MBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[Gregory Sager]

I can confirm that Joe Hakes is gone from Millikin. However, "fired" appears to be the wrong term to describe his departure. The decision was a mutual one.

Any word on what, if anything, this does to the job security of Matt Nadelhoffer?

Nothing at all, I'm sure, for this year.  But if the new AD comes from the outside, she/he could have someone in mind, someone they know,  etc.  This will be a year that you have to hope will be a good one for Matt.

Nadelhoffer might be caught between the devil and the deep blue sea. Consider what he's up against. A good year for Millikin would involve no more than eight possible returnees for 2011-12, and that high a number only if he's been resoundingly persuasive in terms of convincing every one of Marc Smith's kids not to jump ship. (Pay no attention to the fact that all eight are currently listed on the "2011-12 roster" -- it's too early to tell right now.) And let's be frank about those eight returnees. They are not competitive-grade CCIW players, or at least they weren't last season; the team's best player, center Kyle Taylor, has graduated. I mean, Jacob Shasteen can shoot, and Nikko Robertson is a good athlete, but we're really talking about eight individuals who'd have a hard time breaking into anybody else's rotation in the CCIW (by their standards of play last year, at least; we'll see how much they are able to progress under Nadelhoffer's tutelage). On top of that, you've got a whole bunch of consecutive losing seasons culminating in last year's epic 1-23 basketball version of Napoleon's retreat from Moscow. A new coach brings new hope, of course, but when you start from the utterly demoralized place in which Millikin basketball finds itself it's hard to see much light at the end of the tunnel for the 2011-12 season.

I'm pretty sure that Jimmy Millikin has the institutional wherewithal to make a go of it in basketball again, but it'll be a long, hard slog back to competence. I'll be very, very surprised if Nadelhoffer is able to avoid a 20-loss season this year. In an ideal world he'd not only get a mulligan for 2011-12, but two or three of them, for 2012-13 and 2013-14 as well, not just because you can't turn around a basketball program on a dime but because the CCIW is an elite basketball league chock full of Top 100 level programs. The idea that he not only might not even get one mulligan, but that he might in fact be in a win-or-else situation in 2011-12 because of the change in athletic directors, is unfortunate. But 'rouser might just be right about the new AD wanting his own man in the job, especially since head men's basketball coach is a marquee position in any athletic department. I tend to doubt that Nadelhoffer would get fired after only one year; any AD who would do that would be hanging out a sign that says, "Believe me, you really wouldn't want to work for me." But who knows for sure? There's a lot of people out there looking for coaching jobs. And in a struggling economy, anyone who's in a position to hire and fire people based upon his or her own set of criteria is in the catbird seat.

[cardinalpride]

The Sporting News ranks Augustana third and names Bryant Voiles All-America honorable mention.

NCC's Landon Gamble named to Sporting News Preseason all-american honorable mention team:
http://northcentralcardinals.com/news/2011/9/29/MBB_0929115249.aspx

Here's a complete rundown of the Sporting News preseason top ten and all american list:
http://athletics.williams.edu/sports/mbkb/2011-12/releases/201109199vh3w0

[Titan Q]

On a couple of the Millikin topics discussed here recently, I spoke to a very reliable source recently who told me...

1) Joe Hakes resigned from Millikin due to "differences in philosophy" (he was not fired).

Now, the following does not come from that same source, but I also recently heard that MU's new President is interested in pursuing an NAIA affiliation.  Maybe that has something to do with the differences in philosophy...who knows.


2) Matt Nadelhoffer will have several freshmen on the 2011-12 basketball roster. 

[cciwrabblerouser]

Now, the following does not come from that same source, but I also recently heard that MU's new President is interested in pursuing an NAIA affiliation.  Maybe that has something to do with the differences in philosophy...who knows.

millikin considering the naia?  now that's a scary thought.  the only reason you don't see a mass exodus of naia teams to d-3 is because d-3 limits the number of programs entering the division to a very small number each year.  going naia would be a decision that mu would have to regret.

