STrib: MIAC rivals plot ouster of St. Thomas

Why should st Thomas make a stupid financial decision to make some other schools feel better?

Well Some Guy the whole theme of this thread is what should St. Thomas do IF the MIAC does kick them out. If that does happen, what do you think the best option is?
 

Well Some Guy the whole theme of this thread is what should St. Thomas do IF the MIAC does kick them out. If that does happen, what do you think the best option is?
The MIAC would be foolish to kick St Thomas out. The exposure that the MIAC receives is directly attributable to St Thomas and St John's. Kicking one or both of those schools out turns the MIAC into the UMAC. It becomes an irrelevant conference that no top notch athlete considers for college.
 

There's no better experience than watching a Johnnie-Tommy rivalry football game at Clements Outdoor Stadium in Collegeville on an Autumn day with the colors and smell of the Fall leaves and the tall Norwegian pines.

There's nothing better than partaking in some Johnnie bread and vino sitting down on the slopes with friends.

It is the most anticipated game every other season. I don't think Saint John's will ever want to part with a tradition and rivalry that is over a century old. I envision them putting up a fight for Saint Thomas.
 
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What about 1975-2010? Was there a plot to oust the Johnnies?
 

I could be wrong, but I get the sense that this is about more than just St. Thomas being very good in football. I think it could be about the overall conference philosophy or approach to athletics as part of the overall experience.

If I'm reading this right, the other MIAC schools feel that St. Thomas is putting more emphasis on athletics than the other schools in the conference. They want a balanced approach - athletics as part of the college experience. And at least some of the schools think that St. Thomas has an approach or a philosophy that is out of sync with the other schools in the league. Basically telling St. Thomas - if you want to be an athletic powerhouse, more power to you. But you'll have to do it in a different conference where the other schools share your values.

One could argue that the most successful athletic program in the MIAC is the Augsburg Wrestling program. 13 National Championships. But nobody is talking about kicking Augsburg out of the MIAC. It's a question of balance - balancing approach to athletics within a conference with strong academic programs.
 


Well Some Guy the whole theme of this thread is what should St. Thomas do IF the MIAC does kick them out. If that does happen, what do you think the best option is?

Not go division two

WHich was the point of my response.

IF it happened I would guess they would try to make a play to join the Wisconsin conference. Even if it meant playing independent football and joining in everything else.
 
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I could be wrong, but I get the sense that this is about more than just St. Thomas being very good in football. I think it could be about the overall conference philosophy or approach to athletics as part of the overall experience.

If I'm reading this right, the other MIAC schools feel that St. Thomas is putting more emphasis on athletics than the other schools in the conference. They want a balanced approach - athletics as part of the college experience. And at least some of the schools think that St. Thomas has an approach or a philosophy that is out of sync with the other schools in the league. Basically telling St. Thomas - if you want to be an athletic powerhouse, more power to you. But you'll have to do it in a different conference where the other schools share your values.

One could argue that the most successful athletic program in the MIAC is the Augsburg Wrestling program. 13 National Championships. But nobody is talking about kicking Augsburg out of the MIAC. It's a question of balance - balancing approach to athletics within a conference with strong academic programs.

Winning 17 of 19 women’s basketball titles or whatever it is might actually be a bigger deal than football, I agree.
 

It’s very possible nobody is actually plotting to kick them out. Reusse heard a rumor and reported it as fact. It’s a column not a report after all and it doesn’t actually say anything is a fact that is finalized

Actually, this was not a column byline. It was written as a report.
 

The MIAC would be foolish to kick St Thomas out. The exposure that the MIAC receives is directly attributable to St Thomas and St John's. Kicking one or both of those schools out turns the MIAC into the UMAC. It becomes an irrelevant conference that no top notch athlete considers for college.

That's the thing. In a lot of ways I think that's what the St. Olafs, Carletons, and Macalesters would prefer, the MIAC be another UMAC. Heaven forbid a few MIAC schools (I'm mainly thinking St. Thomas, St. John's, Concordia) actually don't mind being known for or associated with athletic excellence, and striving for it!
 
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I could be wrong, but I get the sense that this is about more than just St. Thomas being very good in football. I think it could be about the overall conference philosophy or approach to athletics as part of the overall experience.

If I'm reading this right, the other MIAC schools feel that St. Thomas is putting more emphasis on athletics than the other schools in the conference. They want a balanced approach - athletics as part of the college experience. And at least some of the schools think that St. Thomas has an approach or a philosophy that is out of sync with the other schools in the league. Basically telling St. Thomas - if you want to be an athletic powerhouse, more power to you. But you'll have to do it in a different conference where the other schools share your values.

