FB: Old Dominion Athletic Conference

[HSCTiger fan]

Had you gone back to 2010 it would have been 9-3.

The USAAC was the 15th ranked conference by D3 Football in 2014.  Losing CNU next season will most likely move it further down the list.

Narch when looking up this information in Kickoff, I noticed Methodist had 244 players report to camp. I figured a typo. Wrong. It was right. There are about 170 freshmen on the MC roster and only 10 seniors. What is that all about?  Do all these kids practice?  Do they all dress out on game day?  There are over 50 DBs and 40+ offensive linemen listed.  They would likely need to recruit over 2000 players to end up with 170 freshmen.  I'm sure the board of trustees loved the enrollment numbers for this fall but as a fan I'd be very concerned. 

[Pat Coleman]

It's not the first year they've had this high a number of players. That's a pretty big JV team they have to have, though.

[tigerfanalso]

I think its clear based on evidence the odac dominates the usasac. Now JK, can you come up with another topic of interest that might spark some debate during this very boring "off" week ?

[narch]

as a fan, i'm excited that MU has a strong jv program, with 8 games and a number of road games...some of the best d3 programs (mt union, umhb to name two) use this model effectively - i hope MU can emulate these programs and keep more of those young guys through their senior year - i see no reason to be concerned about a large roster and a legit jv program...

[tigerfanalso]

JV program is a great thing for many reasons, but a waste of time if you don't keep the kids in the program for 4 years. That seems to be the disconnect at MU. I wish HSC had such a program to help bring/coach the kids along but that means more coaches/locker room space/equipment, etc., and it is just not in the budget, unfortunately. What schools does your JV team play and in your opinion, why has it been so difficult keeping the kids in the program (10 seniors) ?

[narch]

a true jv program with coaching staff and full schedule at MU is new this year, so I doubt we'll see that small number of seniors in 4 years...time will tell - jv schedule is on MU website

[hscathletics]

JV program is a great thing for many reasons, but a waste of time if you don't keep the kids in the program for 4 years. That seems to be the disconnect at MU. I wish HSC had such a program to help bring/coach the kids along but that means more coaches/locker room space/equipment, etc., and it is just not in the budget, unfortunately. What schools does your JV team play and in your opinion, why has it been so difficult keeping the kids in the program (10 seniors) ?

Unless one of the big reasons behind having a JV program is for enrollment (and there is nothing wrong with that at all), I would say JV programs are generally a waste of time if they aren't producing eventual contributors. It's great if it produces four-year players, but what good does that do if they are riding the bench the entirety of their varsity career? Just seems like a money drain that could be going towards stuff to benefit the student body at large.

[tigerfanalso]

Well, like I said its not in the budget but a JV team is good for development of the freshman that are good enough to play 2nd, 3rd, 4th years. Cut those that are not good enough to contribute going forward. JV teams are meant to develop players in lieu of them sitting on the bench with no game experience freshman year. As you know, not many freshman are able to contribute. There is a reason Mount, and others, field a JV team.

[narch]

Unless one of the big reasons behind having a JV program is for enrollment (and there is nothing wrong with that at all), I would say JV programs are generally a waste of time if they aren't producing eventual contributors. It's great if it produces four-year players, but what good does that do if they are riding the bench the entirety of their varsity career? Just seems like a money drain that could be going towards stuff to benefit the student body at large.

i think a well-run jv program can have lots of benefits, and i think the hope at mu is that it produces more 4 year players - i honestly have less of a problem with mu having 200+ on their roster with a LEGIT jv program than i did when they had 160+ and had a bogus jv program - in previous years, the jv team has played anywhere from 2 to 5 games, they didn't travel much and they didn't have a dedicated jv coaching staff - the bottom line is that the mu coaches think it's the right model for mu - it may not be right for hsc, but hsc isn't who mu is modeling after...umhb, umu and other national powers have used the jv model to help them produce top-notch football programs, and that's where mu wants to be in time...we'll see if it works out - i'm all in and i think most mu fans are all in, because in the long-run, i think it's good for the football program AND good for the university

mu is in the early stages of a $35 million capital campaign (almost $30 million raised since the campaign went public in February) to fund "stuff to benefit the student body at large" - namely a $12 to $14 million health sciences building housing the athletic training, kinesiology and doctor of physical therapy programs (dpt is starting fall 2015) which will break ground very soon, significant expansion and renovation of the student center, significant expansion and renovation of the performing arts center and upgrades to every outdoor athletic facility on campus - i think the "stuff to benefit the student body at large" is being well taken care of

one other thing that i'll point out...despite having around 2x as many football players as hsc (hsc lists 111 on their roster, while mu lists 227), mu also has twice as many teams...in reality, the same percentage of kids are "riding the bench" at each school

[HSCTiger fan]

It appears about 550 students enrolled at Methodist each fall. Assuming half were girls that means 275 boys. Over 60% of the incoming boys are freshmen football players. When you throw in all the freshmen guys playing soccer, basketball, baseball, cross country, golf and any other sport MC offers there cannot be many guys just coming to school for the sake of the education alone.

Even with a full staff of JV coaches 170 is a lot of guys to evaluate and prepare. Methodist is just throwing it against the wall and seeing what sticks. You can try and compare Methodist to Mt Union, MHB or HSC. But I'm not buying it.

