Doug Doughty’s local colleges notebook in today’s Roanoke Times details a conversation between Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim and Roanoke coach Page Moir regarding Syracuse’s Billy Edelin transferring to Roanoke for his senior season.

In short, Edelin was likely headed for eligibility problems at Syracuse, and if that’s the case, how is he going to transfer and be eligible at a Division III school? Forget the entire question about what such a transfer would do to the chemistry of a team — one would have to question whether someone in shaky academic standing even merits being admitted to a D-III school.

There’s nothing wrong in general with players transferring from Division I schools. It happens pretty regularly. Some pan out, some don’t, but often an athlete moves up to Division III to become a student-athlete, to concentrate more on education, to have fun playing basketball instead of it being a job.

I could name some not-in-the-spirit-of-Division-III transfers, but I think D-III veterans probably already have some idea of what those would be.

In short, Division III is not a pit stop for someone on the way up from or the way down to Division I. Don’t use us like that. If you’re here to be serious about your education, we welcome you. Otherwise… try a different division.