Isn’t this bad for Division III?
This question pops up like clockwork this time of year, as fans who are tired of seeing the same teams in the Stagg Bowl every year campaign to get either Mount Union or UW-Whitewater out of Division III, if not both. But my message now is the same as it always has been: no.
For 15 years, Mount Union has been the single team on top of the Division III world. In some years, the Purple Raiders have come into the season as the foregone conclusion favorite to win the national championship, without any reasonable hope for any other team.
Is that what we want?
I think the dynastic duo is better for Division III than the alternative. Those who remember when Rowan was that second team in position to challenge for the title know that the Profs gave the Purple Raiders some tests, even if they didn’t finish it off. But since then, teams have come and gone. St. John’s is the only other team to beat Mount Union in Salem, but has lost its last three playoff games by an average of three touchdowns. Bridgewater challenged Mount Union once, then lost 66-0 in the semifinals. Mary Hardin-Baylor beat the Purple Raiders in Alliance but wasn’t able to live up to its “program No. 3” status this season. Linfield could get itself onto that list but has never played Mount Union.
I would much, much rather have UW-Whitewater and Mount Union in the Stagg Bowl every year than have one of those two teams dominate all comers and roll over someone in Salem. I have personally seen enough teams lay eggs in the Stagg Bowl.
All I ask is the same thing every year: I don’t care who wins the national title, as long as there’s some doubt when the season starts. If it’s a foregone conclusion for one team or the other every single year, that’s a problem.
What we have is not a problem.
What the other 236 programs need to do is step up. Good luck this offseason.
If you are strictly looking at Division III football as an opportunity for a good number of students to continue playing football and other sports after their high school days, then the current system is completely satisfactory. After all, schools generally affiliate in conferences with other institutions that are similar in size and philosophy.
If you are looking at Division III football as a spectator sports, in general, it is probably the worst of the various divisions. This is not meant as a critique of the athletes who probably work as hard and prepare as well as any other NCAA athletes; however, look at the scores on an average Saturday, and you see more blowouts. Personally, I live 30 miles south of Whitewater (and used to live in the Cleveland area) and there were perhaps 2-3 games that I believed would be good competitive games to watch. I have no affiliation with UWW and it is no great thrill to see UWW cream still another Lakeland team.
Personally, I wish that you could go back about 20 years and have the schools that are currently Division I-AA non-scholarship return to playing Div-III sports other than basketball. If that were the case, you would probably see more competition throughout the season and in the playoffs. It would also probably keep more schools from dropping football as a competitive sport as Hofstra and Northeastern dropped their football programs this year as have a number of the New England schools.
Personally, I do not see much difference in talent between the Pioneer Conference and the WIAC.
I don’t pretend to know as much as others about the various programs. However, I would pretty much bet that the average follower of this website could pick six teams and would probably name the final four in the 2010 season.
At the beginning of the season someone laid it out like this: Mount Union, UWW, or the field.
If you’re looking for competitive football, then yes, you should go watch another game. The top-ranked teams who are head and shoulders above are certainly going to blow out a lot of teams.
Quote…
“Personally, I wish that you could go back about 20 years and have the schools that are currently Division I-AA non-scholarship return to playing Div-III sports other than basketball. If that were the case, you would probably see more competition throughout the season and in the playoffs. It would also probably keep more schools from dropping football as a competitive sport as Hofstra and Northeastern dropped their football programs this year as have a number of the New England schools.”
Thanks for the thoughts…
As D-III is currently configured, which conferences would those D-1’s join? Which teams would be those D-I opponents? It seems that the conferences are “full”, and every weekend after the second or third weekend is filled with conference games.
Would Hofstra or Northeastern actually fly to Wisconsin for an early season game? Wisconsin schools have cut back on their travel budgets so that decreases that likelihood for a home-and-home. Wesley might get help with its schedules, but I can foresee real scheduling difficulties.
I wonder what we would gain in D-III by having those D-1 schools drop into D-III to “cherry-pick” opportunities. They do not have the same philosophy in their athletic department about student-athletes. How likely is Hofstra to put in place the administrative support, in things other than dollars, that would build a MUC, Linfield or UWW program with respect to success and longevity?
In any case, the West was brutal again this season. The seeds held in three of the four brackets. After the first weeks games, the games were exctinh yo follow and competitive, for the part.
We have expanded the playoffs in the Pools System. The number of schools that have added football is one of the success stories of this decade. They have added football because the experience is valued on the D-III campus. We are pretty sure that football at Hofstra and Northeastern is not a valued campus experience. Why would we want them in the D-III mix?
After the first round, the weaker conferences have been eliminated, and we are back to that 16-team bracket from the 1990’s. We still have strong programs, at this level, as we do at all levels. That won’t change.
