FB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[USee]

Maybe not that exact transition, but some of us are old enough to remember North Central make the pivot from perpetual mediocrity (in a good year) to a level of consistent success and recalibrated expectations.  It's not easy to push through that sort of tipping point, which I believe NPU has, and is a nice feeling when you realize the paradigm has shifted from 'I hope Augustana doesn't beat us by 40 this year' to 'we are as good as they are*, and expect to beat them'.

(*) - today this is 'we are a better team than they are', which was a second tipping point to break past.

I understand it. I saw it first hand at Wheaton. They were 2-7 for 4 straight years before JR Bishop took over and began the cultural change that led to where they are now. It wasn't the stretch of futility that the Park fans have endured, but it was a sea change nonetheless. It started with getting better, then getting better players, then expecting to win, and eventually they won and then kept winning. It's no easy task but I see the familiar roots of it on Foster with Coach Conway. He has that ship headed in the right direction. The only question is when, not if. It won't be this year but I would expect NPU to continue to surprise people with what they are doing.

Gotberg- I know where you are coming from.  This was a vision of mine on the air for 10 years covering the Jays. Seeing quality recruits and coaches go to rival schools,  trying to get the school excited about their team, being 7-3 and just not getting over that "hump".   Keep the faith.   I see NPU putting the building blocks in place to start (continue) climbing the ladder.   

I appreciate the positive sentiments, gentlemen, but, with all due respect, you don't understand the magnitude of NPU's change in attitude. No matter how poor North Central, Wheaton, or Elmhurst were in the past, they always had North Park below them to cushion the fall. Lest anybody forget, the Vikings went almost thirteen full seasons without a CCIW win prior to Mike Conway's hire three and a half years ago. They haven't had a break-even season since 1993 or a winning season since 1968. The feeling at NCC, Wheaton, Elmhurst, and other CCIW schools has always been that if the right coach came along, and if he got adequate support from the school's administration, the program could become a winner, and historical evidence bears that out. That was never true at North Park, at least not since the late '60s. You really have to have been around North Park to grasp the perennial sense of futility and despair (which, all too often, eventually led to indifference or dissension) that plagued the program.

It's just not the same thing at all.

Disagree with this.  Your framing is 'they always had North Park below them'.  Looking through the other end of the telescope, the view was 'Augustana will always be six levels above you'.  It is equally hopeless.

I get why you think the Park is a special snowflake in this regard, and the Vikings did have to move mountains just to secure the progress we've seen to date.  But the other transitions referenced were not even close to the slam dunks you suggest they would be if you tick the coach/admin support boxes, particularly when you consider how sustained they've been.  The idea in, say, 1990, that North Central would soon become a perennial Top 20 program was simply not believable.

You're not going to agree with this, and that is fine.  But just as you feel someone had to loiter a bit near Foster and Kedzie to understand the Park's challenges, I'd suggest that you haven't walked in the shoes of those at other schools to fully understand their journey.   North Park has had to overcome more than its share of challenges on the athletic front, particularly in football, but it doesn't have a monopoly on them.

And I disagree with this.

Augie's strangle-hold on the CCIW lasted less than a decade; NPC went THIRTEEN consecutive years without a single conference win - no comparison!

Wheaton does not even belong in this conversation, having been part of the upper group in the decades-long Big Four/Little Four model.  IWU has also had some rough years lately, but I'm sure both the Thunder and Titans were confident that the bad times were short termed.  Since NCC and Elmhurst were both perennial members of the 'Little Four', I can understand their comparisons, but they were still (almost) ALWAYS able to look down and see NPC.

The struggles of NPC(U) football are truly UNIQUE in CCIW history.  (Though they still pale next to Caltech baseball! )

To be clear, this conversation is about changing a culture inside of a program and institution from one of losing to one of expecting to win (and ultimately winning). That has happened at Wheaton. When the then Crusaders rejoined the CCIW in 1970 they posted a 13 season record of 38-78-1. The ONLY team worse than them over that time period was North Park (26-89-2) and Wheaton's record vs NP during that time was 8-5. Wheaton ended that era on an absolutely brutal downtick with 4 different head coaches in 4 years from '79-'82 and a record 7-29. Fortunately for Wheaton the last of those 4 coaches was JR Bishop who lasted 14 seasons as head coach (84-43) and 20 overall and brought Mike Swider to the program in '85. That era also saw a slow but discernable committment change for athletics as Hudson Armerding's presidency gave way to athletic friendly Dick Chase and the massive culture change was on. Bishop

North Park may be able to say "We sucked more and for longer" to which I wouldn't argue but there is no question Wheaton was terrible for a sustained period of time and has changed from the inside out to where they are now.