[AndOne]

Now, the following does not come from that same source, but I also recently heard that MU's new President is interested in pursuing an NAIA affiliation.  Maybe that has something to do with the differences in philosophy...who knows.

millikin considering the naia?  now that's a scary thought.  the only reason you don't see a mass exodus of naia teams to d-3 is because d-3 limits the number of programs entering the division to a very small number each year.  going naia would be a decision that mu would have to regret.

Not necessarily.
Right now Millikin is likely one of the worst D3 basketball teams in the country. They lost the best player off last year's 1-23 team to graduation, and only have 8 returning players on the roster. From all reports, it would seem like many people who are fairly to very familiar with the current situation at MU would be surprised if, under the direction of new head coach Nadelhoffer, the level of recruiting and corresponding roster size/strength doesn't pick up at least mildly within 2-3 years. However, even if they made bigger than expected strides over that time period they would most likely still trail the vast majority of their competition by a significant degree. This is especially true when you consider the current depth of the sinkhole that they have to begin digging themselves out of. The competition isn't just going to stop recruiting/improving and let them catch up. An additional burden that many of us here are familiar with is the fact that Decatur, IL cannot accurately be described as anywhere near one of the jewels or top travel destinations of the Midwest.

Accordingly, given their current state, perhaps, for Millikin, NAIA association may not really be such a bad idea. They would be able to offer athletic as well as academic money. Perhaps this would help lure more talented athletes to campus, and thus improve the fortunes of MU across the various athletic venues. While D3 membership would of course be the overwhelming choice of those of us who regularly post on the different boards here, its doubtful that D3 membership is the best choice for each and every institution. Millikin just may be one of the exceptions. Nothing definite, just something to consider. 

[Pat Coleman]

They could also cut back their athletic department significantly, give up the exposure of being in the NCAA, as well as the catastrophic student-athlete insurance that is covered by the NCAA. And the NCAA's reimbursement of postseason travel.

Don't see too many schools going the other direction. The vast majority of the NAIA-NCAA traffic has been leaving the NAIA.

[hopefan]

If Millikin can not be competitive in the CCIW, why not consider the MWC, NathC, or SLIAC?  At least in terms of the SLIAC, it would make 'us' a stronger conference, and likely put Millikin back into a situation where the team would be able to set meaningful goals like conference tournament spots....remember, 5 of the 9 teams in the SLIAC are Illinois schools......

[Dennis_Prikkel]

If Millikin can not be competitive in the CCIW, why not consider the MWC, NathC, or SLIAC?  At least in terms of the SLIAC, it would make 'us' a stronger conference, and likely put Millikin back into a situation where the team would be able to set meaningful goals like conference tournament spots....remember, 5 of the 9 teams in the SLIAC are Illinois schools......

Where are you on this topic G.S.?

There has been a quiet, below the surface, hush-hush, attitude in some North Park athletic circles for several years that perhaps the Vikings are out-classed in their current CCIW membership.  I, myself, do not feel that way.  This feeling is that Vikings would be better served in conference competition with Aurora & IBC, rather than North Central, Wheaton & Elmhurst.

Perhaps the Millikin powers that be feel that some sort of athletic arrangement with the downstate Illinois NAIA schools would be more to their current overall athletic abilities than the upstate-looking CCIW.

Who knows, the CCIW could be looking at two defections rather than one if Millikin gets the ball rolling.

[markerickson]

I would not oppose NPU moving to the NAIA.

[cciwrabblerouser]

i am amazed that any d3 school would move to the naia.  if the competition in the cciw is too much, move to a less competitive d3 conference. the naia does NOT reimburse for post-season travel.  the general public has minimal interest in the naia (what's  that???).  the ncaa provides each member with $250,000 in catastrophic insurance coverage -- the naia does NOT.  the naia school needs to offer substantial scholarship dollars to  its athletes if it wants to be competitive -- so there are additional significant costs in financial aid.

any athletics or senior administrator who thinks the naia is the answer either doesn't have a clue or secretly despises college athletics.

[Gregory Sager]

They could also cut back their athletic department significantly, give up the exposure of being in the NCAA, as well as the catastrophic student-athlete insurance that is covered by the NCAA. And the NCAA's reimbursement of postseason travel.

Don't see too many schools going the other direction. The vast majority of the NAIA-NCAA traffic has been leaving the NAIA.

