<p>The release of the 2005-2006 U.S. Sports Academy Directors' Cup standings provides quantitative data to answer the oft-argued question, "Which Ivy League school has the best athletic teams?" While athletic juggernauts Notre Dame and Penn State sit atop the Director's Cup list after the fall season, Dartmouth ranks 34th among Division-I schools, highest among Ivy League programs. Yale and Princeton rank 53rd and 67th, respectively. No other Ivies made the list that was released last month.</p>
<p>UMich should be embarrassed! :D</p>
<p>Complete listing</p>
<p>watch out FS, byerly is getting loaded for bear since you know who did not make the cut.</p>
<p>umm ... that is a pretty limited range of sports ... and frankly if they included a long list of sports any of the IVYies would be way up on this list ... big time sports schools like Ohio State and LSU tend to have few varsity sports (varisty sports number in the low teens ... driven by Title IX, football, and viewing sports as a marketing/cash tool) ... while the IVYies and a lot of less high profile sports focused schools have twice as many varsity sports. Add swimming, gynastics, wrestling, hockey, track & field, lacrosse, etc to the list and all the IVYs would shoot up along with many other DI-AA schools (and DIII LACs).</p>
<p>3togo:</p>
<p>you maybe correct about LSU, but, according to their website, THE Ohio State University has ~18 varsity sports, including swimming, hockey, lacrosse, et al. Ditto UMich.</p>
<p>The weird thing about these awards is the extent to which they have been historically monopolized by the same schools year after year. I wouldn't expect athletic talent to be so tightly and consistently concentrated, but that's how it seems to work. Historical data at <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NACDA_Director%27s_Cup%5B/url%5D">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NACDA_Director%27s_Cup</a></p>
<p>In 1996, 1997, 2000, 2001, 2002, and 2003, the exact same trio of schools won the Director's Cups in each NCAA Division. Stanford won Division I, UC Davis won Division II, and Williams won Division III. </p>
<p>Davis then "retired" from Division II competition by moving to Division I. It was replaced by Grand Valley State (in Michigan). Otherwise the same patterns continued. So for 2004 and 2005, Stanford won Division I, Grand Valley State won Division II, and Williams won Division III.</p>
<p>Possibly Stanford and Williams are finally running out of steam. Currently Stanford is only 3rd in Division I, and Williams is only 6th in Division III (Grand Valley State, on the other hand, is currently 1st in Divison II).</p>
<p>
[quote]
you maybe correct about LSU, but, according to their website, THE Ohio State University has ~18 varsity sports, including swimming, hockey, lacrosse, et al. Ditto UMich.
[/quote]
and Cornell has 33 ... while LSU has 14 ... I believe, in general, the big time sports school are more similar to each other than different when it comes to supporting a (relatively low) number of varsity sports. So even if Cornell stinks at the additional 19 teams it fields over LSU it would make up series ground if the director's cup included all sports.</p>
<p>FYI - I discovered this because my soccer / basketball / lacrosse playing son wanted to know what schools he liked had varsity teams in all 3 sports (not that playing all 3 in college is realistic but he is still a pup) ... and when I checked them out I was surprised by how few sports most of the big time sports schools sponsor.</p>
<p><< Add swimming, gynastics, wrestling, hockey, track & field, lacrosse, etc to the list and all the IVYs would shoot up along with many other DI-AA schools (and DIII LACs). >></p>
<p>There is a separate Division III list for LACs. As noted above, it has historically been "owned" by Williams, with Middlebury as a strong runner-up. It seems likely that Dartmouth would rank highly if there were a separate list for Division I-AA schools.</p>
<p>Last year, Harvard teams won a record-tying 14 Ivy titles and two national titles; Cornell won 8 Ivy titles; and Princeton finished third with 5 Ivy championships.</p>
<p>Harvard has more Division I teams, and more Division I varsity athletes, than any other school in the U nited States of America.</p>
<p>Most other Ivy schools (including Dartmouth) also offer far broader Division I programs than the athletic-scholarship granting giants, who tend to sponsor far fewer sports.</p>
<p>The "Sears Cup" thing is politically controlled by coaches and athletic directors at the large schools, who limit the sports that "count", and assign "points" for various sports in a manner to benefit themselves.</p>
<p>For example, the school winning the major Ivy sports championship - in football - is oddly denied any "Sears Cup" points for doing so because the Ivies do not participate in post-season play.</p>
<p>And Harvard's national championships in rowing and sailing earned them no "Sears Cup" points because the NCAA is not the sanctioning body for those sports.</p>
<p>The points for lacrosse - both men's and women's - were chopped in half this year because the factory schools - which control the selection and "valuing" of "Sears Cup" sports, are generally not very good at it (or don't even field teams.)</p>
<p>^</p>
<p>...No offense, but who cares?</p>
<p>Stanford presumably cares a <em>lot</em>, since it spends more on salaries for recruited athletes than any other college or university in the United States of America.</p>
<p>Athletic "scholarships" (an anomolous term indeed) totalling over $12,000,000 are paid to more than 5% of the undergraduate student body at Stanford.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Harvard has more Division I teams, and more Division I varsity athletes, than any other school in the U nited States of America.