[Mr. Ypsi]

USee, I stand (partially) corrected.  Aside from my time at IWU (when Wheaton was not in the CCIW), my knowledge of CCIW history basically begins with the onset of Pat Coleman Enterprises.   For as long as I have followed the conference, Wheaton has nearly always been a contender.  On the other hand, I DO clearly recall when NCC was a pushover.

[AndOne]

USee,

When you say Wheaton "changed from the inside out," what do you feel were the primary factors that brought about this change? Were any of the following involved?
* More support from the Admininstation?
* More money allocated for athletics/recruiting?
* Hiring better coaches?
* Building up a recruiting "network" among alums and encouraging them to refer athletes who not only preform on the field, but who, of course, also subscribe to Wheaton's overall philosophy/culture?

[USee]

USee,

When you say Wheaton "changed from the inside out," what do you feel were the primary factors that brought about this change? Were any of the following involved?
* More support from the Admininstation?
* More money allocated for athletics/recruiting?
* Hiting better coaches?
* Building up a recruiting "network" among alums and encouraging them to refer athletes who not only preform on the field, but who, of course, also subscribe to Wheaton's overall philosophy/culture?

Yes to all of this but not necessarily in any particular order. JR Bishop was the main driver of change as he took over and began to educate people on the inside. He also recruited better talent and coached kids on how to be great parts of the student body. He made sure players sat in the front of class and worked on their grades, went to mandatory chapel, participated in service and leadership groups on campus. As he began to win and educate people the administration also changed. Hudson Armerding (who was a great man but not a huge athletic advocate) gave way to Dick Chase who played intramural athletics and came to every sports contest. Those two changes started it and the subsequent success fueled it. Wheaton had one of the lowest budgets and smallest staffs in the CCIW for many years after JR Bishop started (Augie and Millikin had 4 full time coaches, most other schools had 3 and Wheaton had 2). Wheaton didn't add a 3rd full time paid coach until the 90's if memory serves. Swider began the upgrade of the facilities in the mid to late 80's when he went after successful football alums to help him buy better weight room equipment, uniforms and locker room upgrades. These two individuals and the committment of Dick Chase led to a move to the Big Four for Wheaton but did not result in any CCIW championships until 1995, Jr Bishops last year as head coach (he stayed on for several years as OC) when the Thunder went undefeated, beat Witt in their first playoff appearance (14 seasons after he took over) and lost @Mt Union in the Semis in their first of 6 trips to Alliance. So to me, it took every bit of 14 years and closer to 18-19 years to get Wheaton where they are today. Even now I have seen an uptick in the quality of the program in the last 3-4 years. It continues to be an evolution.

[CardinalAlum]

Wheaton 26
Benedictine 7

Wheaton 62 plays, 471 yds (210 rushing, 261 passing), 7.6 yds per play
Benedictine 73 plays, 298 yds (22 rushing, 276 passing), 4.1 yds per play

Turnovers:
Wheaton 4 (4 fumbles)
Benedictine 3 (2 Int, 4 fumbles-1 lost)

Andrew Bowers 19-29 (66%), 261 yds 3 TD's
Stone Watson 10 rush, 124 yds 1 TD
Luke Sahly 2 sacks, Chase Greenlee 2 sacks

Despite playing without 5 of their regular starters (all of whom are back next week) Wheaton dominated this game and the outcome was really never in doubt against a Benedictine team that I expect will win the NACC conference and make it to the NCAA playoffs. The Eagles have 3 D1 transfers on their team and are quite talented. Wheaton's defense was much better than I anticipated and their offense moved the ball the way I would have expected. Benedictine had 88 yards of offense at halftime and entered the redzone just once the entire game. Benedictine got 200 yds of their 298 total yards at the end of the 3rd and during the 4th quarter after Wheaton put in their subs and played a vanilla defense. On offense Wheaton had 4 fumbles going in to score that kept the score from being a much larger margin.

I was most excited about Wheaton's young players that are in the mix with a great group of veterans. They started a freshman WR Phillip Nichols, who will be a difference maker in this league. He had 4 catchs for 105 yds and 1 TD and 3 kick returns for 66 yds. Their is a strong talent of sophomores that had great performances yesterday inclduding Stone Watson, Luke Van Dyke, Jaelin Goldsmith, Mason Ohendalski, Eric Stevenson, Stone Watson, Dmarte Arifiles, and Christian Bolhuis, and Zach Feddeler in what Swider had previously called his best recruiting class ever and it's easy to see why.