Precisely. The phrase "rats jumping onto a sinking ship" is what comes to mind when I think of the handful of schools (William Penn is the only one I can recall at the moment, but I know that there have been others) that have defected from the NCAA to the NAIA. While the NAIA membership hemorrhage seems to have stabilized, what with D2 setting a ceiling of ten new members per year and the new NAIA bylaw to allow for-profit institutions to join the association opening up a new pool of prospective applicants, the NAIA is still not out of the woods yet. And if it does survive, it will be a drastically different association that caters largely to schools that field teams in only a few sports.

It seems to me that the current trend among D3 schools that are having financial difficulties is to add sports, rather than drop them (Adrian is a good example). That may seem counterintuitive at first blush, but the reality is that more sports brings more students onto campus to play them. And if you have the infrastructure to house these new sports -- which Millikin does, although it lags behind the rest of the CCIW in terms of athletic facilities quality -- then you reduce the start-up costs involved with adding them.

If Bob's source is correct, and the new Millikin president really is considering the NAIA, I think that it means one of two things:

1. The new Millikin president is uninformed as to the current health of the NAIA and the direction in which it's heading; or

2. He is informed, and wants the school to join the NAIA because he wants to save money by paring down the number of sports Millikin offers below the twelve-sport minimum required by D3.

Now, the following does not come from that same source, but I also recently heard that MU's new President is interested in pursuing an NAIA affiliation.  Maybe that has something to do with the differences in philosophy...who knows.

millikin considering the naia?  now that's a scary thought.  the only reason you don't see a mass exodus of naia teams to d-3 is because d-3 limits the number of programs entering the division to a very small number each year.  going naia would be a decision that mu would have to regret.

No, it's actually the limit imposed by D2 that has stopped up the leak in the levee, not D3. More NAIA schools see D2 as an ideal destination than D3, because D2, like the NAIA, allows athletic scholarships. But I suspect that you're right about Millikin regretting this move if it comes to fruition. While it's obvious that there's an acceptable home for Millikin in the CCAC -- the only other NAIA conference represented in Illinois is the American Midwest Conference to which Benedictine-Springfield belongs, and I can't imagine a conference that requires travel to Arkansas and suburban Kansas City being viewed as a cost-effective alternative to the CCIW -- and Jimmy Millikin would definitely save some coin if it pared down to eight or nine sports in which it really felt it could compete, the loss of academic cachet the school would suffer would be considerable. Because, let's face it, if your "premium" institutions such as Georgetown (KY) are looking to follow all the other well-regarded schools that've walked out the NAIA's door over the past thirty years, and their ranks are being replaced by schools of the ilk of the University of Phoenix, then you're going to suffer guilt by association (literally!) in the eyes of prospective students. I've heard a number of college administrators say that there's a growing disdain towards NAIA members in terms of academics, especially when compared to D3 members.

Now, the following does not come from that same source, but I also recently heard that MU's new President is interested in pursuing an NAIA affiliation.  Maybe that has something to do with the differences in philosophy...who knows.

millikin considering the naia?  now that's a scary thought.  the only reason you don't see a mass exodus of naia teams to d-3 is because d-3 limits the number of programs entering the division to a very small number each year.  going naia would be a decision that mu would have to regret.

Not necessarily.
Right now Millikin is likely one of the worst D3 basketball teams in the country. They lost the best player off last year's 1-23 team to graduation, and only have 8 returning players on the roster. From all reports, it would seem like many people who are fairly to very familiar with the current situation at MU would be surprised if, under the direction of new head coach Nadelhoffer, the level of recruiting and corresponding roster size/strength doesn't pick up at least mildly within 2-3 years. However, even if they made bigger than expected strides over that time period they would most likely still trail the vast majority of their competition by a significant degree. This is especially true when you consider the current depth of the sinkhole that they have to begin digging themselves out of. The competition isn't just going to stop recruiting/improving and let them catch up.

You're only looking at men's basketball, Mark, and men's basketball is merely one of seventeen CCIW sports in which Millikin competes. Millikin is currently either the reigning CCIW champion of, or very competitive in, softball, volleyball, women's basketball, and men's golf.

