 loss to Massachusetts on Nov. 27. Licata received a ‘B’ for our gridiron season report card.

Judge recommends lawsuit against former law school dean be dismissed

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

Undefeated no moreDismal offensive night ends

Bulls’ undefeated start

KAINAN GUO, THE SPECTRUM

Sophomore guard Liisa Ups goes for a layup in a 54-40 victory over Canisius in Alumni Arena

on Nov. 17. The Bulls’ undefeated season came to an end Thursday with a 79-36 loss to Hofstra.

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8 SPORTSFriday, December 4, 2015THE SPECTRUM

JORDAN GROSSMAN SENIOR SPORTS EDITOR

Head coach Nate Oats will never take the easy way out for his basketball team.

Even as a high school coach at Romulus, he sought out the toughest competition to ready his players for the brunt of the season.

And the competition cannot get any tougher for the men’s basketball team than what it will face this upcoming week: reign-ing national champion Duke.

“The only way to get better is to play good competition,” Oats said. “I’m not one of those guys to play four non-Division I games to get to 20 wins. I don’t care about that. When we

go into Duke, we’ll play well, we’ll play hard, we’ll learn how to compete. We’ll get better … Those games make you better in March.”

After a tough loss to Big 4 rival St. Bo-naventure Wednesday night, the Bulls (4-3) fa-ceoff against two of the top-10 teams in the nation in No. 7 Duke (7-1) on Saturday and No. 5 Iowa State (6-0) on Monday. Buffalo will first travel to Durham, North Carolina to face the Blue Devils in Cameron Indoor Stadium, considered the mecca of college basketball.

It’s tough to assume Buffalo will grab a victory over the defending champion Blue Devils. But Oats just wants to see a well-played, fundamental basketball game.

And he thinks he has the pieces in place for a competitive game.

“I think we’ve got some guys that can play better than they’ve been playing,” Oats said. “I think we’ve got some athletes … that can play in a game with those guys.”

But Buffalo may still have work to do. In its loss to St. Bonaventure (3-2), Buf-

falo shot just 19-of-32 from the free throw line and just 1-of-13 from deep for just 58 points – tied for its lowest scoring output of the season. Oats noted that the combi-nation of freshman forwards Ikenna Smart and Nick Perkins need to improve around the rim offensively and defensively.

That may pose a big problem against a team like Duke. The Blue Devils are one of the premier teams in the country on both offense and defense. Duke ranks 36th in the country in offensive boards (14.38/game) and are tied for 26th in the country with 311 total rebounds through eight games played.

On the other side of the ball, the Blue Devils are 23rd in the nation with 86.5 points per game, led by an array of talented guards

and dominating forwards. Duke guard Gray-son Allen is one of the top players in the nation with 21.8 points per game. Allen, a sophomore, first broke onto the national scene with a scintillating performance during Duke’s 2015 NCAA Tournament run.

But Buffalo has a talented sophomore guard of its own. Lamonte Bearden’s all-around game has improved this season, as he’s averaged 13.6 points and 2.7 assists per game. Bearden said the team will try to play loose in Cameron Indoor Stadium.

“We’re going to go in, try and play normal-ly,” Bearden said. “We’re the underdogs, so we have nothing to lose. We’re going to go in there fighting to the best of our abilities.”

But even if Buffalo leaves North Carolina with a loss, it would still be considered a win in Oats’ mind. He prepares his teams for confer-ence play and beyond, not early in the season.

“It’s one of the best places in America as far as college basketball environment goes,” Oats said. “I think it’s big our guys get to go in there and experience it.”

This wouldn’t be the Bulls’ first time play-ing two national contenders in the same sea-son. Last year, Buffalo played both Ken-tucky and Wisconsin and held first half leads over both before eventually losing.

Both of those teams met in the Final Four of the NCAA Tournament season last season.

Buffalo may be more prepared to play in a big basketball venue this season compared to last, after playing at Kentucky and Wiscon-sin and in front of a packed out Nationwide Arena in the NCAA Tournament last march.

“It’s going to be a great atmosphere,” Bearden said. “I don’t know how many stu-dents, but just as much as Kentucky or may-be even more. But it’s going to be real great

for us – a good challenge, a good test.” Tipoff against Duke is set for 5:15 p.m.

and will air nationally on ESPN2.

email: sports@ubspectrum.com

Duking it out Buffalo prepares for reigning national champion Duke

COURTESY OF DUKE PHOTOGRAPHY

Duke guard/forward Brandon Ingram averages 12.5 points and 4.0 rebounds per game and will present

one of many challenges to Buffalo on Saturday.

COURTESY OF DUKE PHOTOGRAPHY

Blue Devils guard Luke Kennard is averaging 9.1 points and 2.4 points per game this

season. The Bulls face No. 7 Duke in Cameron Indoor Stadium Saturday.

