FB: Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference

[Ron Boerger]

Isn't the point of D3 athletics, to demonstrate the meaning of STUDENT-athlete? What is wrong with accepting students who don't fit the schools scholastic, economic, and (bbking might argue ethnic) portfolio. Would these presidents not agree that the mission of D3 athletics to mold men and women of BALANCE? Where is the balance within these institutions? Are they concerned that they're not able to educate students with average high school scores? I could write an entire blog on reasons students can perform much higher than their high school scores suggest, if given the right guidance and motivation.

Admitting a student-athlete on the basis of athletic potential over academic qualifications - and let's face it, that is your basic premise, window dressing aside - is a pretty basic violation of NCAA Division III policy, is it not?  Especially since those student-athletes would probably also need substantial financial aid to pay the piper, and granting aid disproportionately to student-athletes for whatever reason IS a huge no-no that the NCAA will seek out and has been paying more attention to as of late.   

Folks, if you're not in the SCAC, you're free to call it a "geographic mess," but the fact of the matter is it worked quite well for a couple of decades until it choked on its own success (too many teams, too far apart).   Whether a new SCAC can rise from the ashes to retain its geographic independence is a matter still very much in the balance, but that is the direction that has been announced.   

[Ralph Turner]

...
Folks, if you're not in the SCAC, you're free to call it a "geographic mess," but the fact of the matter is it worked quite well for a couple of decades until it choked on its own success (too many teams, too far apart).   Whether a new SCAC can rise from the ashes to retain its geographic independence is a matter still very much in the balance, but that is the direction that has been announced.    

Respectfully, RHIT was only in the conference for less than a decade. (1998-99 thru 2005-06).  With that departure the conference had to replace a football school way out in the third time zone.

I do agree the success did lead to the split.  When 8 geographically concentrated teams could form a new league, then they did.  As long as the conference was "10 like minded institutions", they were stuck with making it work for themselves.

[HelloGoodbye]

Admitting a student-athlete on the basis of athletic potential over academic qualifications - and let's face it, that is your basic premise, window dressing aside - is a pretty basic violation of NCAA Division III policy, is it not?  Especially since those student-athletes would probably also need substantial financial aid to pay the piper, and granting aid disproportionately to student-athletes for whatever reason IS a huge no-no that the NCAA will seek out and has been paying more attention to as of late.   

Folks, if you're not in the SCAC, you're free to call it a "geographic mess," but the fact of the matter is it worked quite well for a couple of decades until it choked on its own success (too many teams, too far apart).   Whether a new SCAC can rise from the ashes to retain its geographic independence is a matter still very much in the balance, but that is the direction that has been announced.   

No one said based on athletic potential, so let's be very clear about that. A students' potential might include athletics, but is not BASED on athletics. Would a school be out of line to accept a exceptional drama student into the theater program, even if their GPA wasn't on par with the schools average? No, they would (should) look at what else the student offers.
If the schools want the balance they teach their students, then they'll see the advantage in students who WILL contribute to their school in things beyond the USAtoday rankings. D3 is about the COMPLETE student, correct? Further, absolutely NO ONE mentioned granting a student unfair acceptance because of athletics. The point, though, is that these schools are looking at numbers...not the person. That's lazy, not elite. I don't care if its art, athletics, academics, or anything else like that... ELITE schools will find the very best blend. Window dress that statement however you'd like... I believe all students should have a chance. The attitudes of these institutions in this matter, reflect their feelings on these types of "average" students, in general. This isn't the first time someone is saying these things on these boards.

"If you're not in the SCAC..." What makes someone "in" the SCAC? And what makes someone more in the SCAC? Have you played in it, or dealt with the week in and week out travel, while doing homework? Did you participate in loading/unloading of equipment after you bus arrived at 3am, from several of these trips? Did you do school work on buses coming back 12+ hours back and forth from games, and on the plane ride back from CC? You know anyone who struggled with school in season, because of the full weekends of travel, and teachers who didn't like athletes which in turn made their lives harder? Are you really implying that anyone in this room is less "in" the SCAC than another? It's a blog... it's here for opinion... it's here for FANS to exchange ideas. My thinking the SCAC is a mess is my opinion, and one I can support... I've been there.

My comment about the ASC/SCAC "trading" schools put academics aside. It was purely from a "this would be cool for football" moment. The Texas schools should have a league, and have the rest bring over/in schools like MC/LC/Huntingdon... D3 not losing UNO or Cent. Those are all regional teams to the former SCAC "east."

[cush]

McMurry going D2 is nuts in my view. They have a great chance to reverse that move and join up with the scac right now. I would guess the scac will offer some asc school's but i don't see them getting more than 6 or 7 school's in texas, which would mean 2-3 invites. I also could see centenary team up with the school's that left the scac rather than join the current scac. I don't see Mississippi or Louisiana college + hundington joining the scac either. My guess would the scac targets 2-3 naia school's who might move to d3 with a goal of reaching 10 members total.   

[HelloGoodbye]

McMurry would definately be a good call, but Mumme probably wants his hands on some scholarship type kids in Texas. When they brought him in, you knew they were serious about sports. I can't wait to see how they do.

You're right about LC/MC/Huntingdon, as they're not the same type of "academic" schools. Regionally, though, it would make for some good matchups with the teams that just left the SCAC. As for a Texas league, who wouldn't want to see Trinity, UMHB, and UMHS in the same conference? That would be awesome.

I'm a huge SCAC supporter, and I'm sad to see it come to this. I wish the schools could find another way, but alas, it is what it is. The SCAC as it's been has been a lot of fun, and very exciting in recent years. I hope all of the schools find their own balance, and continue to demonstrate success on AND off the field. It's a shame that some don't seem to want to necessarily do both.

