FB: New England Small College Athletic Conference

[lewdogg11]

And who cares what your SATs are anyway.  There are a lot of guys like me who did pretty well, but still never brought a book home in high school and had to turn it around in college after a year and a half of staying up untill 4am every morning only to get up for an 8am class at NCR!

Seconded. The world is run by C students anyway in my opinion.

Agreed Tags....C students who can make others feel good about themselves.

It's called sales and I'm a happy, card carrying member!!!

Stoopid Sales Club for Jerks...

[union89]

And who cares what your SATs are anyway.  There are a lot of guys like me who did pretty well, but still never brought a book home in high school and had to turn it around in college after a year and a half of staying up untill 4am every morning only to get up for an 8am class at NCR!

Seconded. The world is run by C students anyway in my opinion.

Agreed Tags....C students who can make others feel good about themselves.

It's called sales and I'm a happy, card carrying member!!!

Stoopid Sales Club for Jerks...

Very true, but.......

THAT'S HOW I ROLL!!!!!!!!!

[Col. Partridge]

Williams WR John Drenckhahn scores on a 4Q pass(?!) in Team USA's 77-0 victory over Korea.

[Pat Coleman]

On the front page the past few days. Not the lead story anymore but still there.

We're taking the USA Football releases and whittling it down to players of D-III interest.

[nescac1]

If you think the NYTimes, or any other newspaper, would care that the SAT average for ONE class of football recruits at ONE division III school with a football program no one west of Albany has ever heard of had high SAT's, you received a few too many bashes to the skull during your football playing years.  Now, if it was USC with a 1400 SAT average for a class of recruits, might be a different story. 

I never said the average of every football player ever admitted to Williams over the past ten years was 1400.  I said in LAST year's frosh class of tips, a three year starter on the team posted an exact figure for that class on both the widely read student listserve and the a widely read alumni blog.  He confirmed that figure speaking in person to the author of the blog, who is  widely known investigator and debunker of false claims.   He claims his head coach told him that.     He has no more reason to lie, and I'd say less, than all the other people fond of posting stories about how person x and y they knew got into Williams with 700 SAT's or the comments made by Coach x and y at Williams about how they should committ suicide instead of going to Trinity.  But I guess the Williams coach just made the 1405 number out of thin air and allowed a player to post it all over the most widely read Williams related forums on the internet.   That simply makes no sense.   

I responded initially to someone who claimed that kids with 1000 SAT's were getting into Williams for football.  TODAY, in 2006/2007/2008, after a crack down on athlete admissions at Williams and a substantial rise in the overall academic credentials at Williams (average SAT's overall are now up above 1420, meaning even if football guys are averaging in the 1300's, they are well below the norm) that is a false assertion.  I am quite confident that only a very small handful of athletes get accepted with SAT's even below 1300, let alone in the 1150 range.   

But y'all act as if I claimed that every Williams player had a 1600 SAT.  Or that I claimed that high SAT's made Williams superior in some way.  I didn't.  Or that I claimed having high SAT's made you a better person.  I didn't.  This all was a response to undocumented, unsubstantiated, unecessary attacks on Williams, and ridiculous claims that Williams somehow has LOWER athletic recruit standards than other NESCAC schools.  Just trying to set the record straight.  Apparently, making outdated and/or outlandish claims about Williams without any support are fine, but rebutting them / claiming them false is not.  Sheesh. 

And Bant551: I know you love to post your own admission story about Williams over and over and over.  You were recruited nearly ten years ago.  Get over it.  There was a different President, admissions director, athletics director, associate athletics director, and head coach ten years ago.  Your story, even if true, is totally irrelevant to anything that has happened at Williams in the last 3-5 years.  Isn't it good enough that you kicked Williams' ass in football for four years straight?  Why are you still so bitter about an athletic establishment that doesn't even remotely affect the football program anymore?  And what in god's name are you talking about regarding current Williams football players or students wanting to set admissions policies at Trinity?  Most current Williams students don't even care about WILLIAMS football, let alone Trinity football, let alone admissions standards for Trinity.  Now you are really making stuff up out of thin air. 