This Wheaton deep is very deep and really talented. I am more optimistic about this team at this stage than I was for either of the last two years after week 1.

Ok, so I'm guessing Stone Watson really impressed you!   

[79jaybird]

Gotberg-  Every team has had their highs and lows.  With the exception of maybe Augie,  there has not been a lot of consistency sustained decade to decade.  Yes,  NPU was in another timezone for many years, but I think we all can agree that there have been years/decades where their school has been looking at 0, 1, or 2 wins in the conference.   North Park finally has a solid foundation to continue to build on.

Thank goodness the Elmhurst defense showed up Saturday.  They are going to rely on the defense many times this year.  Big question is can that defense carry the team and bend/but not break seems to be the theme.

[markerickson]

Viking DB Simmons may be one of the best in the CCIW, and he is a sophomore.  Anderson's line had definite fat yet they did not run the ball as much as I expected, given that NPU's D-Line is way undersized.  Viking WR Daniels looked like he has game (after one game), and the WR corps fared well while AC Childress did not suit.  I am mostly concerned about the D-Line, but in this pass-happy era I do not know.  Congrats to TD Conway for breaking the NPU career record for TD passes.  More to come when Childress returns.

[Gregory Sager]

Congrats to T.D. Conway upon being named the CCIW offensive player of the week.

[Gregory Sager]

Viking DB Simmons may be one of the best in the CCIW, and he is a sophomore.  Anderson's line had definite fat yet they did not run the ball as much as I expected, given that NPU's D-Line is way undersized.  Viking WR Daniels looked like he has game (after one game), and the WR corps fared well while AC Childress did not suit.  I am mostly concerned about the D-Line, but in this pass-happy era I do not know.  Congrats to TD Conway for breaking the NPU career record for TD passes.  More to come when Childress returns.

The defensive line was pretty banged-up coming into the opener, as Allen Lagaaia and John Kellum didn't dress for Saturday's game. Fortunately, freshman Patamo Soa stepped in and had a really nice college debut for the Vikings, registering a sack and assisting on a TFL as Mark Mamola's backup at DT. Once Lagaaia and Kellum are back, the defensive line should be pretty solid.

Lagaaia is 6'2, 305 and Kellum is 6'5, 250, so there's your missing size right there. Soa is 5'11, 280, so it's pretty hard to move him, too.

[Gregory Sager]

Maybe not that exact transition, but some of us are old enough to remember North Central make the pivot from perpetual mediocrity (in a good year) to a level of consistent success and recalibrated expectations.  It's not easy to push through that sort of tipping point, which I believe NPU has, and is a nice feeling when you realize the paradigm has shifted from 'I hope Augustana doesn't beat us by 40 this year' to 'we are as good as they are*, and expect to beat them'.

(*) - today this is 'we are a better team than they are', which was a second tipping point to break past.

I understand it. I saw it first hand at Wheaton. They were 2-7 for 4 straight years before JR Bishop took over and began the cultural change that led to where they are now. It wasn't the stretch of futility that the Park fans have endured, but it was a sea change nonetheless. It started with getting better, then getting better players, then expecting to win, and eventually they won and then kept winning. It's no easy task but I see the familiar roots of it on Foster with Coach Conway. He has that ship headed in the right direction. The only question is when, not if. It won't be this year but I would expect NPU to continue to surprise people with what they are doing.

Gotberg- I know where you are coming from.  This was a vision of mine on the air for 10 years covering the Jays. Seeing quality recruits and coaches go to rival schools,  trying to get the school excited about their team, being 7-3 and just not getting over that "hump".   Keep the faith.   I see NPU putting the building blocks in place to start (continue) climbing the ladder.   

I appreciate the positive sentiments, gentlemen, but, with all due respect, you don't understand the magnitude of NPU's change in attitude. No matter how poor North Central, Wheaton, or Elmhurst were in the past, they always had North Park below them to cushion the fall. Lest anybody forget, the Vikings went almost thirteen full seasons without a CCIW win prior to Mike Conway's hire three and a half years ago. They haven't had a break-even season since 1993 or a winning season since 1968. The feeling at NCC, Wheaton, Elmhurst, and other CCIW schools has always been that if the right coach came along, and if he got adequate support from the school's administration, the program could become a winner, and historical evidence bears that out. That was never true at North Park, at least not since the late '60s. You really have to have been around North Park to grasp the perennial sense of futility and despair (which, all too often, eventually led to indifference or dissension) that plagued the program.

