University Athletic Association

[DagarmanSpartan]

Pat Coleman,

I wasn't lecturing you about Division I.  I was merely pointing out the reason why I think Case is having unprecedented athletic success:

three straight unusually large freshmen classes!!!!

That translates into more potential athletes, and increases the probability that Case will be able to field better athletic programs (which, as you can see, is exactly what Case has been doing over the last couple of years).

I noticed very little real athletic recruiting going on at Case when I was there.  I suppose it's possible that there's more going on now, but I doubt it, given Case's nerdy reputation and its lack of athletic tradition.  I'm more inclined to credit an increase in the size of out student body for our sudden athletic improvement than an improvement in athletic recruiting.

Now then, I realize that no Division III school offers athletic scholarships.  Case is no better or worse in that regard.

But I'd bet that few other Division III schools have had as marked an increase in the size of the undergraduate student population as Case has had in the last three years, and moreover, I'd bet that most Division III schools probably recruit a lot more actively than Case does, and have a less nerdy reputation.  That makes it hard to conclude that any factor other than an increase in the potential number of student athletes is the reason for Case's unprecedented athletic success in recent years.

To answer your question from before, yes.  I've seen HIGH SCHOOLS here in Texas that put more effort into succeeding athletically than Case did as a university.  It's simply the school's tradition and philosophy.  I doubt that that has changed in recent years.

The only difference is that now, with a larger student body, there's a greater probability of each athletic coach finding regular students that might be able to help them athletically.  The amount of athletic recruiting, which was nearly non-existent in my time, has probably not increases significantly, and probably cannot be considered a factor.

Is that so hard to understand?  Why are you making this an issue?

[DagarmanSpartan]

Pat,

I'd be willing to bet that the reason that most of those 51 freshmen got into summer practice 2 weeks before school started is because the coach contacted them AFTER they had already been admitted; just as the coach had done with me when I was in high school, and invited them to come out for the team.  Most of them were probably NOT recruited and NOT admitted primarily to play football.  They were recruited primarily from the ranks of the admitted student body.  If it were any other way, then believe me, the faculty there would be up in arms.

That's the way athletic "recruiting" worked at Case back in my time.  I doubt that it has changed much, although I could be wrong.

Nobody I knew at Case back in the early 90s was recruited to go there and play football.  They got accepted, and after being accepted, were contacted later that Spring by athletic coaches (who saw that they had played high school football on their applications), and asked them to come out for the team.  Now then, Case's admissions office considers extra-curricular activities like athletics when admitting students, so I'm sure that being a top-notch athletic didn't hurt anybody's chances of being admitted.  It undoubtedly helped some people with otherwise average academic marks.  But no one at that school gets admitted primarily because of their athletic prowess.

Now then given that our undergrad student population has increased from under 3000 back in the late 80s to over 4,200 today; much of that in the last three years, a greater number of potential athletes has arrived for the coaches to contact and invite to come out.

It's hardly any wonder then, that the # of players in our football program has nearly doubled in the last few years.

[frank uible]

Isn't the new athletic facility on 115th Street a significant factor?

[ADL70]

Frank  I believe that that was the first factor cited by Maj.

Pat the point I would make about the increased freshmen classes is it indicates increased interest in attending CWRU both for those interested in competing in athletics and those interested in competing in building robotic vehicles.

http://blog.case.edu/case-news/2007/08/09/dexterwins

On the down side, there is an ironic juxtaposion over controversy about retention of a tennis coach with an inflated resume (leading to almost all of both teams no longer competing) and the non-renewal of a long-time well-liked track coach (this recommendation apparently came from the previous administration and the current administration kept him for another year before implementing the recommendation.)  They appear to have made a good hire there however with a coach with a background from Emory.  W Hoops has hired Allegheny's successful coach.  Baseball suffered last spring with a new coach who had limited time to recruit, but he comes from the Wooster program which bodes well for the future.

[Pat Coleman]

MajorSpartan, simply put, that's just not the way it goes in college except at the very bottommost schools. Sorry man -- you're making an assumption that is false.

I see yearly numbers of full-time undergraduate enrollment (aka, those eligible to play intercollegiate athletics). The 3,256 FTUGs from last year are indeed a whole 100 more than the previous year.

Unless those 100 all played sports -- and that would be very much unlike the Case you try to portray -- there simply can't be that big an impact.

Frank Uible hit the nail on the head: It's far more likely to be the facilities, first. But it's also coaches doing a better job of going out and recruiting.