[hasanova]

Isn't the point of D3 athletics, to demonstrate the meaning of STUDENT-athlete? What is wrong with accepting students who don't fit the schools scholastic, economic, and (bbking might argue ethnic) portfolio. Would these presidents not agree that the mission of D3 athletics to mold men and women of BALANCE? Where is the balance within these institutions? Are they concerned that they're not able to educate students with average high school scores? I could write an entire blog on reasons students can perform much higher than their high school scores suggest, if given the right guidance and motivation.

Admitting a student-athlete on the basis of athletic potential over academic qualifications - and let's face it, that is your basic premise, window dressing aside - is a pretty basic violation of NCAA Division III policy, is it not?  Especially since those student-athletes would probably also need substantial financial aid to pay the piper, and granting aid disproportionately to student-athletes for whatever reason IS a huge no-no that the NCAA will seek out and has been paying more attention to as of late.   

Folks, if you're not in the SCAC, you're free to call it a "geographic mess," but the fact of the matter is it worked quite well for a couple of decades until it choked on its own success (too many teams, too far apart).   Whether a new SCAC can rise from the ashes to retain its geographic independence is a matter still very much in the balance, but that is the direction that has been announced.   

Well, by comparison, the UAA is a "geographic mess," but ... even without doing my research, I'd be willing to bet the eight UAA schools have a lot healthier endowments and resources to support this kind of far-flung travel than did most of the pre-exodus SCAC schools.  Would you agree?

[Ralph Turner]

Well, by comparison, the UAA is a "geographic mess," but ... even without doing my research, I'd be willing to bet the eight UAA schools have a lot healthier endowments and resources to support this kind of far-flung travel than did most of the pre-exodus SCAC schools.  Would you agree?

Most definitely.

[awadelewis]

Article in the Chattanooga Times-Free Press with comments from Sewanee's AD about the conference break-up:
http://goo.gl/k10f9

[Ralph Turner]

McMurry going D2 is nuts in my view. They have a great chance to reverse that move and join up with the scac right now. I would guess the scac will offer some asc school's but i don't see them getting more than 6 or 7 school's in texas, which would mean 2-3 invites. I also could see centenary team up with the school's that left the scac rather than join the current scac. I don't see Mississippi or Louisiana college + hundington joining the scac either. My guess would the scac targets 2-3 naia school's who might move to d3 with a goal of reaching 10 members total.  

The move to D2 was driven by the "academicians" in the administration and the board. One board member is a former faculty member at a SCAC institution.  In consulting with Cedric Dempsey, former president of the NCAA, Mr Dempsey showed the study committee numerous benefits to D-2 that would apply to us, including use of grants in aid, benefactor monies, access to recruiting clearninghouses, etc.

If/when that time comes, I will discuss them further.

One big factor that is hurting us in Texas is the drop in Tuition Equalization Grants (TEG) funding by the state legislature in the current economic crisis.  The move to D-2 should actually help us weather that loss of revenue better.

[Pat Coleman]

If we assume that the need to grow larger to maintain the AQ was one of the factors in the exapansion and the split, then what type of influence has that had on the school's decision to go with the CAC-East?

Ahem. The CAC-East is certainly that group of schools around D.C.

[Pat Coleman]

McMurry would definately be a good call, but Mumme probably wants his hands on some scholarship type kids in Texas. When they brought him in, you knew they were serious about sports.

Moving an entire athletic department based on one journeyman head coach is not a good model for success. I am sure/I hope McMurry had other thoughts in mind.

[BUBeaverFan]

Well, by comparison, the UAA is a "geographic mess," but ... even without doing my research, I'd be willing to bet the eight UAA schools have a lot healthier endowments and resources to support this kind of far-flung travel than did most of the pre-exodus SCAC schools.  Would you agree?

Most definitely.

Endowments - UAA
U Chicago 5.6 B
Emory 4.6 B
Wash U 4.4 B
NYU 2.3 B
Case 1.4 B
Rochester 1.3 B
Carnegie Mellon 815 M
Brandeis 620 M

Endowments - SCAC/CAC
Trinity 850 M
Colorado College 400 M
Sewanne 246 M
Rhodes 230 M
Southwestern 227 M
Centre 174 M
Hendrix 136 M
Austin 109 M
Birmingham Southern 73 M
Millsaps 71 M
Ogelthorpe 24 M

These numbers change from year to year and are reported differently based on how the question might be asked but this is a best guess based on a few sources I don't suspect they are too far off.

[awadelewis]

A better measure would be spending on athletics.  This is what some of the schools in both the UAA and SCAC reported to the Dept. of Education as to the size of their athletic budget in FY2004:
$2,815,984   EMORY UNIVERSITY
$2,672,545   UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO
$2,020,993   SEWANEE: THE UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH
$2,284,407   CARNEGIE MELLON UNIVERSITY
$1,731,844   TRINITY UNIVERSITY
$1,548,055   RHODES COLLEGE
$1,345,324   CENTRE COLLEGE
$1,062,827   MILLSAPS COLLEGE
$1,002,365   CASE WESTERN RESERVE UNIVERSITY

(Data taken from DEd's OPE website, which is no longer available. BTW, if anyone has more recent data, please post a link. Thanks!)

[Pat Coleman]

Here's a link:
http://ope.ed.gov/athletics/

[hasanova]

Thanks for the UAA vs SCAC Endowment and athletic spending figures, BUBeaverFan and awadelewis.  Your collective efforts easily outstrip my laziness.    +1