<p>MOWC,
You may be right about how hard it is to build up a first-class athletic program. I sure don't know, but it seems to have worked out pretty well for these other colleges and their students and alums, as far as I can tell, really like it (while still realizing that their institutions are defined by their academic excellence). My guess is that if an Ivy college were to pull a Davidson, the Ivy folks would be a lot more enthusiastic and appreciative of the positive social impact that a great athletic scene can have on a campus.</p>
<p>An Ivy college is not likely to pull a Davidson without offering athletic scholarships to attract the Stephen Currys who were overlooked by the stronger programs. So it's a chicken or egg thing. Penn made it to The Dance a couple of years ago only to run into UTexas. It was pretty exciting, but no one had any real hope that they would advance. If you have been watching the tournament, just take a look at the Memphis team. Do you REALLY think that's going to be happening in Providence or Princeton? They would have mopped the floor with my Vanderbilt 'dores! </p>
<p>pizzagirl- Things are a lot better at Penn this year for my kid, except for the crime problem in December.</p>
<p>Hawkette, national championships are not required for Ivy students and alumni to be enthusiastic about or appreciative of their intercollegiate sports programs. For example, some time ago, Penn students developed a strong basketball tradition that persists to this day, i.e., "The Line," in which they camp out overnight to obtain basketball season tickets:</p>
<p>
[quote]
One of the greatest traditions of Penn Basketball is “The Line” for student season tickets. Each year, students show their enthusiasm for the Red & Blue by being first in “The Line” and spending the night at The Palestra in order to get the best seats!</p>
<p>During the week leading up to “The Line,” there will be a surprise announcement both on PennAthletics.com—The</a> Official Website of University of Pennsylvania Athletics and by calling 215-898-4519 that will direct you to a spot on campus. At this location, we will distribute bracelets that will mark your spot in “The Line” and determine the order in which you choose your seats at The Palestra.</p>
<p>In order to save your spot in line and earn your season tickets, your entire group must spend Friday night and all day Saturday at The Palestra. So, if you are the first to see our announcement, get your group together, arrive at the secret location, and ultimately endure your stay at The Palestra, you will get first choice of student seats at the nation’s most historic gymnasium!
[/quote]
</p>
<p>And speaking of Penn's Palestra, it happens to be:</p>
<p>
[quote]
the most storied gymnasium in the history of collegiate athletics. </p>
<p>The Palestra has hosted more games, more visiting teams and more NCAA tournaments that any other facility.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>The</a> Palestra - PennAthletics.com—The Official Website of University of Pennsylvania Athletics</p>
<p>So while not necessarily national sports powers, Ivies like Penn, Harvard, etc. do offer their own vibrant--and uniquely historic--brand of intercollegiate athletics that more than satisfies the spectating/rooting desires of the vast majority of their students and alumni. And quite frankly, as has already been pointed out several times in this thread, most Ivy students could easily have gone to schools with more nationally prominent sports programs if that had been their desire.</p>
<p>
[quote]
I think the big problem here is that you don't really have a concept of just how hard it is to build a top level program and attract top-level athletes. It is NOT going to happen just by changing financial aid. Also, along with a top-level program comes obnoxious alums, huge recruiting violations and payola........ It is highly likely that the Ivy League simply did not and does not want to deal with all this
[/quote]
</p>
<p>This may be true, but don't forget that Ivies already attempt to recruit many of the same Div. 1 players as the top powerhouse sports schools, even without athletic scholarships. A couple months ago our paper reported that a local football player had been offered a "full scholarship" to play football at Harvard. Obviously, he qualified for financial aid. He ultimately chose USC.</p>
<p>(D does not play a revenue sport, but she was recruited by Duke, Cal, Stanford, UCLA, USC and others, but chose Harvard.)</p>
<p>Also, the Ivies already play many non-league games against competitive Div. 1 teams, and they are certainly not hurting for funds. The step up to the next level of play does not seem particularly unattainable for the Ivies, if they choose to pursue it.</p>