[/quote]
At least part of this claim appears to be inaccurate, based on NCAA data. According to the list at ncaa.org, Harvard fields 35 Division I teams (including football in Division 1-AA). This is certainly impressive, but it doesn't appear to be unique. While I have not attempted to check every other school in the United States of America, at least one other university, Brown, is also listed at 35 Division I teams by NCAA. </p>
<p>According to NCAA, Harvard has two Division I men's teams (skiing and volleyball) that Brown lacks; Brown has two Division I women's teams (equestrian and gymnastics) that Harvard lacks. The lists are otherwise similar.</p>
<p>Harvard list at: <a href="http://web1.ncaa.org/ssLists/orgInfo.do?orgID=275%5B/url%5D">http://web1.ncaa.org/ssLists/orgInfo.do?orgID=275</a>
Brown list at: <a href="http://web1.ncaa.org/ssLists/orgInfo.do?orgID=80%5B/url%5D">http://web1.ncaa.org/ssLists/orgInfo.do?orgID=80</a></p>
<p>By the way, the term "Sears Cup" is obsolete. Sears has not sponsored the trophy since the 2002-2003 academic year.</p>
<ol>
<li>Read this: <a href="http://www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/college/sports/articles/18number.htm%5B/url%5D">http://www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/college/sports/articles/18number.htm</a></li>
</ol>
<p>There are scores of other references: Wikepedia relies on some in reporting currently that : "As of 2006, there were 41 Division I intercollegiate varsity sports teams for women and men at Harvard, more than at any other NCAA Division I college in the country."</p>
<p>Here's a Yale Daily News story reporting that Harvard has "a whopping 41 varsity sports" while Princeton has 38, and Yale "only" 31.</p>
<ol>
<li>That's why I put "Sears Cup" in quotes. I know full well that Sears no longer sponsors it; but that is how it is still widely known, in case you were unaware. Similarly, "The Dartmouth" is still widely referred to by its former name - "The Daily Dartmouth."</li>
</ol>
<p>Perhaps you are confused about the distinction between "Division I teams" and "varsity teams". The former is a narrower category; it includes only those sports which are recognized by NCAA (the primary governing body for intercollegiate sports) for its "Division I" schools (including Harvard). NCAA sports are generally the most prominent. The latter is a broader category, which includes non-NCAA and club sports, generally of lower visibility.</p>
<p>Now, Harvard may well offer more "varsity sports", including non-NCAA and club sports, than any other school. It's hard to know for sure, because club sports may exist formally or informally, and may come and go from year to year; their numbers are hard to track. However, I don't doubt that Harvard is at or near the top. If you had claimed that "Harvard has more varsity sports than any school in the US", then I would not have challenged you.</p>
<p>However, you made a different, and more questionable, claim. You stated: "Harvard has more Division I teams...than any other school in the United States of America." It's a simple matter to count NCAA Division I teams; definitive data are readily available from NCAA. And NCAA's lists of Division I teams appear to contradict you.</p>
<p>If you believe that NCAA is wrong, and that there are additional NCAA Division I teams at Harvard beyond the 35 listed at ncaa.org, then I challenge you to identify them. Remember, club teams and non-NCAA teams are not "Division I teams", and don't count.</p>
<p>I am not confused in the slightest. This has nothing to do with "club sports" - of which Harvard has an additional 27.</p>
<p>It is the NCAA blowhards that are "confused" about what constitutes a varsity sport. </p>
<p>For example, they deign to view women's rowing as a varsity sport (because they control and "sanction" it) whereas the much more significant MEN's rowing is NOT controlled or "sanctioned" by them, so they try to pretend it doesn't exist - or - as you say, it "don't count."</p>
<p>Its all "politics" - and the "Sears Cup" is the dirtiest politics of all.</p>
<p>"With 41 varsity teams, Harvard boasts the largest athletics department in college sports. It has by far the largest university endowment known to man. And Harvard is hands-down the best brand name in all of education."</p>
<p>(The question is then asked: when is Harvard going to get a winning basketball team to match its success in other sports? A good question ... in winter, Hockey is king in Cambridge.)</p>
<p>
[quote]
It is the NCAA blowhards that are "confused" about what constitutes a varsity sport...Its all "politics" - and the "Sears Cup" is the dirtiest politics of all.
[/quote]
You apparently feel that the NACDA Director's Cup is unfair, because it does not address all Ivy sports. It would obviously be possible to create an alternative expanded ranking, and in fact an unofficial Ivy all-sports points championship does exist. </p>
<p>You may be saddened, however, to learn that Princeton easily dominates by this measure. In fact, Princeton has won for the past 19 years, including the 2004-2005 season. Harvard won more first-place titles last year, but Princeton athletic teams performed better on average.</p>
<p>That is absurd, self-serving stuff, twisting stats in an unconscionable manner to serve a partisan end, and further, in no way supports the totally unjustified bragging in the initial post in this thread, or your apparent position, on "the oft-argued question, "Which Ivy League school has the best athletic teams?"</p>
<p>At least last year, the answer to THAT question was clear: Harvard, which won a record-tying number of championships (14), and whose teams won 73% of their contests overall.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Harvard, which won a record-tying number of championships (14)
[/quote]
In 2004-2005, Harvard won 10 Ivy championships outright, and shared 4 others. While this does add up to 14 total, it clearly falls well short of the mark set by Princeton in 2000-2001 (14 championships outright, none shared) or even in 1999-2000 (13 championships outright, one shared). </p>
<p>Harvards 2004-2005 season was laudable, but referring to their 14 championships as record-tying is absurd, self-serving stuff, twisting stats in an unconscionable manner to serve a partisan end.</p>
<p>Byerly,</p>
<p>You really like to make a fuzz about Stanford athletics, don't you? Maybe deepdown, you wish Harvard could copy that success? By the way, nice run by your women tennis team until they were BLANKED by Stanford. ;)</p>
<p>Corbett,</p>
<p>Don't count Stanford out yet. They often don't sit on top by this time of the year anyway. There are still many championships left.</p>