<p>4 touchdowns ... more than Stanford has in all 5 conference games!</p>
<p>Comparing Harvard football to Stanford football is like comparing a team from the Little League World Series to the Kansas City Royals.</p>
<p>Why do you care so much about football anyway, Byerly? Believe it or not, football isn't the only sport played at Stanford. We support all of our teams, whether they're losing (like football) or winning (like volleyball).</p>
<p>Harvard football outranks Stanford nationally, even though it uses amateur players while Stanford has the nation's highest payroll.</p>
<p>If I had a dollar for every time you said that on this thread, I'd be able to pay a semester of Harvard's tuition.</p>
<p>You completely ignored Sam Lee's response to your "highest payroll" crap, by the way.</p>
<p>Also, if I'm reading that USA Today chart correctly, Stanford has the 4th hardest schedule in the nation. We haven't even won a game yet and we're still ranked tons higher than most of the Ivy League.</p>
<p>That ranking is outrageous. There's no way you can do a side-by-side comparison of Div IA and IAA teams. Like Jimmy says, it's akin to comparing a MLB team, competing against other MLB teams, to little-leaguers. Besides, Harvard's schedule is a joke.</p>
<p>on the app..it looks like this....does grade level mean, when i started??
Activity or Interest:<br>
Grade Level:<br>
School Year:<br>
School Year:<br>
Hours per Week:
Weeks per Year:</p>
<p>Read it and weep! This computer ranking will counr for 1/3 of the BCS raking.</p>
<p>Note not only that HYP rank higher than Stanford (based on a compter analysis involving strength of schedule) but that the#2 team in the nation represents another West Coast school!</p>
<p>Byerly, I'm kind of confused as to why you take such offense to Stanford offering athletic scholarships (and also why you take such sadistic delight in their football failures).</p>
<p>It seems obvious to me that as part of the PAC-10, considered the best conference in NCAA Division I football, Stanford is practically forced to offer athletic scholarships to remain competitive. When we're competing against much larger public schools like Cal, USC, Arizona, Washington, and everybody else in the PAC-10...how can you expect a smaller private school like Stanford to maintain an unfunded athletic program when pitted against these teams?</p>
<p>Harvard obviously doesn't have to offer athletic scholarships because its primary opponents are the Ivy and Patriot Leagues, which we can all agree are not the same caliber as the PAC-10. If Harvard competed in one of the major NCAA Division I conferences, I would imagine they would be offering athletic scholarships too.</p>
<p>Also, you must consider the idea of athletic scholarships in terms of location. An athlete deciding between the Ivies probably wouldn't choose one over the other because of an athletic scholarship. But if a recruited athlete is trying to decide between Stanford and any other PAC-10 school, Stanford is most likely at an intrinsic disadvantage due to its significantly higher tuition as compared to (potentially) in-state public schools. Isn't the obvious way to rememdy this to offer scholarships?</p>
<p>I think this is a classic case of simply comparing apples to oranges. The athletic programs of Stanford and Harvard operate so differently, and in such different environments, that I think it's foolish to draw conclusions by comparing the two in absolute terms with a simple numerical ranking. Perhaps the structure of NCAA football may require that such a ranking be constructed, but that doesn't mean it should be cause for celebration to discover you're nationally ranked 111th (Harvard) as opposed to 130th (Stanford). You certainly don't see Stanford pundits flaunting our superiority over Harvard in virtually every other athletic category on the Harvard boards.</p>
<p>
[quote]
the PAC-10, considered the best conference in NCAA Division I football
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I think for this year the SEC is considered the best by most football pundits and fans, and that the Big 10 and the Big 12 are considered stronger conferences in general than the PAC 10, although some think the PAC 10 is better than the Big 12. Best conference in the NCAA Division I football is a bit much, though. Maybe if Stanford won a few non-conference games! </p>
<p>
[quote]
When we're competing against much larger public schools like Cal, USC, Arizona, Washington, and everybody else in the PAC-10...how can you expect a smaller private school like Stanford to maintain an unfunded athletic program when pitted against these teams?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>When did USC go public? When does school size cause a low quality football team (Boston College, for example)?</p>
<p>
[quote]