An additional burden that many of us here are familiar with is the fact that Decatur, IL cannot accurately be described as anywhere near one of the jewels or top travel destinations of the Midwest.

The "Decatur Factor" could be hard to overcome if you're a Millikin coach (or admissions counselor, for that matter). I don't know how much of a stigma is attached to Decatur among downstate folks, though. I only know that Chicagolanders thumb their noses -- and hold their noses -- at Decatur.

Accordingly, given their current state, perhaps, for Millikin, NAIA association may not really be such a bad idea. They would be able to offer athletic as well as academic money. Perhaps this would help lure more talented athletes to campus, and thus improve the fortunes of MU across the various athletic venues. While D3 membership would of course be the overwhelming choice of those of us who regularly post on the different boards here, its doubtful that D3 membership is the best choice for each and every institution. Millikin just may be one of the exceptions. Nothing definite, just something to consider.

I totally agree that D3 isn't for everybody. But the NAIA seems like a backwards move for Millikin, for both of the reasons I cited: It's not a stable organization, and the shift in the composition of its membership is making it more and more of an undesirable choice for schools that prize their academic bona-fides.

If Millikin can not be competitive in the CCIW, why not consider the MWC, NathC, or SLIAC?  At least in terms of the SLIAC, it would make 'us' a stronger conference, and likely put Millikin back into a situation where the team would be able to set meaningful goals like conference tournament spots....remember, 5 of the 9 teams in the SLIAC are Illinois schools......

If Millikin's new president wants to retain the football program -- and keep in mind that MU's female:male ratio is already a very lopsided 61:39, even with a football team on campus -- then the SLIAC wouldn't be a good fit. The MWC would probably be ideal for MU, but there are rumblings that that league might be headed for an academics-related split in order to form a new conference based upon the Associated Colleges of the Midwest, of which Millikin is not a member. The NAthC might be the best option, especially if the league goes into a permanent two-division format (North and South) for most sports.

Where are you on this topic G.S.?

I don't want Millikin to leave. It's a charter member of the CCIW, and one of only four schools that have stayed in the league from the beginning and never left (Augustana, Illinois Wesleyan, and North Central are the other three). The league is only as strong as the eight schools in it, and while Millikin has not been across-the-board solid in the CCIW in recent years, these things can go in cycles. Once upon a time, Millikin was very strong in a lot more sports than it is now, while Carthage and North Central were relatively weak in terms of overall competitiveness. That's changed, but, just as what was true yesterday isn't necessarily true today, what's true today isn't necessarily going to be true tomorrow in terms of intraleague competitiveness. The recent overall decline of Augustana's a good example of that, too.

Plus, there'd be the inevitable headache of then having to select a new school to replace MU as the eighth member. I would suspect that it would be Carroll, but that's hardly written in stone.

There has been a quiet, below the surface, hush-hush, attitude in some North Park athletic circles for several years that perhaps the Vikings are out-classed in their current CCIW membership.  I, myself, do not feel that way.  This feeling is that Vikings would be better served in conference competition with Aurora & IBC, rather than North Central, Wheaton & Elmhurst.

There's nothing quiet or hush-hush about it. It's been talked about pretty openly, although mostly as a sort of trial balloon by people like you and me who don't necessarily subscribe to the idea and who simply wish to play devil's advocate for the sake of conversation. While those of us who love and support NPU athletics have long been angry about the school's inability (or refusal -- herein lies a real debate) to bring forward the necessary resources for the school to compete better across the board in the CCIW, almost everybody agrees that the pluses of CCIW membership far outweigh the minuses, even though lots of losing is a big minus. The stark fact of the matter is that a lot of student-athletes come to NPU precisely because of the CCIW, and we'd lose them if we dropped down to the NAthC. Under those circumstances, I'm not sure that we'd even be able to compete with Benedictine if the Park was to step down to the NAthC, since Benedictine has the natural advantages of a strictly Chicagoland-based student body, athletics facilities that are first-class by D3 standards, and a Catholic orientation.

Perhaps the Millikin powers that be feel that some sort of athletic arrangement with the downstate Illinois NAIA schools would be more to their current overall athletic abilities than the upstate-looking CCIW.