<p>"MOWC,
You may be right about how hard it is to build up a first-class athletic program. I sure don't know, but it seems to have worked out pretty well for these other colleges and their students and alums, as far as I can tell, really like it (while still realizing that their institutions are defined by their academic excellence)."</p>
<p>Eh, I think it's possible that NU's done some things a little dirty in the effort to get better in football and basketball and I for one don't like that as an alum.</p>
<p>I'd like to add that some of us--including me--think that the Ivies already do too much to build up their sports teams, i.e., by admitting "scholar-athletes" who are lacking in the scholar part of that equation.</p>
<p>Bay- The Ivys do not try to recruit "many" of the same top potential D1 athletes as the powerhouses do. They may try to recruit a FEW. Your typical Indiana basketball player or Alabama football player is NOT being recruited by Princeton, I promise you. Yes, there are some exceptions and non-revenue sports are a different story. It would be a HUGE leap for the Ivys to get to the level of SEC or Big 10 sports. Not to mention the salaries for the coaches.</p>
<p>Hunt, I obviously can't speak for the Ivies since I didn't go to one, but this is exactly part of what hawkette isn't hearing. That there are certain principles that certain colleges want to stand for. </p>
<p>This article is a bit dated (2003), but still somewhat pertinent. FOOTBALL</a>; College Football at a Crossroads - New York Times</p>
<p>YK how someone upthread was embarrassed that Harvard's football team wasn't as good as Stanford's football team?</p>
<p>What *I think is embarrassing is dirty recruiting, lowering standards to get athletes, and (as shown within this article) abysmal graduation rates for some universities' football players. Not to mention the story about Dexter Manley not knowing how to read despite being at Oklahoma State and playing for them -- how outrageous. I would find those situations personally far more embarrassing than my school's team not being able to throw a pigskin over a line.</p>
<p>"The Ivys do not try to recruit "many" of the same top potential D1 athletes as the powerhouses do. They may try to recruit a FEW. Your typical Indiana basketball player or Alabama football player is NOT being recruited by Princeton, I promise you."</p>
<p>Exactly. So, the bottom line is, for the Ivies to get to that level, they are going to have to relax their academic standards somewhat. Maybe Stanford / Duke / ND / NU / Rice / Vandy already have for a handful of players, and figured that the increased revenue was worth it, that it's only a handful of students, that it doesn't compromise their mission. That's their prerogative to do so, of course; one would hope that they tread lightly in doing so (I for one cross my fingers that NU isn't compromising academic standards terribly, because I would find it embarrassing to have NU football players who can barely put a sentence together, and no Rose Bowl / NU spirit is worth that to me); but by no means does the conclusion follow that therefore HYP et al should do the same thing.</p>
<p>BTW, *my favorite NU homecoming game was the one in which Stephen Colbert was the grand marshall of the parade (homecoming 2006). That was FAR more school spirit to me than anything that happened on the field!</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>pretty much sums up everything against Hawkette here....</p>
<p>i'm not exactly against sports, but as someone has aptly pointed out, this "Big Game" thing diverts too much of the attention off other equally important activities, not to mention it propagates sporting elitism that many ivy folks would not take kindly to</p>
<p>as someone who picked up sports only in grade 10, after being on the receiving end of such sports-based condescension as a nerd for all my life, i can frankly say i would rather have a more reserved and intellectual college experience rather than go thru all the hoo-ha and celebrity cult thingy again, even though i'd be fairly well placed to benefit from the latter</p>
<p>p.s. hawkette are you a leo?</p>
<p>
[quote]
It would be a HUGE leap for the Ivys to get to the level of SEC or Big 10 sports. Not to mention the salaries for the coaches.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>IF Ivies wanted to do it, they could easily afford it.</p>
<p>LOL, there's a blog about NU sports in which the blogger is quite peeved that NU is getting something like $500 million for the Lyrica patent and yet the basketball team isn't apparently getting any of it. To which my response is ... why should they? I don't pretend to know the ins and outs of how NU should spend windfalls, but I can easily think of other things they should invest it first that are more consistent with their mission of being a world-class university. Financial aid consistent with Harvard's would be among the top, and then investment in some facilities that need upgrading.</p>
