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ATN Podcast 328: Three teams with reason to look ahead

The Division III basketball season is wrapping up and Pat Coleman is diving back into D3football and podcast production, but that doesn’t mean basketball is far from his mind. As it turns out, when you combine the two Division III basketball Final Fours, eight teams, across seven schools, only three of them sponsor football, and that’s exactly the right number of interviews it takes to make one of our offseason podcasts.

So this month we welcome Jace Rindahl of UW-Whitewater, the new 36-year-old head coach who was playing linebacker for the Warhawks so recently that he was the 2008 D3football.com Defensive Player of the Year. The Warhawks men’s basketball team made a surprising run to the D-III Final Four. We also welcome John Carroll coach Jeff Behrman. (Mount Union’s men’s basketball team made it to the Final Four, but coach Geoff Dartt again declined an interview request, so we’ll represent the OAC with its next-best men’s basketball team.) And Paul Crowley of Christopher Newport joins us as well after the CNU men won the D-III national title and the CNU women won their national semifinal and will play for the national title on Saturday, April 1.

Rindahl has spent 16 of the past 18 years in the Whitewater football program, and he comes into his first year as head coach with a schedule that is just simply loaded, starting with John Carroll. He talks with us about what kind of head coach he’ll be, how the program feels after their surprising first-round playoff loss to Aurora, and how they intend to handle each new opponent in that gauntlet. Behrman is a John Carroll grad just returning to the institution after a quarter-century, and he talks about what the university has to sell to recruits, how much he’ll change the scheme, whether he’ll be able to bring some stability to a program that is on its third head coach in three seasons, and how much Mount Union footage he has watched so far. And Crowley talks about the great gameday atmosphere at his institution, some of last year’s early growing pains in his first year as a head coach and what kind of kids he is looking to recruit to get his program back in the conference title conversation.

Plus, Pat and Greg talk about the fact that D-III seems to keep losing programs and what that means for the SCIAC (divisions?) and the SAA (expansion?). Pat puts Greg on the spot and gets a conference ranking for the SCAC, whenever it is able to get all of its programs on the field.

For the record, from the remaining Final Four teams: Swarthmore hasn’t had a football program or coach since 2000, Rhode Island College and Transylvania do not sponsor football and Smith College does not enroll men.

Also of note: There is a bonus podcast for our Patreon subscribers with more content from each of these coaches at patreon.com/d3sports.

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Theme music: Power 2 by DJmentos.
Photos by Doug Sasse, d3photography.com; Vance Solseth, Christopher Newport athletics; Ben Peskar, John Carroll athletics

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ATN Podcast 255: The one with November

The final few weeks of the regular season get started, well, now, as we have key showdowns in the state of New York, and Iowa, and Pennsylvania, among others. Plus, if you are looking for a better understanding of how the mock regional rankings that we put together work, well, we welcome back our chief bracketologist, Greg Thomas. He’ll tell you what goes into the mock rankings, and the real ones which we will see on Nov. 6, then Pat and Keith talk about how the field is selected and who the at-large teams might be at this point.

Plus, Pat and Keith make up a rivalry trophy for a North Region game this week. Keith picks six winners and also has to mispronounce school names, as if he were working for a national network, while Pat has to pick games in keeping with Thursday night’s Halloween.

This edition of the D3football.com Around the Nation podcast is sponsored by Gotta Have It: 3D Fan Foam Wall Signs for the D-III fan in your life.

Pat and Keith talk about it all in the latest D3football.com Around the Nation Podcast. The D3football.com Around the Nation Podcast is a regular conversation between Pat Coleman and Keith McMillan and guests covering the wide range of Division III football.

Hit play, or subscribe to get this podcast on your mobile device.

Full episode:

You can subscribe to the Around the Nation Podcast in Apple Podcasts, and many other places. You can also get this and any of our future Around the Nation podcasts automatically by subscribing to this RSS feed: http://www.d3blogs.com/d3football/?feed=podcast

Here’s how to find us on some of the major podcasting apps:

Theme music: DJmentos. Cortland athletics photo by Darl Zehr Photography.

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ATN Podcast 252: Johnnies and Tommies and Panthers (oh my)

One of Saturday’s big games was well-known, well-promoted, and lived up to the hype of 19,508 fans. The other was played in front of a little bit fewer people, and was hardly predicted. So when the Johnnies beat the Tommies, sure, we knew that would be a big deal — but when Birmingham-Southern knocked off No. 7 Berry …

Berry had two chances to get back into the game in the third quarter, but Birmingham-Southern held firm. We talked with Panthers coach Tony Joe White about his team’s game plan, their star running back, and the mess created at the top of the Southern Athletic Association.

Plus, Keith gave his game ball to an offensive line, while one off-the-beaten path highlight was a Maine event. Someone threw nine touchdowns. UK soccer teams were cited. And rushing yards were a big negative. Plus, are the Johnnies a national title contender? Pat has seen them the past two weeks against top-notch competition and reveals where he moved SJU to on his Top 25 ballot.

This edition of the D3football.com Around the Nation podcast is sponsored by Gotta Have It: 3D Fan Foam Wall Signs for the D-III fan in your life.

Pat and Keith talk about it all in the latest D3football.com Around the Nation Podcast. The D3football.com Around the Nation Podcast is a regular conversation between Pat Coleman and Keith McMillan and guests covering the wide range of Division III football.

Show links: Miracle in Mississippi

Hit play, or subscribe to get this podcast on your mobile device.

Full episode:

You can subscribe to the Around the Nation Podcast in Apple Podcasts, and many other places. You can also get this and any of our future Around the Nation podcasts automatically by subscribing to this RSS feed: http://www.d3blogs.com/d3football/?feed=podcast

Here’s how to find us on some of the major podcasting apps:

Theme music: DJmentos. Photo by Thomas Nettleton, d3photography.com.