Harvard obviously doesn't have to offer athletic scholarships because its primary opponents are the Ivy and Patriot Leagues, which we can all agree are not the same caliber as the PAC-10. If Harvard competed in one of the major NCAA Division I conferences, I would imagine they would be offering athletic scholarships too.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Well, as part of the Ivy League rules, it's illegal to offer athletic scholarship. If it weren't part of the Ivy League (a sports conference) or if the league decided to change the rule, I imagine it would offer scholarships, but it is one major rule in the league. Anyway, Harvard could offer them, if allowed, and clobber the other team's if it so wanted. It being a weak conference is irrelevant, I think.</p>
<p>
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Also, you must consider the idea of athletic scholarships in terms of location. An athlete deciding between the Ivies probably wouldn't choose one over the other because of an athletic scholarship.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Because none of them can offer any.</p>
<p>
[quote]
But if a recruited athlete is trying to decide between Stanford and any other PAC-10 school, Stanford is most likely at an intrinsic disadvantage due to its significantly higher tuition as compared to (potentially) in-state public schools. Isn't the obvious way to remedy this to offer scholarships?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>But it has an unquestionable superior name (prestige wise) to any but perhaps a few in general, so it has at least that advantage. Also, it may be able to offer more fin aid than the other schools, giving it another advantage, amongst others.</p>
<p>
[quote]
The athletic programs of Stanford and Harvard operate so differently, and in such different environments, that I think it's foolish to draw conclusions by comparing the two in absolute terms with a simple numerical ranking. Perhaps the structure of NCAA football may require that such a ranking be constructed, but that doesn't mean it should be cause for celebration to discover you're nationally ranked 111th (Harvard) as opposed to 130th (Stanford). You certainly don't see Stanford pundits flaunting our superiority over Harvard in virtually every other athletic category on the Harvard boards.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Now we're talking.</p>
<p>Regarding scholarships-
The fact that Stanford offers scholarships is due to the fundamental nature of Division IA football, and that constitutes the difference between Division IA and IAA football. What Jimmy was trying to say was that it's more difficult at a more academically demanding school to recruit players. USC, UMich, Cal, and other schools get away with this because they have different academic standards with regard to recruited athletes, which is something that schools like Stanford, Northwestern, and Duke don't do, hence their dismal records in D-IA football. Stanford doesn't compromise it's academic standards with athletic recruiting.</p>
<p>Regarding level of competition-
Yeah, the SEC is probably the most competitive conference year in year out (but that's highly debatable if you look at their bowl records in recent years), but the Pac-10 isn't exactly filled with schools like Columbia, Dartmouth, Yale, South Dakota State, Appalachian State, and Princeton, to name a few. Again, like Jimmy said, comparing D-IA football to D-IAA football is like comparing apples to oranges. You just can't. Which is why that particular poll is bogus.</p>
<p>Regarding the BCS-
I don't think that's an issue here. Neither Stanford nor Harvard are top 15 teams in D-IA football, which is what the BCS really deals with. Plus, the BCS doesn't use that particular USA Today ranking. Why would it? It factors DIAA teams into the formula. Why ANY ranking would do that is beyond me.</p>
<p>
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I think for this year the SEC is considered the best by most football pundits and fans, and that the Big 10 and the Big 12 are considered stronger conferences in general than the PAC 10, although some think the PAC 10 is better than the Big 12.
[/quote]
Debatable, but OK. The fact that the PAC 10 is definitely one of the top conferences in NCAA D1, and not really comparable to the Ivy League, is all I'm pointing out here and I think we can agree on that.
[quote]
When does school size cause a low quality football team (Boston College, for example)?
[/quote]
Well, if you look at the top 25 schools, they're ALL large schools (like, 15,000+ undergrads) with the exceptions of BC and Notre Dame (both of which are still bigger than Stanford). The correlation between school size and D1 football success is not an absolute one but definitely noticeable. In any case, the point I was making in the sentence you quoted was that, logically, smaller private schools must do SOMETHING in terms of recruiting if they wish to remain athletically competitive with larger schools. The fact that both BC and ND offer athletic scholarships, and have fairly storied athletic programs, just proves the point.</p>
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Stanford doesn't compromise it's academic standards with athletic recruiting.