One could argue that the most successful athletic program in the MIAC is the Augsburg Wrestling program. 13 National Championships. But nobody is talking about kicking Augsburg out of the MIAC. It's a question of balance - balancing approach to athletics within a conference with strong academic programs.

Wrestling is not an official MIAC sport, hasn’t been since the early 2000s. I think SJU, Augsburg, and Concordia are the only 3 with programs still.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

I could be wrong, but I get the sense that this is about more than just St. Thomas being very good in football. I think it could be about the overall conference philosophy or approach to athletics as part of the overall experience.

If I'm reading this right, the other MIAC schools feel that St. Thomas is putting more emphasis on athletics than the other schools in the conference. They want a balanced approach - athletics as part of the college experience. And at least some of the schools think that St. Thomas has an approach or a philosophy that is out of sync with the other schools in the league. Basically telling St. Thomas - if you want to be an athletic powerhouse, more power to you. But you'll have to do it in a different conference where the other schools share your values.

One could argue that the most successful athletic program in the MIAC is the Augsburg Wrestling program. 13 National Championships. But nobody is talking about kicking Augsburg out of the MIAC. It's a question of balance - balancing approach to athletics within a conference with strong academic programs.

Hit the nail on the head. The part that has really bothered other MIAC coaches is the amount of "leadership" and "academic" financial aid awards that go to athletes at St. Thomas. It's not technically breaking any rules to do that, as those are given at the discretion of the school, but most can probably see why other schools wouldn't like it.
 

Not go division two

WHich was the point of my response.

IF it happened I would guess they would try to make a play to join the Wisconsin conference. Even if it meant playing independent football and joining in everything else.

Gotcha. Makes sense. I don't think the MIAC does anything either. It is just a platform for a few of the bottom dwellers to voice displeasure.
 

Hit the nail on the head. The part that has really bothered other MIAC coaches is the amount of "leadership" and "academic" financial aid awards that go to athletes at St. Thomas. It's not technically breaking any rules to do that, as those are given at the discretion of the school, but most can probably see why other schools wouldn't like it.
St. Thomas and St John's were both historically all men's schools (St. Johns still sort of is), and there is a long tradition of manly head bashing at the Johnny/Tommie game.
Along with this issue is the nationwide decreasing student attendence in collegiate sports & revenue (which we have observed here). Much of the support then comes from alum who want a nostalgic afternoon. The long predominantly male population of these alums means more enthusisam for donations for the sports they follow.

And then also has come the knowledge that all that head bashing might not be the best for John or Tom's scholastic success/GPA. Concussion syndrome is not going away and will be a major issue for football. Athletic excellence might be better pursued in the less injury-oriented sports.
 



Hey - if you're interested, Pat Reusse has a new podcast up on the Skor North website. Goes into a lot of background about the MIAC story, including what he's been told from his sources about which schools are pushing this. he says the vote to change the by-laws, so they can kick St. Thomas out, is going to be very close. worth listening to.

(warning - Reusse also discusses Pitino's contract extension. does not have nice things to say about Mark Coyle.....)
 

I will try to listen to the Pat R podcast at some point. I would guess that St. Johns, Concordia, Bethel and maybe Gustavus are not leading the charge on this, with Carleton, MAC, and St. Olaf being behind it. I am not sure here Hamline, Augsburg and St. Mary's would fall.
 

Hey - if you're interested, Pat Reusse has a new podcast up on the Skor North website. Goes into a lot of background about the MIAC story, including what he's been told from his sources about which schools are pushing this. he says the vote to change the by-laws, so they can kick St. Thomas out, is going to be very close. worth listening to.

(warning - Reusse also discusses Pitino's contract extension. does not have nice things to say about Mark Coyle.....)


I thought he ripped Pitino just about as badly as Coyle.
 

