FB: Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference

[Ron Boerger]

That is a wacky schedule.

...back to back road tilts against Rhodes and Millsaps...then at Greencastle in late October...the SA Tigers will indeed need to be road wariors this season...

And with a new QB to boot!!

[frank_ezelle]

Millsaps goes to Austin 9/19, hosts Trinity on 9/26, and then travel to DePauw on 10/3 and Colorado on 10/10.  Not exactly an easy schedule and they too will be going with a new quarterback.  Here's a link to the schedule and the story about Aaron Pelch going to the Oakland Raiders:

Schedule:  http://www.gomajors.com/schedule.aspx?path=football&schedule=58&

Aaron Pelch to Raiders:  http://www.gomajors.com/news/2009/3/8/FB_0308092029.aspx

[roocru]

Congratulations to Austin College head coach Ronnie Gage. 

It has been announced that he will be inducted into the Texas High School Coaches Association Hall of Honor at the THSCA coaching convention this summer.  This is the highest award that can be bestowed to someone who has coached Texas high school football!!

We are very proud of you Coach Gage!

[rooski]

A high quality award for a high quality man and a high quality coach. Well deserved Coach!

[rooski]

Since everyone has been talkin' schedules... I would have to say I think AC has a pretty decent one. Opening conference play at home vs Millsaps, then off to Danville for a rare night game. {We will certainly know what we've got at that point.} Then in November the last two are at Greencastle and home for TU.

While everyone knows we have not hung with MC or TU lately, I felt that we did compete with Centre and DPU in '08. But we lost to all four last season. So this schedule may kinda give us an early chance to see how we measure up. If were gonna show improvement this year we have to win one or more of these games. Who knows - if things go right, maybe we could be in a couple of really big games late in 2009. Time will tell. And the old saying really applies: "you have to take one game at a time".

[Ralph Turner]

From The DePauw DPU's college newspaper

http://media.www.thedepauw.com/media/storage/paper912/news/2009/02/20/Sports/Scac-Looks.For.Ways.To.Cut.Costs-3641137.shtml

[frank_ezelle]

From The DePauw DPU's college newspaper

http://media.www.thedepauw.com/media/storage/paper912/news/2009/02/20/Sports/Scac-Looks.For.Ways.To.Cut.Costs-3641137.shtml

Very interesting article.  Thanks for posting that and I would call it highly recommended reading for all SCAC fans, players, and coaches.

[rooski]

Hats off to the "powers that be" for their leadership!

While even guys like the 'Rooski' know that it takes money to keep college athletics going, we may tend to forget how much effort and forsight is required. Thanks for shining a light it for Ralph.

[frank_ezelle]

Juan Joseph has signed with the Edmonton Eskimos of the Canadian Football League:

http://www.gomajors.com/news/2009/3/12/FB_0312095119.aspx

[D3_DPUFan]

Juan Joseph has signed with the Edmonton Eskimos of the Canadian Football League:

Congrats to Juan and best wishes to a young man who has represented his school and conference well...I'm sure that will continue north of the border...need to check my satellite listings to see if I get any CFL games!

[D3_DPUFan]

From the Edmonton website...

Edmonton Eskimo Assistant General Manager Paul Jones says, "Juan Joseph is an unpolished gem. He's a strong and accurate passer who can also exploit defences with his running ability."

http://www.esks.com/default.aspx?tabid=1114

[DPU3619]

From that article that Ralph posted - I'm not sure that I believe Page about the whole switching conferences thing. 

Being in the SCAC was Bottoms' thing.  If I recall, he got us in it because he was BFF with the Millsaps president at the time.  While the new president is a fromer Trinity employee, I think a time like this makes the most sense for DePauw to try to get in somewhere else.  Such a seperation being blamed on the economy makes for better PR than they crap they pulled leaving the conference that they had helped create after such a short period of time.

The question is - where do they go?  They wouldn't want to go to the Heartland.  I was always told they got out of the ICAC because of prestige issues, among other things.  They can't get in the North Coast right now.  If you're going to use travel as the excuse for leaving, the UAA makes absolutely no sense.  I was a part of a study during my time as a student and, at the time, Wash U was the only D3 school who traveled more than DPU did.  I presume Colorado is now also ahead of DePauw that they've joined the conference. 

Now would be a good time to leave - but is there a better place for them right now?  Maybe not.

[cush]

I don't think the UAA would ever have any interest in Depauw, those guys are just a little different type of institution than depauw...no ? depauw would be a natural fit for the NCAC, always wondered why they didn't join as a par with wabash instead of going to the scac. I could also see depauw in the Midwest Conference but like the NCAC, they are at 10 members (all with football teams) so expanding probably isn't in the cards. THus, unless somebody drops out, depauw is out of luck in getting in either of those leagues. Another option for Depauw might be the Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association but really unless the NCAC ever has a open spot, I see Depauw staying in the SCAC + no chance they go back to the heartland. What i could see happen is the SCAC expand to 14 or 16 to try to easy the travel burdens by basically creating two separate leagues under one conference umbrella...pop in udallas in the west and berry college in the east right now for starters with the possibility of going to 16 at a later date.

[D3_DPUFan]

Why is a team in a conference? What is the criteria for an institution to belong to a conference...geography? quality of competition? consitency in the academic missions of schools involved?
Other than geography, why would DePauw want to be in the NCAC?

[DPU3619]

Why is a team in a conference? What is the criteria for an institution to belong to a conference...geography? quality of competition? consitency in the academic missions of schools involved?

 
It's important to be thinking about the other sports besides football when you're talking about the quality of competition.  A couple years ago we'd be talking about men's basketball as a 3rd place finish right out of the gate in the NCAC because of Wooster & Wittenberg.  Not like that anymore.  The women's basketball program could run roughshod over that conference.  That conference kind of feels like the SCAC did about 2 or 3 years ago when DePauw was the only really, really good team in it.  Oglethorpe was growing and Trinity was starting to decline a little bit.  The NCAC probably evens the field for the baseball program a little bit.  DePauw is in about a month deep hole right now because Millsaps will have played 21 games and Trinity will have played 22 games by day's end.   DePauw is 7-5 with a couple of weather cancellations.  Trinity is having baseball practice over Christmas break.  Our pitching staff is making snow angels on the rubber.

I think DePauw is glad to be in the SCAC with schools like Trinity, Colorado, and Oglethorpe from an academic standpoint, but would they like to be with Denison, Kenyon, and Wabash more?  I'd think so.

I've got to believe that this new administration doesn't like the travel budget and exorbitant missed class time.  The number of flights that DePauw was taking automatically doubled when Colorado joined the conference.  It'd also be nice to have more than one school within 6 hours by bus.  It's over 4 hours to the closest school in our current configuration.  There are long bus rides in almost every conference, but DePauw is one of the few who has no short bus rides. 

They aren't going to reach to a HCAC, MIAA, or something like that.  I don't think that there's a hurry to switch, and if they don't find anything good, they'll just stay.  That said, there's something that tells me that Mr. Cotton isn't being completely honest with us.