It's just not the same thing at all.

Disagree with this.  Your framing is 'they always had North Park below them'.

That's not the extent of the frame I created. It also includes the institutional aspect ("The feeling at NCC, Wheaton, Elmhurst, and other CCIW schools has always been that if the right coach came along, and if he got adequate support from the school's administration, the program could become a winner, and historical evidence bears that out."), which is as key to the situation at North Park as the actual endless loop of losing seasons itself.

  Looking through the other end of the telescope, the view was 'Augustana will always be six levels above you'.  It is equally hopeless.

No, it isn't. If North Central was six levels below Augie back in the day, then North Park was ten levels below Augie. Over a six-year period during the Reade era, f'rinstance, Augustana outscored North Park 244-14 -- and it wasn't Augie's national championship era, either. It wasn't simply a matter of getting massacred every time that the Park had to face Augustana on the football field. One genuinely worried about the physical safety of NPC players when they took the field against Augie.

I get why you think the Park is a special snowflake in this regard,

It's not a "special snowflake" thing at all. I take no pride in North Park's perpetual football futility. Nobody does. For most of the students, faculty, staff, and alumni of the school, football was a required burden of CCIW membership and the team itself and its performance was best ignored as being irrelevant to anything else regarding campus life (aside from the admissions department). And for generations the vast majority of North Park students have gone through their four years at Foster and Kedzie without ever having seen a Vikings football game.

I get what you're saying, but the term "special snowflake" connotes a sense of pride, and pride is the last thing in the world that anyone connected with NPU holds with regard to the school's football history.

and the Vikings did have to move mountains just to secure the progress we've seen to date.  But the other transitions referenced were not even close to the slam dunks you suggest they would be if you tick the coach/admin support boxes, particularly when you consider how sustained they've been.  The idea in, say, 1990, that North Central would soon become a perennial Top 20 program was simply not believable.

Here you're confusing climbing to the next level with sustaining the next level, which is a different topic entirely.

[Gregory Sager]

You're not going to agree with this, and that is fine.  But just as you feel someone had to loiter a bit near Foster and Kedzie to understand the Park's challenges, I'd suggest that you haven't walked in the shoes of those at other schools to fully understand their journey.   North Park has had to overcome more than its share of challenges on the athletic front, particularly in football, but it doesn't have a monopoly on them.

I never said that North Park has a monopoly upon athletic challenges. But in terms of football, especially, the challenges faced by North Park dwarf those of other CCIW schools, and that's reflected in the historical record. Except for Illinois College, which was only in the league for a five-year cup of coffee during the league's infancy in the late '40s and early '50s, each of the other CCIW schools has won at least a couple of league titles in football. That includes Carroll, which took its business elsewhere for a quarter-century and was not particularly good for long stretches of CCIW football history, and it also includes Lake Forest, which fled for the Midwest Conference while John F. Kennedy was still in the White House.

Not only has North Park never won a CCIW football title, it's finished in the top four a (debatable) grand total of two times: a second-place tie in the magical year of '68 and a three-way tie for fourth in Mike Conway's first year (2013). As everybody and his brother knows, the Vikings lost 89 times in a row in CCIW play -- that's almost thirteen full seasons -- and no more than a handful of times over the course of that streak did the Vikings even manage to hang around until late in the fourth quarter. NPU had a 27-game losing streak in the '70s, a 24-game losing streak in the '80s, and a 19-game losing streak in the '90s. The Vikings have endured 22 straight losing seasons to date, and 47 straight seasons since their one and only winning campaign (1968, when they were 6-3, 5-2) after becoming a CCIW member in 1961-62 (their first CCIW football season was in the fall of '62).

That's the historical record. But what I'm driving at every bit as much in this argument is what lies behind the historical record, and that's the decline of football as an urban sport. North Park has always struggled financially, and even with generous donations from the Holmgren and Helwig families the athletic facilities have always suffered as a result ... but even in that regard it's not as though a few other CCIW schools haven't had difficulty keeping up with the Joneses in terms of the facilities arms race. But it's not so much about the facilities, I've found over the years, as it is about where you find your players. High-school football is, for all intents and purposes, a suburban sport now. Suburban kids, not urban kids, play youth football. Suburban kids, not urban kids, go to summer football camps. Suburban kids, not urban kids, go to high schools with multiple JV/frosh teams, full slates of coaches, fresh and up-to-date equipment and fields, and parents who can drive them to practice every day. I'm not bemoaning this state of affairs as some sort of sociopolitical or cultural statement; it simply is what it is.