What downstate Illinois NAIA schools? There aren't any left, Dennis ... or hardly any. UI-Springfield has joined D2, as has McKendree University. Robert Morris-Springfield has remained in the USCAA rather than join the NAIA, and newbie Lindenwood-Belleville is also USCAA rather than NAIA. The lone downstate member of the NAIA at the moment is Benedictine's branch campus, Benedictine-Springfield.

If Millikin was to join the NAIA, it would clearly have to apply for membership to the CCAC and thus become a peer of Chicagoland-area schools such as Trinity International, Robert Morris, Judson, Olivet Nazarene, etc., as well as the handful of northern Indiana schools that are CCAC members. In other words, CCAC membership would mean even more chartered buses with Big Blue athletes on them heading northward on I-57 than is already the case.

Who knows, the CCIW could be looking at two defections rather than one if Millikin gets the ball rolling.

NPU isn't going anywhere, if that's what you're insinuating. Besides, the Park is slowly becoming more competitive in the CCIW. It will take a lot of time and effort and some tangible support from the administration -- and David Parkyn strikes me as being a very pro-athletics president -- but overall the arrow is pointed up rather than down. I don't think that we can say the same thing about Millikin. Although he didn't tell me specificially why he resigned, aside from "philosophical differences," my read is that being in a bad situation that's about to become worse is why Joe Hakes tendered his resignation last week.

I would not oppose NPU moving to the NAIA.

I would scream long and loud if NPU moved to the NAIA. It would be a monumentally stupid thing for the school to do.

[Dennis_Prikkel]

Thank you for your "Sage-r" wisdom on the topic of the day - GS.

I too, would decry a North Park move to the NAIA.

What happened to Greenville, McKendree, Principia - did they all go D3?

[petemcb]

Greenville and Principia are in the D3 SLIAC and McKendree went from NAIA to D2 recently.

[petemcb]

They could also cut back their athletic department significantly, give up the exposure of being in the NCAA, as well as the catastrophic student-athlete insurance that is covered by the NCAA. And the NCAA's reimbursement of postseason travel.

Don't see too many schools going the other direction. The vast majority of the NAIA-NCAA traffic has been leaving the NAIA.

Precisely. The phrase "rats jumping onto a sinking ship" is what comes to mind when I think of the handful of schools (William Penn is the only one I can recall at the moment, but I know that there have been others) that have defected from the NCAA to the NAIA. While the NAIA membership hemorrhage seems to have stabilized, what with D2 setting a ceiling of ten new members per year and the new NAIA bylaw to allow for-profit institutions to join the association opening up a new pool of prospective applicants, the NAIA is still not out of the woods yet. And if it does survive, it will be a drastically different association that caters largely to schools that field teams in only a few sports.

It seems to me that the current trend among D3 schools that are having financial difficulties is to add sports, rather than drop them (Adrian is a good example). That may seem counterintuitive at first blush, but the reality is that more sports brings more students onto campus to play them. And if you have the infrastructure to house these new sports -- which Millikin does, although it lags behind the rest of the CCIW in terms of athletic facilities quality -- then you reduce the start-up costs involved with adding them.

If Bob's source is correct, and the new Millikin president really is considering the NAIA, I think that it means one of two things:

1. The new Millikin president is uninformed as to the current health of the NAIA and the direction in which it's heading; or

2. He is informed, and wants the school to join the NAIA because he wants to save money by paring down the number of sports Millikin offers below the twelve-sport minimum required by D3.

Now, the following does not come from that same source, but I also recently heard that MU's new President is interested in pursuing an NAIA affiliation.  Maybe that has something to do with the differences in philosophy...who knows.

millikin considering the naia?  now that's a scary thought.  the only reason you don't see a mass exodus of naia teams to d-3 is because d-3 limits the number of programs entering the division to a very small number each year.  going naia would be a decision that mu would have to regret.

