FB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[79jaybird]

Interesting they never release the voting.    Understandable how one may not want to vote for an underclassmen when there is a top Senior in the running.  Even to be considered for the Gagliardi Trophy is an honor.
What's the latest on Carthage's new helmet logo status?

[matblake]

Here is my stab in the dark prediction:

Mt. Union 35
Whitewater 14

With all of the focus on Kmic, Garcon will have a big day.  Besides, the consensus seems that Jorris seemed to have an off day last week.  I am sure he wants to show what he can do on the national stage.

[Jim Matson]

I think Mount Union wins this one by 10 points.  As soon as Whitewater makes a mistake, this game will be over.

Plus, I'll go with the "real" d3 experience over the state school any day - even if it is an OAC school!

[79jaybird]

I know their is a strong resentment to the WIAC being a state school and a far cry from what the CCIW, OAC, and other confs. represent/have in D-3.  My question is, where else would you place the WIAC? 
My two trips up to UWW this Fall were enjoyable and not that different from the Wheaton/MSJ playoff game I went to last year.  Certainly, enrollments and Stadium size are different, but IMO  I don't see the WIAC as being a "problem".  I'm hoping UWW wins only because it's close to home (IL) and I spend most of my Summers in Wisconsin on Silver Lake.

[zorbadagreek]

I heard someone mention that the new Carthage logo will simply be the letter C minus the feathers, there is no other change other than their getting rid of the feathers!!

[RedmenFB44]

Go Thunder-

I understand what you are saying and agree. However, many of these D3 schools are private and therefore are very expensive. I can speak for Carthage in saying that coach Rucks does a great job of getting players there if they want to go to Carthage. If a player says that he wants to play at Carthage but cant not pay the $30,000 a year tuition (understandable), he will get that player to come to Carthage for a price that works for that family. Carthage's football team was very diverse with about 30-35% of the players being a minority. I know that this is kinda high looking at many other D3 schools expecially Wheaton who may have 1 or 2 minority players. Its hard for not just minority families but also white familes that are not well off as well. This is a problem thats hould be fixed but the reality is that it probally wont which is a shame.

[Mugsy]

There are some other factors regarding a low percentage of minorities at some CCIW schools. 

I know Wheaton continually looks for ways to increase the overall percentage of minority students.  While the percentage of African Americans is very low at Wheaton, there are other minority students at Wheaton, but not nearly at a 30% level.  I don't think it is a function of who they target as perspective students.  I'm not sure how much it has changed, if at all, since I attended back in the 80's.

In the same way, I don't think Coach Swider targets players based on ethnicity - not implying that anyone else is either.  I think they go after the best players possible who fit the type of student and individual the admissions at Wheaton expect, regardless of race.  One of my roomates at Wheaton and fellow teammate was African-American.  From my discussions with him, the biggest hurdle is how do you attract perspective minority students and athletes when the school or team has so few minorities to begin with?  There are numerous minority student/athletes who meet all the criteria to gain admission to the school, but why would they come if there are only a handful of African-Americans in the entire school?  What's the draw?  To an extent it's a self perpetuating problem, it's hard to draw more minority students and players without getting more minority students and players - especially when I don't think the school is doing anything to exclude groups of students.

[Jim Matson]

Good thoughts about state schools in D3.  I didn't really mean to make a philosophical comment about student accessability and tuition costs - these are topics for a smarter guy than me.  When viewed from a different perspective, public education at the D3 level is indeed important.

I was speaking more about my desire to see a typical small college win on national TV.  THe WIAC schools are clearly good examples of D3 athletics and I enjoy their participation in the system.  But a very large student body and state level budget support (when needed for borrowing, etc.) can give a program a decided edge over a small private liberal arts college.

Yeah, part of me would love to see Whitewater stick it to a team that kills the CCIW every year.  But the better part of me respects Mount Union and their committment to excellence - I'd like to see them beat the University of Wisconsin at Whitewater.

