Top 25 talk

[stlawus]

UR is in the LL for baseball and football.  They're kind of like what Hamilton used to be in the league.  Technically a UAA member but are in the LL for certain sports.

I would take NYU in a heart beat if it meant kicking Bard out, but that will never happen.

[Ryan Scott (Hoops Fan)]

I think Yeshiva might be down for a new conference. I believe they're an internationally recognized research university, right?

[WUPHF]

Yeshiva is not far off the UAA profile with graduate schools in law, social work and medicine among other areas.  Maybe business.  Definitely an outlier in the Skyline.

[thebear]

Yeshiva does not play after sundown on Fridays or before sundown on Saturdays - so there's that. It is ranked 68 among US universities.

The UAA schools range from 6 [Chicago] to 42 [CWRU & Brandeis]

According to US News, the following top rated Non California non UAA D3 schools are: MIT (2), Johns Hopkins (9), Tufts (28), RPI (55) , WPI (63), Stevens (83).

[Ryan Scott (Hoops Fan)]

You're right, the travel would be difficult. If I recall, though, Hopkins has had opportunities to join in the past and decided against it, correct?

[thebear]

Hopkins has a really nice travel situation. 

Their average trip in their league is about 75 miles each way.  The only "long" trip is to Muhlenberg, which is about 150 miles. 

[WUPHF]

Hopkins was a founding member of the UAA but left due to financial concerns.  The year escapes me.

[Caz Bombers]

Yeshiva might have built a decent men's basketball program but they'd be a million miles out of their depth in the UAA from an all-sports perspective. Their other men's sports are mid- to lower-tier in the Skyline at best and their women's programs...I intend no exaggeration nor rudeness when I say any high school junior varsity team you can name would beat them at any sport you can think of.

They simply do not value women's athletics in the slightest. They don't let the WBB or VB team use the Max Stern Center for home games and send them elsewhere in the NYC area, for example. (Due to COVID they had to let volleyball play on campus this fall, but ordinarily they do not allow it.)

[deiscanton]

Yeshiva might have built a decent men's basketball program but they'd be a million miles out of their depth in the UAA from an all-sports perspective. Their other men's sports are mid- to lower-tier in the Skyline at best and their women's programs...I intend no exaggeration nor rudeness when I say any high school junior varsity team you can name would beat them at any sport you can think of.

They simply do not value women's athletics in the slightest. They don't let the WBB or VB team use the Max Stern Center for home games and send them elsewhere in the NYC area, for example. (Due to COVID they had to let volleyball play on campus this fall, but ordinarily they do not allow it.)

That is understandable under Orthodox Jewish tradition.  I belong to a Conservative "Masorti" Egalitarian synagogue, but my synagogue currently leans more Reform in practice--  The Rabbinical Assembly/ United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism prayerbooks are used for services.-- "Siddur Sim Shalom" and "Siddur Lev Shalem for Shabbat and Festivals" in the case of my synagogue)  Women do not count as part of the 10 for prayer in an Orthodox Jewish minyan, and an Orthdox Jewish minyan is otherwise known as a mechitzah minyan, where the women are kept separate from the men with a divider separating the two sections.   In an Orthodox Jewish family, women have separate roles from the men.  Of course, Orthodox Jewish families are very big families, as the women are commanded to "be fruitful and multiply." (Not to say that a woman's role is not important-- it is just different.)   Modesty governs a woman's role in Orthodox Jewish tradition.  Yeshiva University is essentially two colleges at the undergraduate level-- the women go to Stern College, and the men go to Yeshiva, and the populations are kept separate.   Kind of like what Columbia/Barnard or Harvard/Radcliffe used to be.

Modern Orthodox Jewish tradition sometimes uses partnership minyans where they don't start service until 10 men and 10 women get together and the two pray as separate but equal minyans.  In a Chabad minyan, they only need 10 men to start the service-- exclusively 10 men.

That is what separates Brandeis from Yeshiva-- Yeshiva is the Modern Orthodox Jewish university, while Brandeis was always intended to be a home for all faiths, even though the Jewish community founded Brandeis as well.