[BDTartan]

Look, the only real input I can give you is this......CWRU is not the only "nerdy" school.  CMU, for example, takes the same rap when recruiting.  I know for a fact the Lackner didn't come to our area to recruit my brother.  I also know for a fact that there was only one high school football player in our area who was interested in playing football for CMU, even though they have had a winning tradition there for the last 3 decades.  Here's the bottom line......Lackner went and talked to that kid at his high school.  When finished, he asked this kid if there was anybody else in our area that he thought he should talk to.  This kid then told Lackner about my brother.  And that is how my bro ended up at CMU.  The original kid Lackner talked to ended up in the military as far as I know.  So, I am going to guess that the majority of recruiting trips in DIII are similar to this exact situation.

[Pat Coleman]

Ahh, but that's still a recruiting trip, isn't it?

[Mr. Ypsi]

BDTartan, while generalizing from ONE recruiting trip to "the majority of recruiting trips in DIII are similar to this exact situation" is obviously foolish, you may well be correct.  But I dare say that recruiters at every other level ask the same question!  (Just that at DI the legitimate targets are generally already well-known.  In DIII potential legitimate targets are much less known - if they have gotten widespread press, they will probably be unavailable since you can't offer a scholarship!)

MajorSpartan, just because YOU weren't recruited doesn't mean recruiting didn't occur!   (Sorry, couldn't resist! )  I dare say that the number of d3 programs that don't specifically recruit their main players (in MOST sports) who are within sniffing distance of the top 25 (make that 100!) is vanishingly small.  Unlike some (many?) scholarship programs, they ARE still legitimate students (most(?) d3 schools allow few if any admissions exceptions for athletes), but most WERE recruited.

[ADL70]

Mr Y - I'm sure you are familiar with occasions at all levels of one player being discovered while another is being recruited.

Pat - As I recall the enrollment figures you use are a federaly sanctioned one whose designation escapes me at the moment.  But here are CWRU's own figures of undergrad enrollment 2002-2007.  It's an apples to apples comparison.

3682  3832  3737  4186  4305 4398

Common Data Set now as I recall is the source you use.  That source lists 3714 FTUs for 2005 and 3849 FTUs for 2006.  2007 not yet reported, but CWRU has reported an incoming class second only to 2005s

[Pat Coleman]

So is my apples to apples comparison, which is actual full-timers reported to the U.S. Department of Education. Common Data Sets were too hard to find.

Dunno why they give the government different numbers, but we've been using those numbers for a couple years now, so it's definitely apples to apples.

[ADL70]

What were the USDE figures for 2004 and 2005?  The big freshmen classes as I understand were in 2005 and now in 2007.  Do the USDE figures give freshman enrollment as well as total?

[Pat Coleman]

They don't have archival information around. They did list 3157 in 2004-05 and 3256 in 2005-06, if that helps.

I will update to 3256 when I get a moment.

[MCDT07]

why is this an argument...schools such as Case, CMU, Chicago, Washington, etc won't recruit you if your not a good student the same as a Div I school will not recruit you if your not a div I level player.  With this being said, no college coach is simply going to leave his team to the whim of the random people that come into the classes.  If that where the case the schools mentioned before wouldn't even have teams, because only 20 people would come out.  It would make sense that the coaches of these schools only recruit the athletes that are BOTH good enough students to be accepted to the school AND good enough football players to be on a college team.  Now the coaches can't make all of these finds, so I would assume that they're primarily going to recruit the people that send them videos or contact them or they see at a camp etc.  And if that doesn't happen, they by word of mouth... as we have seen can happen.  Remember, these aren't the blue chippers, so they have to make contact w/ a college coach or have a local coach recommend them for interest to be spurred.  Now, given that I'm sure recruiting is harder for schools such as Case, CMU, WashU, Chicago and the classes of freshmen recruits coming may be smaller than other schools, it wouldn't hurt to call up an already accepted student who played football in hs (Major) and tell them that they could come try out for the team.  If the reputation for the notorious nerdyness in Case, CMU, Chicago and WashU is true, if the football teams would composed of only walk-ons from these nerdy schools, the 4 above mentioned teams would round out the bottom 5 NCAA Div III schools nicely.  As it is, all of your programs have respected histories, so I doubt thats the case.

[ADL70]

Not to beat a dead horse [of course if I'm saying that I probably am]

Fall 2004 5493 applications  784 enrolled
      2005 7181                      1162
      2006 7508                      1015
Years before 2004 were even lower.  A very significant spike in 2005 and the level has been maintained.

I'm sure federal  regs of who and when you count explain the different numbers. 

WashU and CMU have consistently had recruiting classes in the 40 range.  CWRU has acheived that level the last two years.  Chicago last few years has been closer to 30.  It's Oberlin, Kenyon, and Denison (smaller schools) whose classes have lagged behind.

[Pat Coleman]

I'm not disputing that CWRU has more students. I'm saying that is not the direct correlation that MajorSpartan wants us to think it is.

Plenty of schools have gotten larger without an appreciable increase in athletic acumen. College is not like high school.