The recent departures of Howard Payne’s Chris Kielsmeier and Bowdoin’s Stefanie Pemper should remind us all that coaching in Division III can be fairly transient.

Many great coaches have given their life’s work to Division III. Others have started in Division III and moved on. For the most part, this is the nature of the business. I was talking about this at the Final Four with our colleague, Chris Pesotski, and while I don’t think he agreed fully with my theory, here it is anyway.

Among the top coaches in Division III, we really have two basic groups. I know this may be a little oversimplified, but here goes anyway. There are coaches who are lifers, often working at their alma mater, who love the Division III experience and would never have it any other way. And there are coaches who look to pursue jobs at the scholarship level.

We had three lifers at the men’s Final Four: Not only have Mark Edwards, Dave Hixon and Glenn VanWieren been coaching at their respective schools for decades, they are all coaching at alma mater. I think it was fairly clear Kielsmeier was not a lifer. He had built a great program at Howard Payne, but he had a Division I background and no particular ties to West Texas. And Pemper was beginning to show signs of liferism, but got a good opportunity and is running with it.

It’s hard to tell who’s a lifer and who isn’t for coaches in their 30s and 40s. I would be willing to bet the coaches themselves don’t necessarily know either. But the coaches who have taken Division I head coaching jobs, such as Pemper, Hardin-Simmons/Oklahoma State/Charleston Southern’s Julie Goodenough, or even UW-Platteville/UW-Milwaukee/UW-Madison’s Bo Ryan … and then those who got D-I head coaching jobs after brief assistant coaching stints, such as Catholic/Maryland/Vermont’s Mike Lonergan and King’s/Virginia Commonwealth/Mount St. Mary’s Bryan Whitten, were all relatively young when they left Division III.

OK, not Bo Ryan, but Ryan is the exception to almost every so-called rule.

The point is, we should be glad for our coaches when they move on and up. Ryan talks about his Platteville experiences all the time. They help shine the spotlight on Division III, just a little.

And just a little is good. Really.

Unfortunately, there are a lot of bad coaches in Division III, and in some instances there isn’t a lot of pressure to get better. That’s good for the institution of pure amateur basketball — no scholarships, no particular emphasis on winning — but bad for the kids who could use more help to reach their full potential. Sometimes ADs don’t have the intestinal fortitude to fire someone, and the win-loss record should never, ever be the only measuring stick. But if the program isn’t improving, and the players aren’t getting as much out of it as they should, isn’t that a reason to change?

We have coaches trying to get back into Division III this summer — recognizable coaches who would make an immediate impact on their school after doing something else or coaching elsewhere for a while. I hope they find what they’re looking for.