[Ryan Scott (Hoops Fan)]

The women aren't on the Washington Heights campus, so it doesn't make a ton of sense to send them up there for games.

I want being entirely serious with the suggestion. Beyond the travel issue, YU would have to seriously increase their athletic investment to do something like that. As we've seen with mbb, the athletes are there if the investment is, but it would likely be a priority shift they're not down for, which is fine.

The reality is, a lot of the more competitive leagues for them (like the Liberty League) do weekend doubles that probably wouldn't work for YU. Being in a conference with a small geographic footprint makes the most sense.

[deiscanton]

Hopkins was a founding member of the UAA but left due to financial concerns.  The year escapes me.

Johns Hopkins left the UAA at the end of the 2000-2001 academic year.

[Dave 'd-mac' McHugh]

Every time Johns Hopkins reenters the UAA convo I say the following - it is NOT going to happen. I have talked to more Hopkins people about this than I can remember at this point and it is a non-starter. They are not interested.

As for other possible schools, I can't believe no one mentions Tufts... I think they would be more realistic, even a stretch, than MIT or others in New England.

And I know another school west of the Mississippi who apparently has been making a play for the UAA, but it would take a few more years before they achieve the right status - and even then they don't quite fit properly.

AND you need to add by two members, not one at a time.

While Chicago rumors are interesting, those aren't where I've been focused. I think UAA could have everything dissolve, though I've been told by many around the league it isn't imminent nor realistic that members would leave ... but I know of where the most likely locations would be and it would likely result in the league folding - they simply couldn't find the members that fit.

Being a member of the Association of American Universities I think has been a pre-requisite as well, and Yeshiva is not on that list, by the way (neither is the institution I'm told is interested in joining, but I'm told they are trying to become part of that group thus the time it is taking). Also being a Tier 1 research institution, Yeshiva is not.

[nescac1]

I don't see any incentive for Tufts to join UAA.  What would be the point?  They are currently in an equally prestigious academic league which also happens to be the best overall athletic D3 league in the country.  Tufts in recent years has won multiple national titles for each sport in men's soccer, men's lacrosse, women's softball, and had other title or contending teams in lots of other sports (field hockey, women's hoops, I think a few others).  In other words, they are flying high from their current perch. They get to play against their traditional rivals, all of whom are an easy drive (other than Hamilton, I think all within 3.5 hours and half of the league more like 1-2 hours), and many of whom are some of their biggest overlaps for applicants (I think Tufts competes mostly with other NESCAC schools, perhaps Emory among UAA schools would be a big overlap too but with no UAA schools in New England it's a pretty different applicant group). 

Instead of being the biggest school in the league and the only one with significant grad programs, which gives a competitive advantage, they become one of the smallest, which is a competitive disadvantage.  Why switch leagues to one that (1) is not any better athletically OR academically and (2) requires a massively increased athletic budget (not to mention increased burdens on student-athletes) due to plane travel while (3) ditching traditional rivals like Amherst, Williams, Trinity and so on?   

[WUPHF]

Tufts was mentioned by two or three posters.

I even said they would be the next best candidate because Johns Hopkins is not coming back.

But I agree, I do not see Tufts leaving the NESCAC.

I do think that if an institution or two were to leave the UAA, the remaining schools would look at schools outside of the traditional profile (e.g. research university, AAU membership), but it all comes down to the Chancellors or Presidents and Provosts.

[Gregory Sager]

If the UAA did ever break up, there would certainly be some leagues absolutely delighted to add those teams.  Just for fun, I imagine it going like this:

Rochester - Liberty League (no brainer)
Brandeis - NEWMAC (no brainer)
NYU - probably Liberty League
Carnegie Mellon -- NCAC
Wash U -- CCIW
Chicago -- CCIW
Emory -- SAA
Case Western -- NCAC

I think Emory would be the biggest loser there.  Rochester and NYU could together join an already strong conference and make it loaded.  Wash U and Chicago would make the CCIW even stronger and certainly adding St. Louis and Chicago would be appealing to the league for recruiting purposes.

The CCIW would not be adding the city of Chicago to the league by bringing in the U of C. The CCIW already has a member school that is located in the Windy City, and that's been true for sixty years now.