[narch]

It appears about 550 students enrolled at Methodist each fall. Assuming half were girls that means 275 boys. Over 60% of the incoming boys are freshmen football players. When you throw in all the freshmen guys playing soccer, basketball, baseball, cross country, golf and any other sport MC offers there cannot be many guys just coming to school for the sake of the education alone.

Even with a full staff of JV coaches 170 is a lot of guys to evaluate and prepare. Methodist is just throwing it against the wall and seeing what sticks. You can try and compare Methodist to Mt Union, MHB or HSC. But I'm not buying it.

i didn't compare methodist to umu or umhb...i compared the football model to those places - i'm not sure what you mean by " throwing it against the wall and seeing what sticks" - from what i've been told, the decision to go full force with the jv football program was a calculated strategy that coach goss brought when he was named head coach - he was an assistant for a number of years with the previous jv strategy, and felt that it was flawed - you've made it clear that you don't agree with the mu strategy...maybe it wouldn't fly at hsc or many other places, but i can tell you that the mu coaching staff believes this is the model for them - they are not trying to build the hsc football program...they are trying to build the mu program into the best it can be, and the goal is to be a team that can compete on a national level - i know that this team has more sophomores (both raw number and percentage returning) than they've ever had - i've heard that the freshman are as happy as they've ever been at this point in the season, so something seems to be working...we'll see if that translates on the field and we'll see if mu has 20 to 30 seniors in 3 years - mu doesn't need the parent of a hsc player buying their football model as long as the mu coaches, players, alumni and administration do

to address your numbers, mu has around 1,800 traditional undergraduate students (there are around 500 in the evening program and around 200 graduate students that make up the total of 2,500) and around 540 are student-athletes...that's around 30% of the traditional student body (and around 22% of the overall enrollment) - hsc has 1090 students per the hsc website, and i pulled all the athletic rosters into a spreadsheet and found hsc has 299 student-athletes...that's around 27% of the student body - you can attempt to criticize mu for having a lot of student athletes, but the bottom line is that most small, private schools are around 25% to 40% student-athletes, including hsc and the raw number of students attending mu "for the sake of the education alone" is much higher than that number at hsc and the percentage of students attending mu "for the sake of the education alone" is similar to the percentage at hsc

[narch]

Um... Narch. You polluted your statistics by not including the playoff win last year. I get it didn't help your argument, but it can't be ignored because you don't like it. That actually was top vs top. So it's 5-3 right now, and the ODAC is probably going to pick up at least one more this year. So 6-3 is reasonable? Over 4 seasons the top of the ODAC is going to have a 66% winning percentage. Small sample size, one or two wins makes a difference, but the numbers are pretty clear...

should've included that playoff win...i was focused on regular season, and didn't even think about it

i've admitted all along that the odac is a stronger football conference than the usasac, but my contention is that the gap isn't as wide as the margin appears to be, because many of those match-ups (perhaps most) are upper-tier odac wins vs. lower tier usasac teams (ehc games notwithstanding )

Had you gone back to 2010 it would have been 9-3.

2010 is ancient history in college football, especially d3  (not a lot of 5th year seniors in d3)...i purposefully went back just 3 years because there are very, very few players in either conference that played before 2011, but i get why you'd want to

[HSCTiger fan]

I am certainly 100% for student athletes.  I'm sorry I sounded overly critical. But honestly to me 170 seems excessive.  One would think MU could accomplish the same things - have a JV program, build a nationally competitive program, retain 20 to 30 seniors, with 75 to 100 players.   HSC has accomplished 2 of those 3 goals recruiting 30 to 45 guys each fall.  But there's always different ways to skin a tiger or a lion! .

Best of luck this weekend with CNU.

[Pat Coleman]

JV program is a great thing for many reasons, but a waste of time if you don't keep the kids in the program for 4 years.

This isn't true, either. A JV program helps you develop the kids who are going to contribute in their sophomore, junior and senior years. And if they aren't kids who are going to contribute, the JV program helps you weed out the ones who won't contribute.

One would think MU could accomplish the same things - have a JV program, build a nationally competitive program, retain 20 to 30 seniors, with 75 to 100 players.   HSC has accomplished 2 of those 3 goals recruiting 30 to 45 guys each fall. 

By the way, HSC opened camp with 120 kids, not 75-100.

[narch]

But honestly to me 170 seems excessive.

if 170 (or, more accurately, 227) is excessive with two teams, why is it that the 111 hsc has on its roster is NOT excessive with just one team? if that number is difficult to evaluate and prepare (as you stated earlier) with 16 coaches, why is 111 easier to evaluate and prepare with 8 to 10 coaches?

hsc and mu are very different schools and what works at hsc won't work everywhere else, including many other odac schools - 40% of hsc students attended a private high school...i bet the number is less than half of that at mu - i'd be willing to bet that a much smaller percentage of hsc students are first-generation students (judging solely by the fact that 40% of the students attended a private high school) than at mu, so it's easier to keep those kids around - hsc has been in continuous operation since 1775 and mu opened its doors almost 200 years later in 1960 - of course the two institutions are going to approach things differently because they serve a much different demographic - i would never criticize hsc for their model, because it's what works for them

for what it's worth, i'd like to see mu bring in around 75, retain 2/3 each year and have a total of around 180 on the two rosters with around 25 seniors...but it's not my decision to make