Back in ancient times (the late '50s), when North Park had a very solid football program as an independent under head coach Harold "Yank" Swanson, the program was mostly made up of Covenant kids from across the country and urban kids from here in the city, in an age when Chicago high school football was still relevant outside of the names "Mount Carmel" and "St. Rita". But the drying up of the city as a source for football players (as opposed to basketball and soccer players, for example) and the fact that the Evangelical Covenant denomination is much too small to be a steady source of student-athletes for North Park meant that the Park had to go where the players are: the Chicagoland suburbs.

And that's where it all fell apart.

The vast majority of suburban kids are just not interested in attending college in the big city, a place which is outside of the comfort zone of the typical suburban teenager. And that's fine; to each his or her own. NPU and DePaul and Loyola and IIT and the U of C and other urban schools are able to find plenty of students regardless. North Park is somewhat handicapped by this in terms of athletics recruiting, but creative thinking has allowed some of them to get around it; men's soccer coach John Born is the best example, as his heavy reliance upon Swedish players over the past decade and a half has helped make NPU a legitimate regional power in that sport.

The problem is that football is not like other sports. You need to bring in a dozen to fifteen new players per year, tops, in a sport such as soccer or baseball, and in basketball you can certainly make do with less than that in a recruiting class. Even if you're relying upon the suburbs for your recruiting and you're coaching at an urban school you can still make that kind of recruiting quota. But for football you're going to need anywhere from 40 to 60 new bodies every year, and that's where the difficulty of recruiting in the suburbs really hurts North Park. The numbers game makes it very difficult for a school that's already going to be an acquired taste for most suburban kids due to location. Throw in the fact that the losing tradition carries a cumulative sort of weight upon it -- it seems like, more than anything else, student-athletes want to choose a college that has a winning tradition in their sport -- and the institutional burdens of location and relative resource poverty make building a good football program a totally uphill battle for North Park in a way is a magnitude of difference than it is elsewhere.

And I disagree with this.

Augie's strangle-hold on the CCIW lasted less than a decade; NPC went THIRTEEN consecutive years without a single conference win - no comparison!

Wheaton does not even belong in this conversation, having been part of the upper group in the decades-long Big Four/Little Four model.  IWU has also had some rough years lately, but I'm sure both the Thunder and Titans were confident that the bad times were short termed.  Since NCC and Elmhurst were both perennial members of the 'Little Four', I can understand their comparisons, but they were still (almost) ALWAYS able to look down and see NPC.

The struggles of NPC(U) football are truly UNIQUE in CCIW history.  (Though they still pale next to Caltech baseball! )

Okay Ypsi, I'll play along.

In the 14 seasons between 1981 and 1994, Augustana's conference record was 102-7-1.  North Central's was 42-65-2, and that's padded by a weird random 6-1-1 record in 1982.  There was an ocean-sized chasm between the two programs, and to broach the thought that North Central would soon sit above the Vikings in the conference pecking order was a non-starter.

In the last ten years of that span, the Cardinals' record was 28-48-1.  In the most recent ten years, it is 64-6.  That's basically a pivot from a 3-5 program to a 6-1 program.

Again, though, you're talking about sustaining something. I'm talking simply about the process of getting from Point A to Point B in the first place. It was not unprecedented for North Central to have a good football team prior to the arrival of the Thornes. There were strings of seasons in the '70s and '80s in which the Cardinals had winning records in both the CCIW and overall. And, of course, back in the earlier days of the league, NCC won three football titles. Given that, and the fact that NCC's resources in terms of stadium and weight room are certainly decent, it was not unrealistic for the Cardinals to aspire to CCIW success under the criteria (good head coach, cooperative administration) that I cited in my earlier post.

What North Park has done coming out of the depths of a decade-plus of winless conference seasons is massive.  It has changed expectations, optics, attitudes, etc.  The Vikings are in a different place on a hundred different dimensions both large and small.  But North Central's pivot has involved a change in magnitude of expectations/attitude/etc. that is not so far removed from what the Vikings have done that it should be dismissed out of hand.  North Central's progression has nothing to do with where North Park was or the fact that the Cardinals weren't perennial cellar-dwellers.  It has everything to do with going from evergreen mediocrity to a program that has had sustained excellence.  Those same attributes that have changed for North Park in the past couple of years made similarly seismic moves for the Cardinals when the program evolved to where it is today.