I am ready for someone else to be in the Stagg, but it is not like there weren’t some news faces having good seasons to make the playoffs. Twenty-one of the 32 teams were different from the 2008 playoffs.
The repeaters were familiar: MUC from the OAC, TMore and W&J from the Pres AC, UMHB from the ASC, Wabash as a Pool C this year, Trine from the MIAA, Pool B schools CWRU and Wesley, and UWW. SJU and Monomuth from the West Region.
What did I hear Pat say during the Stagg broadcast? It took us 1200 games to get here. The Stagg Bowl is the most publicized game, but it is one game. I think lots of teams are perfectly fine with being conference champion or being undefeated in the regular season. For them the playoffs are exciting, but not the primary goal.
Wittenberg was down only one point with Whitewater at the half, but lost with a backup at QB the rest of the way. Linfield lead the semi game with Whitewater in the fourth quarter. Either had a good shot at making it to the Stagg, but fell short.
jlawrence01, very interesting thoughts. However, I would nit-pick the idea that D-III is the worst as a spectator sport. It might depend on what your idea of a spectator sport encompasses. I would consider D-I, with its fake national championship, to be the worst for fans who are interested in the overall scene. Although the Bama-Texas game will be a good game in and of itself, it lacks the value for fans who want to follow the entire “league” and see the best team winning its way to a true title. D-III (as well as II, FCS and NFL) has many games that are also good games in and of themselves, both in the regular and postseasons, and it also has a legitimate championship, with everyone having a shot, and several teams having a good shot (see cwru70’s comment, adding Wesley’s close game with MUC), notwithstanding the fact that “the field” happens to be in a several-year slump.
Whether you are an ardent DIII fan or a football fan in general, this Stagg Bowl was a classic! Not in the sense I certainly expected but a classic nonetheless.
I was fully expecting a low score as two premier defenses had the right conditions to contain the offense. Boy was I wrong! For two teams to combine for almost 950 yards is amazing.
Congrats to UWW for closing the deal. Mount made a valiant effort and played like the defending champions but the turnover bug that had plagued them in recent games finally proved to large to overcome.
As far as being bad for DIII, I would wholeheartedly disagree! Every league needs storylines. Storylines draw attention, attention draws interest, interest draws fans, etc., etc. I did not go to Salem this year but I watched the game with several “fans” of football in general. They were only watching the game because I asked that the channel not be changed. Initially, they had no interest as they thought DIII was akin to “JV NCAA” in their words. By the end of the game, they were impressed with the quality of play, intensity of players, and execution! It was a proud moment.
That is not suggesting other teams would not have performed as well as MUC and UWW but the two teams drew attention because of their history.
I look at MUC and UWW as measuring sticks for other programs and motivation for improvement (Wesley, UMHB, Linfield, etc.). If these same two teams meet in next year’s Stagg Bowl, so be it. But it will not diminish the path to get there nor the remaining teams that played and ultmately came up short!
Let’s focus on the positives that UWW and MUC bring to the table and not the “boring” aspect of non-variety.
It would be disingenuous for me to suggest UWW vs MUC in D3football is bad for the sport, and then celebrate Cortland’s 4 consecutive trips to the NCAA Lacrosse Championship, including 2 championships. I’d have no problem watching Cortland play Salisbury or Gettysburg one more time in May.
So as Pat states, it’s up to the rest of the nation to step it up if they truly aspire to compete on the level of MUC and UWW.
…Just as I challenge the rest of the nation to step up and challenge the upstate NY lacrosse juggernaut which is Syracuse, LeMoyne, and Cortland. Think Spring!
Great game by two great teams. I made the trip out there with my two sons- 31 hours in the car-stuck on the turnpike. I for one am so thankful the game was pushed back to 4:00 as I was sitting on highway 81 at 10:00 a.m.- I don’t care what the motive was for doing it.
As for UWW-MUC being bad for DIII football, in no way do I agree with that. In my opinion, one of the main benefits of this rivalry is the impact it will have on improving DIII football. We saw a game Saturday that featured two teams that could do it all. I don’t see the score as reflecting bad defense, I see it reflecting tremendous talent. Other teams in DIII will absolutely get better because of these teams. Coaches and players alike will break through whatever limits they may place on themselves for being DIII. I believe both of these teams had the offensive diversity to play in whatever weather conditions existed. If there was snow on the ground or rain, we would have seen two teams open up the running section of their playbooks and still witnessed a great game. I believe the next couple of years will produce more teams capable of challenging for the title as they clearly see what it takes and what DIII kids are capable of doing.
Thanks to both teams for showing the football world how talented DIII really is.