No, it's actually the limit imposed by D2 that has stopped up the leak in the levee, not D3. More NAIA schools see D2 as an ideal destination than D3, because D2, like the NAIA, allows athletic scholarships. But I suspect that you're right about Millikin regretting this move if it comes to fruition. While it's obvious that there's an acceptable home for Millikin in the CCAC -- the only other NAIA conference represented in Illinois is the American Midwest Conference to which Benedictine-Springfield belongs, and I can't imagine a conference that requires travel to Arkansas and suburban Kansas City being viewed as a cost-effective alternative to the CCIW -- and Jimmy Millikin would definitely save some coin if it pared down to eight or nine sports in which it really felt it could compete, the loss of academic cachet the school would suffer would be considerable. Because, let's face it, if your "premium" institutions such as Georgetown (KY) are looking to follow all the other well-regarded schools that've walked out the NAIA's door over the past thirty years, and their ranks are being replaced by schools of the ilk of the University of Phoenix, then you're going to suffer guilt by association (literally!) in the eyes of prospective students. I've heard a number of college administrators say that there's a growing disdain towards NAIA members in terms of academics, especially when compared to D3 members.

Now, the following does not come from that same source, but I also recently heard that MU's new President is interested in pursuing an NAIA affiliation.  Maybe that has something to do with the differences in philosophy...who knows.

millikin considering the naia?  now that's a scary thought.  the only reason you don't see a mass exodus of naia teams to d-3 is because d-3 limits the number of programs entering the division to a very small number each year.  going naia would be a decision that mu would have to regret.

Not necessarily.
Right now Millikin is likely one of the worst D3 basketball teams in the country. They lost the best player off last year's 1-23 team to graduation, and only have 8 returning players on the roster. From all reports, it would seem like many people who are fairly to very familiar with the current situation at MU would be surprised if, under the direction of new head coach Nadelhoffer, the level of recruiting and corresponding roster size/strength doesn't pick up at least mildly within 2-3 years. However, even if they made bigger than expected strides over that time period they would most likely still trail the vast majority of their competition by a significant degree. This is especially true when you consider the current depth of the sinkhole that they have to begin digging themselves out of. The competition isn't just going to stop recruiting/improving and let them catch up.

You're only looking at men's basketball, Mark, and men's basketball is merely one of seventeen CCIW sports in which Millikin competes. Millikin is currently either the reigning CCIW champion of, or very competitive in, softball, volleyball, women's basketball, and men's golf.

An additional burden that many of us here are familiar with is the fact that Decatur, IL cannot accurately be described as anywhere near one of the jewels or top travel destinations of the Midwest.

The "Decatur Factor" could be hard to overcome if you're a Millikin coach (or admissions counselor, for that matter). I don't know how much of a stigma is attached to Decatur among downstate folks, though. I only know that Chicagolanders thumb their noses -- and hold their noses -- at Decatur.

Accordingly, given their current state, perhaps, for Millikin, NAIA association may not really be such a bad idea. They would be able to offer athletic as well as academic money. Perhaps this would help lure more talented athletes to campus, and thus improve the fortunes of MU across the various athletic venues. While D3 membership would of course be the overwhelming choice of those of us who regularly post on the different boards here, its doubtful that D3 membership is the best choice for each and every institution. Millikin just may be one of the exceptions. Nothing definite, just something to consider.

I totally agree that D3 isn't for everybody. But the NAIA seems like a backwards move for Millikin, for both of the reasons I cited: It's not a stable organization, and the shift in the composition of its membership is making it more and more of an undesirable choice for schools that prize their academic bona-fides.

If Millikin can not be competitive in the CCIW, why not consider the MWC, NathC, or SLIAC?  At least in terms of the SLIAC, it would make 'us' a stronger conference, and likely put Millikin back into a situation where the team would be able to set meaningful goals like conference tournament spots....remember, 5 of the 9 teams in the SLIAC are Illinois schools......

If Millikin's new president wants to retain the football program -- and keep in mind that MU's female:male ratio is already a very lopsided 61:39, even with a football team on campus -- then the SLIAC wouldn't be a good fit. The MWC would probably be ideal for MU, but there are rumblings that that league might be headed for an academics-related split in order to form a new conference based upon the Associated Colleges of the Midwest, of which Millikin is not a member. The NAthC might be the best option, especially if the league goes into a permanent two-division format (North and South) for most sports.

Where are you on this topic G.S.?