And, as you expected I would, I disagree with that. The institutional situations are simply too dissimilar. NPU has to do what Mike Conway's trying to do with twenty-pound weights tied around its ankles. Mind you, I'm in no way making light of what John Thorne did at North Central in terms of both rising up the ladder and staying there, which is impressive by the standards of anybody whose team doesn't wear purple on Saturdays. It's simply a matter of degree of difficulty.

Maybe long-time Cardinal fans doesn't understand going from the basement to where North Park is today, but we certainly understand the excitement and wonder of a program transforming into something that was unthinkable just a few years prior.

Totally agree with that.

To be clear, this conversation is about changing a culture inside of a program and institution from one of losing to one of expecting to win (and ultimately winning). That has happened at Wheaton. When the then Crusaders rejoined the CCIW in 1970 they posted a 13 season record of 38-78-1. The ONLY team worse than them over that time period was North Park (26-89-2) and Wheaton's record vs NP during that time was 8-5. Wheaton ended that era on an absolutely brutal downtick with 4 different head coaches in 4 years from '79-'82 and a record 7-29. Fortunately for Wheaton the last of those 4 coaches was JR Bishop who lasted 14 seasons as head coach (84-43) and 20 overall and brought Mike Swider to the program in '85. That era also saw a slow but discernable committment change for athletics as Hudson Armerding's presidency gave way to athletic friendly Dick Chase and the massive culture change was on. Bishop

North Park may be able to say "We sucked more and for longer" to which I wouldn't argue but there is no question Wheaton was terrible for a sustained period of time and has changed from the inside out to where they are now.

Again, I'm not disputing that long-time Wheaton fans understand the excitement involved in moving up the ladder. But, as is the case with North Central, it's ultimately just not the same thing as it is at North Park. Your description matches precisely the good-head-coach/cooperative-administration criteria I cited earlier. And, because Wheaton had been successful in the CCIW in football in the past, and obviously had the latent resources (whether tapped through direct alumni support of the program or indirectly through the overall athletics budget) necessary to get back there again, it was just as feasible for Bishop and Swider to rebuild the program as it was for Thorne to do so at North Central. (I'd argue that it's just as feasible for Steve Bell to do it at Augie, too.) That situation did not exist at North Park. All that was there when Mike Conway arrived was a sea of losing seasons and last-place finishes stretching as far back to the horizon as the eye can see.

[augie77]

I'm curious what specific attributes a "cooperative administration" would bring to an athletic climate, in contrast to a less cooperative administration.  Much has been made of this cooperation contributing to a winning program.

[Gregory Sager]

That's a good question. I think that USee touched upon some of it when talking about Wheaton's change of presidents from Armerding to Chase. And I've read a number of posts in this room from disgruntled Augustana fans who've more than hinted that changes in their school's administration has affected Augustana sports in the opposite (i.e., declining) direction. I think that it has to do at least in part with both resource allocation and with fostering a sports-friendly climate that will draw alumni money, both of which start from the top (and I don't mean the athletic director).

[Mr. Ypsi]

That's a good question. I think that USee touched upon some of it when talking about Wheaton's change of presidents from Armerding to Chase. And I've read a number of posts in this room from disgruntled Augustana fans who've more than hinted that changes in their school's administration has affected Augustana sports in the opposite (i.e., declining) direction. I think that it has to do at least in part with both resource allocation and with fostering a sports-friendly climate that will draw alumni money, both of which start from the top (and I don't mean the athletic director).

IMHO, even the visible presence of Presidents (and other top administrators) at sporting events, ESPECIALLY if raucously cheering , is a HUGE plus.

[Gregory Sager]

Agreed, Chuck. I've felt that over the past couple of decades Carthage has done a nice job of punching above its weight in terms of CCIW athletics, given that it has had an endowment roughly the same size as North Park's at the bottom of the league (newcomer Carroll has a substantially smaller endowment than either NPU or CC), plus the additional handicap of being on the wrong side of the Cheddar Curtain (i.e., the WIAC side) in terms of athletics recruiting. But over those past couple of decades, Carthage's now-retired president F. Gregory Campbell was the most raucous and conspicuous fan in the stands, at least at Carthage football and basketball games. I can't help but think that his very public passion for Carthage sports must've had something to do with the school's comparative success on the field by translating into support behind the scenes.