<p>MOWC,
You know a lot about recruiting from your daughter's sport, so please forgive my naivete, but I don't think it's that hard for a school like Harvard to recruit a few very good basketball players and build a nationally competitive men's basketball team. They hired a "name" coach in Tommy Amaker (and I doubt that he doing it for peanuts), they have the best brand name in American education and now they have a financial aid program which can financially compete with scholarship offers from top Division I athletic programs. In basketball, if you get 2-3 good players and some role players, you can be pretty good at the collegiate level. Why can’t Harvard follow the lead of Davidson, not to mention Stanford, Duke, Vanderbilt, and ND in basketball (all are nationally ranked in men’s and women’s basketball)?</p>
<p>45 percenter,
I know about the Palestra and have been there several times. It’s a historic place, but I hope you know that history is for more than just U Penn as it serves many of the colleges in Philly. </p>
<p>The good news is that U Penn probably has the most vibrant basketball scene in the Ivy League. However, U Penn basketball as a draw is not competitive with the likes of Stanford, Duke, Vanderbilt or Notre Dame. And U Penn has about a 50% larger undergrad enrollment than Stanford, Duke and Vanderbilt and almost 1500 more undergrads than Notre Dame. </p>
<p>Here are the facts for average attendance at home league games:</p>
<p>4571 U Penn (capacity over 8000??)</p>
<p>7329 Stanford (all games sold out to capacity)
9314 Duke (all games sold out to capacity)
14,325 Vanderbilt (all games sold out to capacity)
10,231 Notre Dame (all games sold out to capacity)</p>
<p>If you have been following this discussion, I suspect you would be one of those Ivy faithful who would love to see an Ivy team (and especially U Penn) achieve in basketball at the level of one of these other colleges. Am I right? </p>
<p>pizzagirl,
From what I read on CC and a few examples that I know of first-hand, I think you might have an overly rosy view of the nature and purity of the athletic recruiting that goes on in the Ivy League. They also cut corners in their admissions practices and some students who are good hockey players or whatever will find their way in via athletic merits rather than academic ones. I’ll concede that the recruiting is not nearly as competitive as that faced by Stanford, Duke, et al in their respective conferences, but the competition among the Ivy colleges for athletes, even in non-revenue sports like crew, is significant. And with that competition comes a lowering of the academic standards of the Ivy schools. You can argue whether this is appropriate or not, but I think you are kidding yourself if you don’t think it is going on already. </p>
<p>IOng,
I guess we just disagree on what college sports can be on a college campus. I think it can be a lot of fun and potentially energizing to an entire college community and a nice, additional thing to keep alumni engaged for decades after their graduation. You worry about sporting elitism on the college campus (worries about elitism coming from an Ivy Leaguer are rich) and you think college sports might divert too much attention from other campus activities that you value. Do I have it right? Would you have any positive things to say about the athletic life provided at Stanford, Duke, Northwestern, Rice, Vanderbilt, Notre Dame?</p>
<p>Hawkette- My daughter is a musician, not an athlete. My son was an athletic recruit. It is NOT that easy to build a strong program in a major sport. Davidson is good THIS year and has one superstar and some other good players. How long has it taken them to get to this point? Rice has pretty poor football AND basketball teams. We'll see how Harvard does. They simply want to be competitive in their own league!</p>
<p>"I guess we just disagree on what college sports can be on a college campus. I think it can be a lot of fun and potentially energizing to an entire college community and a nice, additional thing to keep alumni engaged for decades after their graduation."</p>
<p>You think it can be a lot of fun because .. well, it's something YOU think is fun, Hawkette. What we are disputing are your contentions that </p>
<p>a) students who aren't currently fans of football / b-ball "don't know what they're missing" and would indeed really like it if they were only exposed to it at high levels and that they can't help but be caught up in all the fun, and