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</p>
<p>Oh, please. Certainly Stanford generally does this less than many other teams, and it's remarkable that Stanford has such a strong overall athletic program and compromises its academic standards less than many schools (Stanford's ability to do this is partially explained by its prestige and $13 a year scholarships to athletes), but stop kidding yourself- Stanford does compromise its academic standards for many athletes, even if it is less than some other schools.</p>
<p>I really think size is basically irrelevant to the discussion. Essentially, if a schools wants a strong team, certainly they must do something to keep that going regardless of size. And yes, the PAC 10 is one of the most competitive conferences, probably the second or third most competitive, but few would say the first.</p>
<p>One usual contender, the University of Miami, has about 10,000 undergrads, Clemson has 14,000, and Gerogia tech 12,000 undergraduates. Certainly most of the teams in the top 25 comes from large schools, but I don't think being a large school has much to do with football success.</p>
<p>Correct. The schools pretending to "big time" status in football only need 100 or so Hessians in order to compete. If you are willing to make the necessary compromises, you can do this with a student body of relatively modest size. Stanford pays more money than any other school to its "scholar athletes".</p>
<p>DRab, I think you're missing the point here. I never said that small schools can't compete in the upper echelon of D1 football, although they may be at an intrinsic disadvantage. It's that they can't compete without offering athletic scholarships or some other major incentive. Thus Stanford, being significantly smaller than all of its conference rivals, has to offer scholarships to remain competitive. Harvard, on the other hand, doesn't offer athletic scholarships because the rules of the Ivy League make it a non-issue. </p>
<p>It's not Stanford's fault that it has to offer scholarships to keep pace, and it's not Harvard's fault that it doesn't have to offer scholarships to keep pace with its conference. Neither is better or worse than the other because they operate in such different environments, so comparing the two programs with a numerical ranking is useless.</p>
<p>Byerly, there's absolutely no reason for anyone to take you seriously if all you do is reply with the same set of trite responses, failing to engage any of the points and questions others pose.</p>
<p>Define how Stanford "pays" it's athletes. I'm sure there's a DE down my hall who would love to get in on this argument. If it's simply by giving out athletic scholarships, then all D-IA football programs do so. Each D-IA program has 85 full athletic scholarships to dish out, and all have to be used due to the competitive nature of D-IA football. I guess you can say that Stanford athletes "get the most money," but that's ONLY because Stanford's tuition is probably among the highest out of all the D-IA schools.</p>
<p>
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It's that they can't compete without offering athletic scholarships or some other major incentive. Thus Stanford, being significantly smaller than all of its conference rivals, has to offer scholarships to remain competitive.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>They can’t compete due to their size, and not some consequence of size, or some other thing? Are smaller schools less desirable to athletes, so they need extra money in order to be coaxed into attending? Stanford gets many applications and is quite coveted, so it seems desirable enough to me. 6,500 people isn’t too small, either- we’re not talking about a 1,000 person school or anything. I think you’re right by saying that Stanford has to offer scholarships to stay competitive. I think this is also true of USC, Cal, x top football school (although the very top have the draw of potential NFL spots for players, which make them ore desirable, and given Stanford’s name it is probably quite generally desirable, even if the football team isn’t so hot). As to the reasons you’ve stated so far, I disagree. Many schools couldn't compete athletically at their current level, regardless of size, if they did not themselves offer athletic scholarships. XRedcomet addresses this point in showing many programs have scholarships. Now, maybe if all colleges and universities were not allowed to give athletic scholarships, private schools such as Stanford might be at a disadvantage to public schools due to their generally higher cost, or smaller schools that might have less money overall, but even if this were the case, many of the private schools have better fin aid in general, and the smaller schools can focus the smaller amounts of money on the fewer students they have to deal with, often meaning more money per student, so size again fails to be relevant (unless you’re talking about things such as alumni support or stadium noise- these two things might be affects, but things of this nature you have not addressed).</p>
<p>Small size might be an intrinsic disadvantage if students are distributed to schools randomly and if schools choose much of their teams internally (after admittance and what not), but this is rarely how competitive teams work, especially top teams in NCAA football.</p>
<p>Attendance cost varies for some of the D-IA schools depending on residency. Stanford has some of the best fin aid amongst the D-IA schools as well, does it not?</p>
<p>I still think my alma mater's team is more pathetic than any of the other teams mentioned in this thread. Did any of you see the Gophers-Bisons game?</p>
<p>Well Stanford didn't lose today!</p>
<p>It looks like you haven't taken a bye week from being a douche</p>
<p>I'd say Cal is Rose-Bowl bound.</p>