QUENTIN HAYNES SENIOR SPORTS EDITOR

The football team ended its first season of the Lance Leipold era 5-7 with a 3-5 Mid-American Conference record.

A 5-7 record isn’t a bad start to the Leipold era, but losing three in a row to end the season, when just one more win was needed to make the team bowl eligible, left a sour taste in fans’ mouths.

Here is how The Spectrum graded the Bulls for the 2015 season. Quarterback: B

Senior Joe Licata never got fully adjusted in Leipold’s system.

Licata completed 62 percent of his pass-es for 2969 passing yards. Good numbers. The issue, however, was Licata’s 16 touch-down passes to 15 interceptions.

The 16 touchdown passes were a career-low since he assumed the starting position full time in 2013, while the 15 interceptions were a career high

But it’s hard to knock Licata’s senior lead-ership, and that came threw in a tough loss to Penn State and a comeback victory over Kent State. He was the heart and soul of this team this season and the past three years as Buffalo’s starting quarterback. Running backs: A

The Bulls send off one of the program’s best-ever running backs, but will also return a pretty good back.

After a career-high 1,403-yard rushing season, senior running back Anthone Tay-lor was hampered with injuries throughout most of the season. He finished the 2015 season with a team-high 829 rushing yards and three touchdowns and ended his UB ca-reer with 2,651 career-rushing yards.

Junior Jordan Johnson experienced a breakout season in 2015. Johnson ran for 811 rushing yards and was Buffalo’s goal line

back, as he racked up 12 touchdowns for the Bulls. He also picked up the slack when Tay-lor was hurt, with nine touchdowns in the team’s final six games of the season and two games with more than 100 yards rushing.

Johnson is expected to be the starter en-tering the 2016 season, with freshman Jona-than Hawkins (15 carries, 53 yards in 2015) to assume a larger role. Wide receivers and tight ends: B

A strength for the Bulls throughout the season, Buffalo’s offensive skill players were vital in the team’s new pro-style offense.

Senior Ron Willoughby continued to be a main target for Licata in the passing game, finishing with 62 receptions, 813 yards and six touchdowns. Junior Marcus McGill an-swered the call as the No. 2 wide receiver, finishing with 50 receptions for 581 yards and four touchdowns.

The tight end position was one that head coach Lance Leipold saw as an untapped re-source for Buffalo. With greater emphasis on the position, Leipold got a breakout sea-son from senior tight end Matt Weiser.

After catching 29 passes during his first three seasons, Weiser finished with a team-high 63 catches on the season with 625 yards and three touchdowns and was named to the first-team All-MAC team. After bat-tling injuries, Schreck finished with 21 catches for 209 yards, a solid contribution for a No. 2 tight end. Offensive line: B

After a rough start to the 2015 season, Buffalo’s offensive line turned it around in conference play and has a bright future heading into the 2016 season.

Buffalo’s offensive line was young and inexperienced, featuring freshman center James O’Hagan, sophomore guard Bran-

don Manosalvas alongside him on the in-terior and junior college transfer Roubbens Joseph. The result was several opponents creating pressure on Licata, forcing several turnovers.

After an injury to senior guard Dillon Guy, Buffalo’s offensive line was shuffled around and became a solid unit, keeping Licata upright in the pocket and allowing him to find Willoughby, McGill and Weiser downfield.

Entering next season, the Bulls will have to replace their offensive tackles Robert Blodgett and all-important left tackle John Kling, but the future is bright for the interi-or of that line. Defensive line: C

The defensive line went through peaks and valleys throughout the season for Buf-falo, but mostly valleys.

The biggest weakness for Buffalo through-out the season was the run defense. The Bulls ranked ninth in the MAC in rushing defense with 186.1 yards allowed a game. Part of that responsibility falls on the D-line. The Bulls also got just 12 sacks from its down linemen.

Junior defensive tackles Brandon Craw-ford and Max Perisse played well at times, but could have added more production. The pair combined for 60 tackles and three sacks.

As for the defensive ends, the Bulls had several underclassmen fill out the roster and all experienced playing time. Sopho-more Demone Harris led the group with 22 tackles and 1.5 sacks, while freshman Solo-mon Jackson and sophomore Charles Har-ris combined for 26 tackles and three sacks.

The defensive line is the position that has to improve the most for Buffalo to contend in the MAC next season. Linebackers: A-

This was the group that was supposed to struggle. It turned out to be the best unit on the team.

Gridiron season report cardAfter a 5-7 season, The Spectrum hands out grades for the 2015 football season

YUSONG SHI, THE SPECTRUM

Senior wide receiver Ron Willoughby tries to make a catch in Buffalo’s 41-30 loss to Northern Illinois on Nov. 11. Willoughby and the rest of the receivers received a ‘B’ in our season grades.

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