[Jonny Utah]

First, I think your getting way to defensive.  I dont think anyone with any credibility has said that Williams is doing anything that bad here.  But, as you even said in your last post:

"He confirmed that figure speaking in person to the author of the blog, who is  widely known investigator and debunker of false claims.   He claims his head coach told him that."

I just thought a better source was needed for a stat like that.  That's all.

[bant551]

***And Bant551: I know you love to post your own admission story about Williams over and over and over.  You were recruited nearly ten years ago.  Get over it.  There was a different President, admissions director, athletics director, associate athletics director, and head coach ten years ago.***

I finished my playing career FOUR years ago, and my best friend from high school did as well.  I met and became friends with a bunch of his Williams friends.  My little brother went to Williams and graduated in 2005.  I know all his friends very well, most of whom played football.  They seem quite willing to offer a contrary opinion as to whether your 1400 claim is accurate, upon my asking them if that stat was correct.  So you heard from a friend who heard from a player who heard from a coach.  I've heard from players/friends directly that the claim is BS. 

Further, the whole SAT thing inevitably will -- as it always has -- end up with mocking Trinity and saying it admits brain-dead athletes, etc.

***Your story, even if true, is totally irrelevant to anything that has happened at Williams in the last 3-5 years.  Isn't it good enough that you kicked Williams' ass in football for four years straight?***

My story -- and those of my friends and acquitances who attended Williams my year and the following two years (by the way those younger guys played with and hosted as recruits the current players who are part of the purported 1400 class) -- are clearly relevant to a rational discussion as to whether or not that claim is accurate.  Further, whether or not the dubious 1400 claim is accurate, my assertions -- if you can take a leap of faith and believe me -- would tend to show that any football class averaging a 1400 would be an abberation, and far from the norm at Williams. 

***Why are you still so bitter about an athletic establishment that doesn't even remotely affect the football program anymore?***



***And what in god's name are you talking about regarding current Williams football players or students wanting to set admissions policies at Trinity?  Most current Williams students don't even care about WILLIAMS football, let alone Trinity football, let alone admissions standards for Trinity.  Now you are really making stuff up out of thin air.***

I haven't made a single claim that isn't accurate.  Williams students, players (actually far less of them than the other categories), alums, coaches (remember Barnard), etc., have been trying to meddle in Trinity's business for years.  If you don't know this, then you clearly aren't informed on this topic.  They have been trying to create league-wide academic standards that would be either binding or at least aspirational for the other teams in the league.  It is absolutely none of their business, and they are perhaps the snobbiest people walking the face of the earth.  Further, it would essentially ensure that the rules regulating the admissions of student-athletes are stacked in their favor.

[Knightstalker]

  It is absolutely none of their business, and they are perhaps the snobbiest people walking the face of the earth. 

+K for speaking what others won't say.

[Pat Coleman]

If you think the NYTimes, or any other newspaper, would care that the SAT average for ONE class of football recruits at ONE division III school with a football program no one west of Albany has ever heard of had high SAT's, you received a few too many bashes to the skull during your football playing years.

You might want to google "Bill Pennington" and "Division III" together, nescac1. He's written several stories for the New York Times about the Division III mission, academics, athletics, etc. You'd be surprised, apparently, what's been written.

[Col. Partridge]

Can we stipulate no more SAT talk?  It drives anyone halfway entertaining off this board.

I sometimes check out the NESCAC men's basketball board (the home of the defending national champion).  Some of those posters are a little creepy in the depth of their knowledge of D-III b-ball (or lack thereof, as Pat might feel), but I never read one accusation about lowering admissions standards, SATs, tips, etc.

[Trin9-0]

Can we stipulate no more SAT talk?  It drives anyone halfway entertaining off this board.

AMEN!

Pat, maybe you should start up www.D3Admissions.com that site would be PACKED!

[Pat Coleman]

Yeah, but not sure anything there would be believable.

[nescac1]

Listen, I am not the one who started this whole thing by spreading misinformation and attacks on Williams.  All I will say is if you discredit my hearsay you have to discredit the hearsay of the various posters from elsewhere who are continuously attacking Williams based on a person they know or something they heard.  I happened to live with football players for two of my four years at Williams so I can also pull the "I know football guys" card but I'm not going to go down that road.  I just don't think it is so hard to believe that one class (I never said every class, I imagine most are closer to the low-mid 1300's) of football recruits averaged over 1400.  And no one has supplied any evidence to the contrary, certainly. 