I think Whitewater and Mt. Union is a good thing for D3 football. I disagree with anyone that says parity is good. Parity equals mediocre football. Mt. Union’s dominance peaks the curiosity of the average college football fan who normally wouldn’t pay attention to division 3. Casual fans will watch the Stagg Bowl on ESPN just to see how good they are. Two different teams in the Stagg Bowl year after year would probably not interest those who don’t already follow D3.
I do agree with JLawrence about the Division 1AA teams. Mt. Union would not be where it is today if Dayton, Wagner and other schools had been allowed to stay at the D3 level. In my opinion, Dayton with it’s football tradition would have had a significant number of the Mt. Union players if they were still at the D3 level. Also, Hofstra, Northeastern and other schools dropping football are not doing it because of a lack of administration support. They did it because at the 1AA level you need to give scholarship money to players, build bigger stadiums, travel further to play games, etc. in order to be competitive. Those elements are not present at the D3 level. You can’t support a 1AA program with a division 3 budget. It always comes down to money.
Mt. Union beat Dayton in a first round match-up in 1992. That was Ballard’s Junior year and the game was played in Dayton. Final score was 27-10. I don’t think it matters if Dayton was still DIII or not. Kehres was one season away from the first Championship and had the pieces in place to build the team.
If Dayton had stayed in Division III I think it’s a little presumptuous to presume that Mount Union would still have 10 titles. Even if 1993 would not have been affected, who’s to say that they would have won the other nine?
I shouldn’t have said Mt. Union would not be where they are today if Dayton was still D3. It’s possible they could still have won all their titles but one would have to concede that Dayton would have been a major thorn in their side both on and off the field (recruiting).
Who says they still don’t recruit the same kids? It is a moot (not mute) point anyway since no one will ever know.
More than in DI, geography plays a bigger role in recuriting for DIII. Maybe the question would be – How many players from the Dayton/Cincinnati area would have gone to Dayton instead of Mount?
Although, I will say that Mount is getting recruits from out of state more than they have in the past. Still, a large majority ore homegrown in Ohio.
No one knows for sure if Mount would have won ten titles but it is an interesting theory. I will say that winning breeds winning which breeds excellent recruits so, if the train would have been slowed early on, would it have gathered the steam it has today?
Love the picture of Aaron Rusch scoring the touchdown at the top of this page in the Superman-like pose!! It’s much better than the cliché that has become of the Heisman pose.
The opposite scenario has played out in NY/PA. Wagner won the D3 championship in 1987. Ithaca won the D3 Championship in both 1988 and 1991. In 1989, Union lost a close game to Dayton. In 1990, Lycoming lost the D3 Championship to Allegheny in overtime.
So in 5 years, Eastern Region teams (technically Lycoming was Southern at the time) played in 5 National Championships and won 3.
Since that time, Wagner, Albany and Hofstra left D3. More importantly, St John Fisher became a NY power, RPI and Hobart became NY powers, and Utica, Hartwick, Morrisville, Maritime all formed D3 teams in roughly the same geographic area as Union and Ithaca.
The wealth of talent which propelled NY/PA teams to 5 consecutive D3 Championship appearances still exists. But now it is spread out over multiple teams. RPI obviously takes a lot of would-be Union recruits. A lot of the kids who would have gone to IC in the past now go to Fisher, Brockport, Hartwick, Utica, Hobart, etc. Can you imagine Ithaca playing with Jason Boltus?
We’ve seen first hand how the formation and/or rise of geographic competitors spreads talent thin. It makes for great games during the regular season, but it drastically harms the ability for this geographic region to compete nationally. We’ll never know how Dayton would have affected Mount Union, but our own experience in NY/PA suggests it would have had a negative effect.
…I should also have added that Syracuse University effectively became a Division III team the last several years and probably stole some if Ithaca’s recruits too (sic).
While 2 teams are dominate now in D3 isn’t that how it is in all of college football? Every few years it seems the top teams seem to rotate and occasionally resurface. (Florida, Oklahoma, FSU, Texas, etc in D1) Mount Union is the model of all D3 football right now, but will they still be on top once their coaching staff retires or moves on? I personally enjoy D3 football because occasionally you’ll get a Bridgewater College that turns their program around after 100 years of futile seasons to come within 3 points of the DOMINATE champions. They then stayed very competitive on the national stage for several seasons.
Division 3 works, the Mount Union’s time will eventually pass and another dominant team will rise.
It’s disappointing to see the same 2 teams play 5 straight years. Let’s put it out there now – the 2010 champ will be either UWW or MTU.
It boils down to recruiting and coaching. Where does UWW/MTU pull their recruits from? Why can’t other teams tap into offensive/defensive schemes that these 2 put out each year? Will other schools designate 14 (UWW) and 15 (MTU) people to its coaching staff as these 2 schools have done?