Great podcast:

https://www.skornorth.com/reusse-unchained/2019/04/im-unchained-because-people-accept-being-scammed-ep-19/[/url]

Ok I just listened to it, and Pat is saying that they will need to "make up" a reason to get rid of 1920 original member Saint Thomas. (Phil Esten new AD mentioned)

-Saint Olaf is driving all of this- President of St. Olaf enraged by 0-97 loss

-Hamline is hiding it, but the new AD there is behind this as well

-Carleton would vote them out

-MAC wants them out, wants to return to MIAC for football

-non football schools get to vote

-Augsburg is the wild card, football coach wants them out too
 

Great podcast:

https://www.skornorth.com/reusse-unchained/2019/04/im-unchained-because-people-accept-being-scammed-ep-19/[/url]

Ok I just listened to it, and Pat is saying that they will need to "make up" a reason to get rid of 1920 original member Saint Thomas. (Phil Esten new AD mentioned)

-Saint Olaf is driving all of this- President of St. Olaf enraged by 0-97 loss

-Hamline is hiding it, but the new AD there is behind this as well

-Carleton would vote them out

-MAC wants them out, wants to return to MIAC for football

-non football schools get to vote

-Augsburg is the wild card, football coach wants them out too


Patrick made it sound like it was St. Olaf, Carleton, Macalester, Hamline, St. Kate's, St. Mary's, most likely Augsburg and maybe St. Ben's that would want them out. He didn't mentioned St. John's, Bethel, Gustavus or Concordia. In order to get to 9 schools, they would need at least one of those schools as well. Carleton and Macalester, which have by far the biggest endowments in the conference, are more interested in moving up the academic rankings for colleges in the US. I think some schools in the conference probably feel that UST awards scholarships more like division 2 schools for their athletes. It isn't in the spirit of division 3 athletics. Who's right? I don't know. What happens if they vote to keep UST in the conference and Carleton, Macalester, Hamline and St. Olaf leave for the Midwest Conference? Kind of a tough situation.
 


Patrick made it sound like it was St. Olaf, Carleton, Macalester, Hamline, St. Kate's, St. Mary's, most likely Augsburg and maybe St. Ben's that would want them out. He didn't mentioned St. John's, Bethel, Gustavus or Concordia. In order to get to 9 schools, they would need at least one of those schools as well. Carleton and Macalester, which have by far the biggest endowments in the conference, are more interested in moving up the academic rankings for colleges in the US. I think some schools in the conference probably feel that UST awards scholarships more like division 2 schools for their athletes. It isn't in the spirit of division 3 athletics. Who's right? I don't know. What happens if they vote to keep UST in the conference and Carleton, Macalester, Hamline and St. Olaf leave for the Midwest Conference? Kind of a tough situation.
Would St Kate's and St Bens leave to play against St Scholastica in the UMAC? Probably a better conference for them.
 

I would think St. Ben's would absolutely destroy UMAC competition, for the most part. Or, have they slipped across the board in the past few years?
 

I have a feeling St. Ben's likes being a player in the MIAC basketball world (not sure if they are very good in VB), and very much doubt if there is much of a gap between St. Ben's and St. John's on this vote.

The St. Olaf agenda may not carry much weight with St. Ben's, an school that has zero interest in being in the UMAC, regardless.
 

What about 1975-2010? Was there a plot to oust the Johnnies?

i think that is a perfect comparison, for many of those years football players going to St Johns somehow got grants that they didn't qualify for at other schools, I heard stories of guy's getting huge grants at St Johns and didn't qualify for one at St Thomas, it's taking a pool of money and using it in a way it was never meant to be, another poster alluded to the fact of St Thomas run's it athletic department like a division II school, that is a huge competitive advantage, I can't help but think the same type of programs are being run at St Thomas now, it's not what many of the MIAC schools want to compete against and I understand that.
 

i think that is a perfect comparison, for many of those years football players going to St Johns somehow got grants that they didn't qualify for at other schools, I heard stories of guy's getting huge grants at St Johns and didn't qualify for one at St Thomas, it's taking a pool of money and using it in a way it was never meant to be, another poster alluded to the fact of St Thomas run's it athletic department like a division II school, that is a huge competitive advantage, I can't help but think the same type of programs are being run at St Thomas now, it's not what many of the MIAC schools want to compete against and I understand that.

I'd guess all the top competitive DIII schools do it. You take a scholarship that's open to the general student body, so it doesn't count as an athletic scholarship per NCAA/MIAC rules, and then you rig it so that the athlete gets the award. It's a defacto athletic scholarship.
 

What about 1975-2010? Was there a plot to oust the Johnnies?

The Johnnies were the most consistent team that whole time span but by my count, 24 teams not named the Johnnies claimed either co-champion or outright champion in that period with Bethel (4) almost even with the Johnnies (5) 2000-2010 and Concordia (9) mostly prior to the mid 90s. A few other teams got into the action too in that span with St. Thomas (4), St. Olaf (2), Hamline (2), and both Carleton and Augsburg with one.

