Having lobbed the hand grenade that got this thread going, I sat on the
sidelines for awhile, but I'm back.
 
Brian D Helland wrote:
 
> I just don't agree with having a D-I program if you can't be competitive.
> Let's face facts, some of these D-I Basketball programs are a joke.  They
> don't even belong at the D-I level.  For example, the University of Akron
> is D-I in all sports, and their enrollment is 10-15,000.  This is probably
> why most of their sports programs are mediocre at best.
 
Maybe they're mediocre because they don't put a lot of emphasis on winning
athletics.  It's an odd mind-set, I know, but it has been known to happen at a
few academic institutions.
 
> There is a reason that you have different levels of College Sports (D-I,
> II, III): not all schools are the same.  Some have large athletic budgets,
> some have small ones.   The point of having D-II and III sports is so the
> small schools in the NCAA can be competitive and have a realistic shot of
> winning championships at least SOME of the time.  But the attitude in our
> sports culture today is "If you aren't D-I, you're not legitimate".  You
> can thank Dick Vitale and E$PN for that.
 
Actually, the attitude has been "If you're not D-1, we won't cut you in on any
of the money" and we can thank the NCAA for that.  Of course, they've now
turned around and said, "If the TV networks don't want to show you, then we're
still going to cut you out of the money."  Sort of lends credence to some of
Adam Wodon's points.
 
> That's just my point, "everyone" in D-I Basketball is NOT a part of the
> "D-I Party".  Most of these programs are getting the same attention that
> they would have gotten being D-II programs.  They get ZERO TV Coverage.
> They get ZERO Top Recruits.  And most of them have ZERO chance at a
> National Title or even an NCAA Tournament bid.  If you aren't going to get
> the benefits of being D-I, then why the heck stay in D-I?  I'll give you
> an example:  North Dakota is D-II in all sports except Hockey.  Our
> Women's Basketball program has won back-to-back D-II Titles, and has won
> 20-plus games for the last 10 years or so.  Our football team has won
> numerous conference titles and has went to the playoffs several times in
> the 90's.  Our men's program has struggled the past few years, but they
> were one of the top D-II teams in the country in the early 90's.  Now, if
> we were to go D-I in all sports, what would we win?  Not a darn thing.
> Our Women's Basketball program would be cannon-fodder for the likes of
> UConn and Tennessee, our Men's Program would be all but forgotten, and our
> football program would be 2-9 every year.  Now, which scenario would YOU
> choose.  My answer is obvious.
 
And how many Divisions do you plan to split the NCAA into?  Sports is
zero-sum; for every game that is won, a game is also lost.  If North Dakota is
always finishing well above .500 in women's basketball, it means that someone
else is consistently finishing under .500.
 
Your argument works for not lumping all of the teams into one conference, but
not for having conferences of different strengths.  Yes, the small schools in
Div 1 basketball often let themselves get waxed by Kentucky or Georgetown a
couple of times a year, but that isn't how they define their season.  No one
makes them play the big schools; they choose to do it for the payday.  Their
season usually revolves around their own conference, most of which are better
balanced than D1 as a whole.  Watch the finals of the small conference
tournaments sometime; those kids lay it all on the line right there.  The team
that wins the national title isn't much more thrilled than they are.  It all
depends upon how you define success for your own team.  Sure, you and I will
never hear of them, but I don't think fame is all it's cracked up to be,
either.
 
I'll also dispute your last thought, but that's purely a matter of
aesthetics.  I have season tickets to a football team that is pretty
consistently 2-9 (though we were 4-7 two years ago, dammit).  I enjoyed last
year's Gopher football team as much as I've enjoyed any sports team in quite a
while.  (Okay, that's not true; what the Red Wings have done the last couple
of seasons is better, but the Gophs were second.)  And there is not a single
athlete I've respected more than Craig Scruggs, the cornerback who isn't big
enough, or fast enough to be playing in the Big 10 (particularly when the
coach's defensive scheme has him in single-man coverage all the frickin'
time), but was out there bustin' his ass every play anyway.  That's what I pay
to see.
 
So the short answer is, why don't you let the other small schools set their
own standards for success and find a home wherever they get accepted?
 
> Personally, I support the formation of a Division I-AA for Basketball.
> Football has a similar set-up, and there aren't as many pretender programs
> as a result.  Teams too big for D-II and not big enough for D-I have a
> place to go.  Take about 150 of those "D-I" Basketball programs and put
> them in I-AA.  Hold a 32 team tournament every year.  Would the media
> ignore these schools?  Probably, but they already ignore them.  At least
> with this type of set-up, they would be competitive.
 
As I said above, they are competitive.  They just set their standards a little
lower than a national championship.
 
J. Michael Neal
 
"From the point of ignition
To the final drive
The point of the journey
Is not to arrive"
 
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