Tag Archives: Division III

From Milwaukee to the D.R.

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The Milwaukee School of Engineering men’s basketball team is in the Dominican Republic to play some exhibition games in addition to holding a basketball clinic for some impoverished children in the country. Senior Austin Meier is writing a blog during the trip:

Day 1 (August 25):

The team was alive and ready to travel this morning despite the fact that we were up before the crack of dawn. We arrived at O’Hare rather early so the down time was spent eating McDonald’s breakfast and bickering about top 50 NBA players. The flight was rather smooth to Miami and a first experience for some on the team. We grabbed a quick bite at Pizza Hut burning a hole through our pockets. The slight layover in Miami went quick due to the anxiousness of the guys to get to the resort for some all you can eat buffets especially (Eric) Bohrer.

After about an hour and a half flight, we safely arrived in the Dominican Republic, but the traveling wasn’t quite over. We took a short bus ride and arrived at our paradise resort with large beautiful rooms with all the amenities. The rest of the night was spent eating and recovering from the day of travel, given there was some fun injected in those last few hours before bed.

Day 2 (August 26):

Since none of us wanted to waste much time with all the activities to do at the resort, we were up at a staggeringly early time of … 9 a.m. We grabbed some more all you can eat breakfast from one of the four restaurants on the resort then immediately transitioned to the ocean front. The group consensus was to snorkel and that is what we did. Not too much action there but it was still a great experience for everyone. We also took a trial dive in the pools just to see what it was look to scuba since the $100 fee was a bit much for us. Then after a relaxing afternoon on the beach we went for an hour drive to see The Three Eyes which was amazing, a natural cave with small pools and a lot of life.

We headed to the gym afterward to play our first game against Los Padros. The game went right down to the wire but we ended up winning by just a couple of points.

The bus ride back to the resort, for lack of a better word, was chaos. Pretty much no street signs, signals, lanes or any of the organization we love in the U.S. The horn is used about 75% of the time while on the streets and a red light doesn’t mean much here.

They are having a Michael Jackson show tonight at the resort and everyone is going to be at that which should be a lot of fun. The night is young and we have plenty of energy for a fun night.

Fact-check the NCAA

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A little over a year ago at the NCAA convention, a proposal to make all of the NCAA’s data public was defeated. Enough peer pressure was put on and, in our opinion, misinformation spread, that the proposal was eventually withdrawn.

A compromise, it was said, would be to make public the data in a handful of sports, through posting PDF files, rather than issuing each school a login to a system that already exists for members of regional ranking committees to use.

We know full well the embarrassment of incorrect data and how D3sports.com people must now check every sport’s championship handbook on its release to make sure that the right number of Pool B and Pool C teams are being awarded. This year, in fact, the women’s basketball committee again had to revise their handbook, having promised twice as many Pool B bids as the numbers actually provided for.

So while they won’t open all of their data, they have opened women’s basketball up for us to look at. We always figure the more eyes on data, the better. That’s why our data has always been open and public, and corrections come in throughout the season. That’s because our system, like the NCAA’s, is reliant on schools entering schedules and results, and sometimes typos occur, or sometimes schools just don’t understand what defines a regional game.

At the bottom of this week’s women’s basketball release on the NCAA Web site there are links to PDF files for each of the eight regions which contain the numbers for each team. What we’re concerned with is the first number: the regional win-loss record. That’s the basis for every other number when calculating strength of schedule.

Compare those numbers to the regional record listed with our strength of schedule numbers. This file is currently through the same day, Sunday, Feb. 7. While we continually audit our own database to make sure no errors occur, we have not been able to audit theirs until now.

D-III unveils identity statement

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Boiling down Division III into a few bullet points isn’t easy, and it hasn’t gotten easier as the division has grown. But Division III has been attempting to define itself in a way that can be easily communicated to those on the outside. After a Division II identity statement process ended up with the fairly meaningless “I chose Division II” mantra and D-II wrapped itself in a lot of the things Division III holds dear, it became important to take control of the message.

To us here at D3sports.com, Division III is the highest form of purely amateur athletics in the U.S. It’s where students — note, not “student-athletes” — play for love of the game. Division III competitors get no special treatment, no scholarships, no special privileges, no separate dining halls, no dorms to themselves. They don’t get preferred treatment from their professors; in fact, it’s far more likely they get treated more harshly from teachers who believe they don’t belong in the school.

But distilling that opinion, plus the opinions of hundreds of other Division III true believers, down into a form that can be easily shared and understood, isn’t easy. Here’s how Division III is positioning itself:

“Follow your passions and discover your potential.

“The college experience is a time of learning and growth – a chance to follow passions and develop potential. For student-athletes in Division III, all of this happens most importantly in the classroom and through earning an academic degree. The Division III experience provides for passionate participation in a competitive athletic environment, where student-athletes push themselves to excellence and build upon their academic success with new challenges and life skills. And student-athletes are encouraged to pursue the full spectrum of opportunities available during their time in college. In this way, Division III provides an integrated environment for student-athletes to take responsibility for their own paths, follow their passions and find their potential through a comprehensive learning experience.”

What’s your take?

For more, here’s the NCAA News article on the unveiling.

Don’t D-III teams want to win?

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Some misguided sports psychologist studied a soccer team and a tennis team and came to the following conclusion:

Division I athletes wanted to win, but those playing in Division III wanted to make friends.

I think all of us here know that’s not true. Thankfully, Division III has a sports psychologist of its own: St. Thomas men’s basketball assistant coach John Tauer. He wrote a response to this blog:

The majority of Division III athletes I have coached or coached against are highly motivated by many factors, not just making friends. one of those factors is competition — individuals and teams in Division III work incredibly hard. Division III athletes are not on athletic scholarships. As a result, they may actually have higher levels of intrinsic motivation than their Division I and II counterparts.

While this is certainly preaching to the choir, I still think it’s worth passing along. I think it’s important to highlight and debunk every misconception about Division III athletics, every time possible.

D-III newbies look peachy

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Three schools were approved for provisional membership in Division III this upcoming season, according to a news release from one of the schools. (The NCAA doesn’t appear to have said anything on the subject yet.)

Covenant College, in Lookout Mountain, Ga., and Berry College, in Mount Berry, Ga., join Division III, chipping into the NAIA’s dominance of the Southeast, as does Penn State-Abington.

Covenant's Crosson Reed “Both academically and athletically, NCAA Division III is a good fit for Berry,” said Steve Briggs, Berry’s president. “We have always placed a high priority on academic achievement and the overall quality of the educational experience for our student-athletes, and affiliation with Division III allows us to be true to these fundamental values while also growing our athletic program in new and exciting ways.”

Berry’s release mentions something else that doesn’t get a lot of discussion around here: the shorter seasons in Division III. NAIA starts basketball competition, for example, weeks before Division III schools do, resulting in increased class time missed. Covenant references Division III’s lower dues, reduced travel time and expenses, and costs of postseason play which are picked up.

Berry is adding men’s and women’s swimming and diving and softball for the upcoming school year, as well as women’s lacrosse in the spring of 2011, as Division III requires sponsorship of more sports than the NAIA does.

Covenant has 13 sports already, while Abington has 12. Neither will need to add sports to make the Division III minimum.

Obviously the entire future of the Great South Athletic Conference is up in the air, with talks continuing that they may end up merging with the USA South. But if the GSAC remains an independent unit, Covenant and Berry would be an ideal geographic fit.