I don't want Millikin to leave. It's a charter member of the CCIW, and one of only four schools that have stayed in the league from the beginning and never left (Augustana, Illinois Wesleyan, and North Central are the other three). The league is only as strong as the eight schools in it, and while Millikin has not been across-the-board solid in the CCIW in recent years, these things can go in cycles. Once upon a time, Millikin was very strong in a lot more sports than it is now, while Carthage and North Central were relatively weak in terms of overall competitiveness. That's changed, but, just as what was true yesterday isn't necessarily true today, what's true today isn't necessarily going to be true tomorrow in terms of intraleague competitiveness. The recent overall decline of Augustana's a good example of that, too.

Plus, there'd be the inevitable headache of then having to select a new school to replace MU as the eighth member. I would suspect that it would be Carroll, but that's hardly written in stone.

There has been a quiet, below the surface, hush-hush, attitude in some North Park athletic circles for several years that perhaps the Vikings are out-classed in their current CCIW membership.  I, myself, do not feel that way.  This feeling is that Vikings would be better served in conference competition with Aurora & IBC, rather than North Central, Wheaton & Elmhurst.

There's nothing quiet or hush-hush about it. It's been talked about pretty openly, although mostly as a sort of trial balloon by people like you and me who don't necessarily subscribe to the idea and who simply wish to play devil's advocate for the sake of conversation. While those of us who love and support NPU athletics have long been angry about the school's inability (or refusal -- herein lies a real debate) to bring forward the necessary resources for the school to compete better across the board in the CCIW, almost everybody agrees that the pluses of CCIW membership far outweigh the minuses, even though lots of losing is a big minus. The stark fact of the matter is that a lot of student-athletes come to NPU precisely because of the CCIW, and we'd lose them if we dropped down to the NAthC. Under those circumstances, I'm not sure that we'd even be able to compete with Benedictine if the Park was to step down to the NAthC, since Benedictine has the natural advantages of a strictly Chicagoland-based student body, athletics facilities that are first-class by D3 standards, and a Catholic orientation.

Perhaps the Millikin powers that be feel that some sort of athletic arrangement with the downstate Illinois NAIA schools would be more to their current overall athletic abilities than the upstate-looking CCIW.

What downstate Illinois NAIA schools? There aren't any left, Dennis ... or hardly any. UI-Springfield has joined D2, as has McKendree University. Robert Morris-Springfield has remained in the USCAA rather than join the NAIA, and newbie Lindenwood-Belleville is also USCAA rather than NAIA. The lone downstate member of the NAIA at the moment is Benedictine's branch campus, Benedictine-Springfield.

If Millikin was to join the NAIA, it would clearly have to apply for membership to the CCAC and thus become a peer of Chicagoland-area schools such as Trinity International, Robert Morris, Judson, Olivet Nazarene, etc., as well as the handful of northern Indiana schools that are CCAC members. In other words, CCAC membership would mean even more chartered buses with Big Blue athletes on them heading northward on I-57 than is already the case.

Who knows, the CCIW could be looking at two defections rather than one if Millikin gets the ball rolling.

NPU isn't going anywhere, if that's what you're insinuating. Besides, the Park is slowly becoming more competitive in the CCIW. It will take a lot of time and effort and some tangible support from the administration -- and David Parkyn strikes me as being a very pro-athletics president -- but overall the arrow is pointed up rather than down. I don't think that we can say the same thing about Millikin. Although he didn't tell me specificially why he resigned, aside from "philosophical differences," my read is that being in a bad situation that's about to become worse is why Joe Hakes tendered his resignation last week.

I would not oppose NPU moving to the NAIA.

I would scream long and loud if NPU moved to the NAIA. It would be a monumentally stupid thing for the school to do.

Impressive!  That's a season's worth of posts for a lot of us and coaches haven't even rolled out the first ball yet! 

[iwu70]

Greg, thanks for your long post on the MU situation.  Very informative.  It is sad to see MU having such troubles.  Truly amazed at Augie being 0-4 in football. 

Looking forward to the basketball season.  IWU has their roster up now.  I was surprised to see Ryan Connelly not on the roster.  It will be very interesting to see how Ron Rose puts together a rotation from this group, a very talented, but in many ways untested group.  Augie is going to be very tough for everyone this season. 

IWU70