b) a highly competitive, winning team is necessary to make fandom be a fun, shared event at a campus.</p>
<p>Tokenadult, Northstarmom, am I missing anything here?</p>
<p>"The good news is that U Penn probably has the most vibrant basketball scene in the Ivy League. However, U Penn basketball as a draw is not competitive with the likes of Stanford, Duke, Vanderbilt or Notre Dame."</p>
<p>So? Does it have to be?</p>
<p>MOWC, Sorry about the mix-up with your kids. </p>
<p>Anyway, what if the Lopez twins or Candace Wiggins had chosen Harvard rather than Stanford? I think we'd see the Crimson at the top of the Ivy League in men's and women's basketball and possibly a lot more. And I think we'd find out if there are many sports fans in the Harvard student body and in their alumni ranks.</p>
<p>
<p>The good news is that U Penn probably has the most vibrant basketball scene in the Ivy League. However, U Penn basketball as a draw is not competitive with the likes of Stanford, Duke, Vanderbilt or Notre Dame. And U Penn has about a 50% larger undergrad enrollment than Stanford, Duke and Vanderbilt and almost 1500 more undergrads than Notre Dame. </p>
<p>Here are the facts for average attendance at home league games:</p>
<p>4571 U Penn (capacity over 8000??)</p>
<p>7329 Stanford (all games sold out to capacity) 9314 Duke (all games sold out to capacity) 14,325 Vanderbilt (all games sold out to capacity) 10,231 Notre Dame (all games sold out to capacity)</p>
<p>If you have been following this discussion, I suspect you would be one of those Ivy faithful who would love to see an Ivy team (and especially U Penn) achieve in basketball at the level of one of these other colleges. Am I right?
hawkette, first, the Palestra doesn't serve many of the colleges in Philly, it is Penn's arena, on Penn's campus, and--besides Penn--also hosts games involving Philly's famous Big 5, which includes Penn and 4 other Philly schools (La Salle, St. Joseph's, Temple, and Villanova). The Palestra has been the headquarters of Big 5 basketball since the Big 5's inception in 1955. All 4 of these other schools have their own arenas, and play all non-Big-5 home games at those arenas. It is only Big 5 games (many of which involve Penn) that are played at the Palestra in addition to all of Penn's home games. So Penn and its Palestra have the distinction of being the headquarters both of Ivy League basketball in Philadelphia and of Big 5 basketball.</p>
<p>Second, although I enjoyed the novelty in 1979 of Penn's being in the Final Four, I would not like to see Penn (or the Ivies in general) develop big-time programs in revenue sports that would keep them consistently competitive nationally. And I'm confident that the many Ivy grads I know share my feelings. Having lived as an alum through the excitement of the 1979 tournament, I can tell you that it was exciting precisely because it was a novelty. Incidentally, here's an interesting article written on the 25th anniversary of Penn's Final Four appearance, which puts its wonderful uniqueness into proper perspective better than I can:</p>
<p>Ivy</a> League Sports</p>
<p>The bottom line is that most Ivy students have chosen to attend their schools--and not the likes of Stanford, Duke, Vanderbilt, etc.--because of the character of those schools, including the role that intercollegiate sports play in that character. Prior to the 1950s, the Ivy schools had nationally competitive sports programs, and the Ivy League was formalized in the 1950s for the specific purpose of steering its 8 members away from the path of big-time college sports programs that had already begun to develop. Simply put, the Ivy League's unique approach to intercollegiate sports is an integral part of its DNA, and to pursue a big-time national program in a revenue sport is simply not consistent with the character of the league or its members.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>nope i'm totally for sports on campus....we disagree on the importance of "spectatorship" and what all the hoo-ha over a "big game" can be, if its even there in the first place</p>
<p>perhaps i misunderstood you but your arguments suggest that you are advocating "sporting fan culture", not sporting culture, and certainly not the quality of "athletic life"....you keep talking bout how going the "big games" are going to galvanize the entire school population and how by cheering for such games will inevitable rejuvenate the stifling college culture of ivies</p>
<p>wats wrong with a school having many big games instead of one BIG BIG game? participation is the true mark of a quality athletic life, not sitting on that bench with a bag popcorn in your hand, screaming as a pigskin gets thrown around</p>