Now in the spring of my senior year, I would like to pass along some of what I learned, and I wish to share my enthusiasm. You might know me from my Colgate sports website, www.oocities.org/redraider013 , I’m also the guy at the hockey games who runs around with the Colgate flag, always showing my school spirit, and trying to support the teams however I can. During the semester, I will be reporting on many different topics. Most of them very positive, but some will be taking a more critical look at the athletic world around us.
The name for this column comes from an old Maroon column by the same name in 1932. Written by Tom Walsh, and found while I was researching Colgate’s famous 1932 football team, “Sports Strolls” was a weekly review of Colgate athletics. It added a personal touch to the reporting, and covered events and stories that the normal columns don’t get a chance to explore. This is a chance to put the events of today, in a larger perspective.
So let’s look where we stand right now. My sophomore year was the height of Colgate athletically. We won 5 Patriot League championships, and the men’s hockey team made it to the NCAA tournament. Since then, we have yet to win a league title in any sport, and the mens ice hockey team has been mired in a 30 year low. The Patriot League faces some difficult questions in terms of scholarships, and the MAAC hockey league is quickly looking to displace the ECAC in the top 4. With all of these problems we face, what are we fighting back with, what can we do?
In a recent Syracuse Post article, the Patriot Leagues trouble with scholarships has been documented. Let’s review the schools in our league first. Holy Cross and Lehigh were responsible for the founding of the league, and they intentionally created the league to be a haven for schools that put academics first, and no athletic scholarships. However, Holy Cross has always had a somewhat schizophrenic personality, and from 1986 to 1991, they were the only team in the league to give athletic scholarships in football. They were 26-1 during that period, and they were the only ones in the league who thought that was a good thing. The Crusaders also have a rich basketball history, winning the national title in 1947. Many people in the Holy Cross community saw the basketball program suffering in the patriot league, so they fought to have basketball scholarships allowed. They got their wish, and starting in 1998, players were now going to Lehigh and Holy Cross on athletic scholarships for basketball. Last year, Holy Cross dominated the league on both the men’s and women’s side. The Crusaders are pushing to get even better, but it is putting stress on the league itself.
Lehigh shared responsibility for the founding of the league. They went along with the athletic scholarships, and used them to carefully recruit good students and good athletes. In 1990, and 1991 respectively, Army and Navy joined the league as full members. They added prestige to the conference, and also contributed geographically. Students at Army and Navy actually get paid to go to the academies, but several years of their life after college must be devoted to the military. This nullifies the recruiting advantage they might have. Bucknell and Lafayette are the two other original members who are still here now. Both schools are very similar to Colgate. Together, we are the three remaining non-scholarship schools, although Lafayette has merit scholarships, which have been used to target athletes. These three schools have traditionally been opposed to scholarships, but all of them are considering them. The Post article suggests that once one of these schools accepts them, all three will.
If the boat was rocking before, a storm hit when American University joined the league last year. The Patriot League was desperate for an 8th team to join, and finally accepted American on the condition they would be allowed to use athletic scholarships for all sports. In the fall alone, American had 5 teams finish in the leagues top three, with two titles to their credit. Compounding the issue is the fact that many people at American do not want to be in the league. They see it as a step down for them, and athletes and coaches protested the decision.
All of this might force Colgate to make a decision in the future. The athletic philosophy we have is not only in the minority of Division 1 schools, but within our own league. But we have options. We could always accept athletic scholarships, and follow the Lehigh model, using them to recruit only above average students. We could go to Division three, where our athletic philosophies would match in terms of the athletic- academic relationship goes. But this goes against Colgate’s long held tradition of competing at the highest level possible. In the past Colgate has always been a “smart jock” school. For over 100 years, students who excelled both academically and athletically, had a place to go, dropping to a lower level would take away our uniqueness. We could spend a lot of money. Make sure we have the best and most modern facilities, that we can hire and keep the best coaches available. We could hire more assistant coaches, and recruit heavily all across the continent. Of course, we don’t have that money, and if we did, that wouldn’t be the most efficient use of it. We could move to another league. But at this point, the only one that would make sense in the Ivy League, who has no use for another team. Finally, we could just do what we have been doing. As other schools recruit more and more aggressively, we will always have our niche, but it will get smaller. Our number of wins might shrink even smaller, but the wins we did get would be appreciated.
It’s hard to predict whether our recent losses have been the result of our philosophy failing to react to a changing world. Downturns are natural in any program, and it takes hindsight to truly establish the cause/ effect relationship. There is evidence for both, which we can get to later in the year.
Now that you have a better feel for the leagues makeup and history, it is time to get to this week’s trivia question. This quote originally came from an interview done by the Utica Observer Dispatch. What New York Yankee Hall of Famer, when asked about his most memorable college sports memory, recalled a football game against Colgate and replied the following… “When the whistle blew, I started a battle with Welsh, the All American guard. When they carried me away five minutes later, I had two black eyes and thought I had a broken nose and a mess of busted ribs.” E-mail your answers to gbraham@mail.colgate.edu and I just might provide a prize for the winner. Until next week…