There will never be a front page NYTimes article about the SAT average for any particular sports team at Williams, Pat, I'm willing to bet on it.

Bant551, way to impugn the entire Williams community as the snobbiest people you know.  If I were to judge Trinity by the behavior of Trinity students I've seen at basketball games and football games, it wouldn't exactly be a pretty picture, but I am not going to make a blanket, sweeping judgment about your alma mater based on a few idiots, something you can find at any institution.  Most Williams folks, if they were truly snobby, would not have chosen to attend a school that almost no one has ever heard of.   And the truth is, one thing I know better than you is Williams students and alumni.  And 95 percent couldn't even tell you Williams' football record in any given November and only care, if at all, about the Amherst game.  99 percent, at LEAST, couldn't care less about Trinity or any other NESCAC football program.  If there are any students who are trying to interfere with Trinity admissions or recruiting or whatever you are trying to suggest, that is news to me, but it can't be more than five out of the 20,000 odd Williams alums and students.  There might be an administrator or two (although I doubt that is much of a priority for anyone), but that is hardly indicative of some greater movement among the Williams alumni and student community, most of whom simply don't care enough about football to worry about what Trinity is doing.  Maybe Dave Barnard made some stupid comments about Trinity, but guess what, he was FIRED.  So you can't say he is somehow indicative of a greater anti-Trinity conspiracy at Williams.  You sound just as bitter and foolish and paranoid as the same posters you love to condemn, the ones who bash Trinity when they are on top.  Which they probably will be again this year in any event, so you can rest easy.   Simply put, there is no anti-Trinity conspiracy at Williams.  At least not among 99.5 percent of people in any way affiliated with the college.     

Trinity has a great football program.  So does Williams.  I believe both bend their academic standards exactly as much as every other NESCAC school does to accomodate athletic admits.  Williams isn't taking guys with 1100's, at least not anymore, and I have no reason to think Trinity is taking guys with 950's.  Their success is bred via great coaching, great traditions, community support, and hard work by student athletes.  Can we leave it at that please?   

[JQV]

If I were to judge Trinity by the behavior of Trinity students I've seen at basketball games and football games, it wouldn't exactly be a pretty picture, but I am not going to make a blanket, sweeping judgment about your alma mater based on a few idiots, something you can find at any institution.

Wait wait wait.  I am shocked, SHOCKED, to hear that college kids are acting inappropriately while attending sporting events.  This just can't be true.

Let me check with my old roommate's brother's girlfriend's twin to find out.  I'll report back.



EDIT:  Sorry PC, I strayed from the E8, I am working late and needed a distraction.  I am going back. My bad.

[Pat Coleman]

There will never be a front page NYTimes article about the SAT average for any particular sports team at Williams, Pat, I'm willing to bet on it.

Front page wasn't part of the original claim, was it?

If you think the NYTimes, or any other newspaper, would care that the SAT average for ONE class of football recruits at ONE division III school with a football program no one west of Albany has ever heard of had high SAT's, you received a few too many bashes to the skull during your football playing years.

But even so, you're still wrong.

Bill Pennington's Dec. 4, 2005 story on academics and recruiting and tips in Division III ran on the front page of the sports section. His Dec. 25, 2005, story on the same subject also ran on the front page of the sports section. His May 21, 2006 story on athletic recruiting ran, sadly, on page 6 of the section. His July 10, 2006, story about small colleges adding football to boost male enrollment ran on the front page of the entire newspaper. His Feb. 13, 2007, story on the size and future of Division III ran on the front page of the sports section.

http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F20913F739550C778CDDAB0994DD404482
http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F30F1FF73E540C768EDDAB0994DD404482
http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F50D1FF9385A0C728EDDAC0894DE404482
http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F20A11FE3A540C738DDDAE0894DE404482
http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F10F1EF7345B0C708DDDAB0894DF404482

So ... what were you going to bet me, exactly?