[usee]

thots from afar on muc/ww:

on ww:anyone who goes into linfield and scores 44 pts to win is the real deal. also, they had no problem w a strong st john's team (#3 ranked defense) a week earlier, putting up 34 pts. other evidence is an undefeated record in the WIAC which isn't an every year performance. this warhawk team will have no stars in their eyes going up vs muc. there is plenty of evidence to suggest this ww team, who put up basically 30+pts on everybody they played, will likely score its share of pts even against the highly regarded muc defense. the bigger question is whether ww defense can slow down the purple people eaters.

muc comes in w the #1 offense in the nation and the #2 defense. muc's defense is best against the pass but it has a couple dbs banged up. whitewater comes in w beaver at rb. I can't see ww stopping muc very much either. and muc hasn't been too prone to turnovers, especially when it matters.

i see this game as a high scoring affair. if muc holds on to the ball and ross watson is healthy enough to play and have an impact, muc wins down the stretch by 7. if muc turns it over and beaver gets it going, uww will take it to the raiders and win by 5+.

my prediction from the cheap seats (having seen neither team play) is MUC 42 UWW 38....and it won't matter what the weather does.

[augiedogie]

I think athletes already get compensated enough at the D3 level. Especially when you're talking about a private institution. There are no "scholarships for athletes" but as one poster said about Carthage they find a way for an athlete to attend the school. The same can be said at any school (my roommate received quite a bit of money to play collegiant ball even though he probably wouldn't have passed the credentials to attend the college if he wasn't a legacy). Attending the types of schools the CCIW provides should be more about the education one receives instead of the ability to complete in an athletic event. I agree with what Mugsy said about the % of minorities at schools in the CCIW.  In the past 5 years the minority population has almost quadruppled at Augustana but there isn't a great % of minorites on the football team yet. 

[HScoach]

muc's defense is best against the pass but it has a couple dbs banged up. ....

....and ross watson is healthy enough to play and have an impact.....

Banged up is an understatement.

[vikes35]

As Augiedogie said, the reason that most of us went, or are going to, a CCIW school is not so we could, or can, star on the athletic field for a future job as an athlete. The fact is that our players are going to do something other than play sports for a living and because of that they value our schools for the academics as much as they do for the athletics. It might be here where you get your reason for the minorities not being interested in playing for such schools. Go Thunder asks why D3 schools do not visit minority schools. My guess would be that they have tried before and they have failed, whether it is because minorities hope that they can play at the higher level or maybe for other reasons. The idea is that after hearing NO so many times, which I am speculating might be the case, it is probably pointless to spend the money to try when they can spend it trying to get recruits that are more likely to say yes. Our new president has been working out a plan that hopes to get more minorities from around the Quad City area to attend Augustana but so far, even though the numbers are quadruppled for minorities they are still much lower than what most would consider diverse (I believe the numbers are something like 92% whites and 8% minorities). I think that the problems of getting minorities onto the playing field go far deeper than sports, I agree with other posters that it has a lot more to do with what the STUDENT athlete does inside the classroom 5 days a week than it does with what the athlete does once or twice a week, depending on the sport, on the field.

[augiedogie]

As a private university like many of them are in the CCIW they have a right to accept whoever they want to accept. They set extremely high standards and not everybody has the grades/desires to attend. Does this make the CCIW an elitest  group of universities possibly. As for a class in study skills, that is great that Devry makes people take one, but at schools like Augustana, and I'm sure at other schools in the CCIW, if they don't have study skills they most likely wouldn't have gotten into the university in the first place. As for adequate financial aid,  I don't believe it to be the case, (not to sound racist), but I am a white male who comes from a family that the government decided that my parents made enough money to not qualify for aid. My sister was at IWU at the same time that I was at Augie. Combine the cost for both schools and it was well over 60k a year for the both of us, and we didn't receive any financial aid.  I have a ton of student loans, bu it was worth it because of the education I recieved.  As for NPU I hope they turn their program around one day, but I don't see other schools complaining that NPU is good because they get city kids to play for them, because this is still a student first athlete second society atleast in the CCIW.