There was a time that all MIAC football teams including those without huge tradition had a chance to compete once or twice a decade. The D3 landscape has changed since then. The top of conference is now 10 touchdowns better than the bottom of the conference (I'm only embellishing a little) and its a problem in other conferences too. What's different with St. Thomas, though, is that they dominate all sports while other football powers like Mary Hardin-Baylor and Mount Union fit well in their conferences in other sports and general institutional size.

Whatever the outcome of this upcoming vote, I get the sense the conference a few years from now will look different than it does today.
 

I'd guess all the top competitive DIII schools do it. You take a scholarship that's open to the general student body, so it doesn't count as an athletic scholarship per NCAA/MIAC rules, and then you rig it so that the athlete gets the award. It's a defacto athletic scholarship.

The most common of these are Leadership Scholarships. I get the impression the NCAA watches this closely and compares the percentage of non-athletes vs. athletes getting the funds. My daughter has been going through this process over the last year so.

My question on that process is this. When a D3 school emphasizes athletic investment via a generous financial aid program that must be available to all students, that seems pretty inefficient to me. Would it actually cost that much more to go D2 or NAIA where the shcool could target athetic financial aid for athletes, instead of needing to spread it around to the whole student population by NCAA D3 requirements? D3 schools already target other types of merit scholarships like music/arts and academics. I would love to get input from a financial aid officer on this one.
 

The most common of these are Leadership Scholarships. I get the impression the NCAA watches this closely and compares the percentage of non-athletes vs. athletes getting the funds. My daughter has been going through this process over the last year so.

My question on that process is this. When a D3 school emphasizes athletic investment via a generous financial aid program that must be available to all students, that seems pretty inefficient to me. Would it actually cost that much more to go D2 or NAIA where the shcool could target athetic financial aid for athletes, instead of needing to spread it around to the whole student population by NCAA D3 requirements? D3 schools already target other types of merit scholarships like music/arts and academics. I would love to get input from a financial aid officer on this one.

It's not like a DIII school's athletic dept sets up a bunch of big scholarship programs, and then makes sure that general students receive a certain percentage of those awards. That's backwards.

Each school has general scholarships that all students can compete for. Those scholarships would be there, even if there was no athletic dept at all. So, it's just a matter of making sure the athletes that you want to take care of will indeed get some of those awards thrown their way.

At DII and DI schools, athletic depts can directly pay for athlete costs as a line item in their budgets, or explicitly direct certain awards to the athlete with no open competition with the student body. What I'm thinking is that at the top DIII schools, the latter scenario happens implicitly, under the hood of the awarding process.

Sure, it may be against the letter of the law ... but if everyone is doing it, then it's only cheating if you get caught.
 

There are a hell of a lot of folks on here that know way more about this than i do but from my distant seat why do these other members not focus on improving themselves ?
 


The Johnnies were the most consistent team that whole time span but by my count, 24 teams not named the Johnnies claimed either co-champion or outright champion in that period with Bethel (4) almost even with the Johnnies (5) 2000-2010 and Concordia (9) mostly prior to the mid 90s. A few other teams got into the action too in that span with St. Thomas (4), St. Olaf (2), Hamline (2), and both Carleton and Augsburg with one.

There was a time that all MIAC football teams including those without huge tradition had a chance to compete once or twice a decade. The D3 landscape has changed since then. The top of conference is now 10 touchdowns better than the bottom of the conference (I'm only embellishing a little) and its a problem in other conferences too. What's different with St. Thomas, though, is that they dominate all sports while other football powers like Mary Hardin-Baylor and Mount Union fit well in their conferences in other sports and general institutional size.

Whatever the outcome of this upcoming vote, I get the sense the conference a few years from now will look different than it does today.

Since 2010, Saint Thomas was MIAC Champions 6 times, Saint John's 2 times, and Bethel 1 time since the arrival of Glenn Caruso in 2008.

https://www.miacathletics.com/about/honor_history/records/archives/fball-archive

https://www.miacathletics.com/sports/fball/2017-18/standings

I can understand the sentiments of the rest of the MIAC Conference. St. Thomas Football is not operating like a MIAC Football program. They have a WCCO TV deal and other tactical recruiting advantages. Is there jealousy involved? Of course. Is there a feeling of unfairness? Of course. Is there a feeling of stepping out of the MIAC mold? Of course. When will DIII Football start penalizing teams like Mount Unions, Saint Thomas, and Saint Johns?

Will they be ousted? Who knows. IMHO, I don't think Saint John's will be on board.

 
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