[79jaybird]

As somebody pointed out earlier, I agree that Athletes are "well taken care of".
While at Elmhurst I knew many advantages athletes received and not just in terms of $$$.  I'm sure this happens at every school to some degree.
Krohn like Rucks,  would do anything he could to help somebody come to Elmhurst and participate in Athletics.
Race/Ethnicity never was a problem at Elm when I was there.  We had every color, race, orientation, shape, etc. on the team.  That's the beauty of a TEAM, they are a hodgepodge of players put together for the common goal... the W.
I am still favoring UWW  and hope they can bring the Walnut & Bronze to the Midwest.

[Mugsy]

North Park seems to have a very diverse roster.  Wouldn't some of those same student athletes be better students at some of these private schools where they would be surrounded by better students?  

Some day North Park is going to get a good coach and the rest of the CCIW will be complaining about their unfair advantage because they get all the inner city kids.  I would like to see a foot race between some of the North Park backs and others in the league and see who wins.  Results could be very interesting.

1. Is it possible North Park has a more diverse roster because say... they are smack in the middle of very, very diverse neighborhoods?  Is it possible kids nearby want a solid education and are familiar with NPU due to proximity?  Is it possible they could save a ton of money on room and board by living at home, which is a bus ride away from NPU?  Look at where some of the NPU players are coming from... inner city high schools.  NPU coaches have a much better chance of establishing relationships with Chicago high school coaches than other CCIW schools.  Again I don't think other schools are targetting recruits based on race. 

Coach Thorne at NCC coached high school in Wheaton for what... close to 20 years.  He is going to use all the relationships he built over those 20 years with coaches in the area to his advantage to find as many stud football players from the immediate area as possible, again regardless of race.  Why would he spend the time and money to recruit inner city Chicago, which by the way is HEAVILY recruited by DI schools from across the country, when he can find the athletes he is looking from locally?  Look at the ethnic make up of Wheaton, Glen Ellyn, Naperville... it's what... say 85% white?

2. Surrounding a student with "better students" does not guarantee they will become a better student.  It is the individual who will determine the kind of student they are.  The school can help by providing tutoring, etc... but it comes down to individual discipline and hardwork.  Are the better students going to do the course work for them?  The only advantage I can think of to having "better students" around you would be to challenge the individual to a greater extent, but that still doesn't mean they will automatically become a better student.

3. You make the assumption that inner city athletes are better than athletes from anywhere else... you also fail to recognize the many, many other requirements necessary to attend many of these schools.  Just because a player (from ANY region) is a great athlete does not insure he/she is even close to meeting the standards for admission.

4. I'm not going to even touch the "foot race" comment... not exactly sure what you are trying to imply there.

5. Right or wrong... schools have the right to accept whatever students they feel meet the standards they are looking for.  Private schools often place a premium on how strong they are academically - especially as they are viewed nationally.  How many national honor students do they have attending?  What is the average ACT/SAT score? etc... I just don't see private schools saying... "hmm... the average ACT score of our incoming freshmen is 32, but we are going to let 100 students in who were 2.0 students in high school and scored 21 on their ACT."  Right or wrong... it's not going to happen.

6. The day NPU is at a point where all other CCIW teams will be complaining about unfair advantages they have, it'll be a sign of the end times.  I believe it is in Matthew and Revelations... "earthquakes, famine, pestilance, NPU winning CCIW football championships year after year..."     I think right now they'd be happy to win a CCIW game period.

I think you've hit on a topic that permeates our society in general, not just athletics.  Racial diversity (or lack thereof), racial reconcilation, racial justice, etc...  However I think you are over simplifying things just a bit... it's not a simple fix.  I would love to see more diversity at all CCIW schools, but it's not as easy as applying one or two "fixes".