Harvard Fish Wrap: Quit the Name Games

[TexasTerror]

The Harvard Crimson has a mention of I-AA.org! How 'bout that?

Seems this Harvard journalist is a bit clueless...:nono:

THE MALCOM X-FACTOR: NCAA: Quit the Name Games
Published On Monday, December 18, 2006 11:58 PM
By MALCOM A. GLENN
Crimson Staff Writer

A quick internet search tells me that mine might refer to anything from Scottish nobility to an Australian Olympian to a small town in Iowa. In pop culture, I’ve been everything from a mathematician to a dysfunctional kid genius to a dead child psychologist.

But after nearly two decades, my name—unique spelling and all—is something that has become a part of who I am. A name isn’t something that should be changed on a whim or disregarded, and it’s surely not something that should be “phased out.”

But that’s exactly what the NCAA is trying to do to our beloved football division. Because when Appalachian State beat the University of Massachusetts last weekend to claim the school’s second straight Division I-AA title, it wasn’t really a repeat effort. In fact, according to those in charge in college sports’ highest governing body, it was really the Mountaineers’ first NCAA Division I Football Championship.

What’s an NCAA Division I Football Championship, you ask? That’s the new championship trophy for the Football Championship Subdivision, the name chosen to replace the I-AA label that has been around for the last 28 years. Quick, try to log onto the old website, i-aa.org. That’s right, dead.

And it’s not just us, either—officials are hoping to refer to our cousins in I-A as the Football Bowl Subdivision.

http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=516516

[lizrdgizrd]

The Harvard Crimson has a mention of I-AA.org! How 'bout that?

Seems this Harvard journalist is a bit clueless...:nono:

THE MALCOM X-FACTOR: NCAA: Quit the Name Games
Published On Monday, December 18, 2006 11:58 PM
By MALCOM A. GLENN
Crimson Staff Writer

A quick internet search tells me that mine might refer to anything from Scottish nobility to an Australian Olympian to a small town in Iowa. In pop culture, I’ve been everything from a mathematician to a dysfunctional kid genius to a dead child psychologist.

But after nearly two decades, my name—unique spelling and all—is something that has become a part of who I am. A name isn’t something that should be changed on a whim or disregarded, and it’s surely not something that should be “phased out.”

But that’s exactly what the NCAA is trying to do to our beloved football division. Because when Appalachian State beat the University of Massachusetts last weekend to claim the school’s second straight Division I-AA title, it wasn’t really a repeat effort. In fact, according to those in charge in college sports’ highest governing body, it was really the Mountaineers’ first NCAA Division I Football Championship.

What’s an NCAA Division I Football Championship, you ask? That’s the new championship trophy for the Football Championship Subdivision, the name chosen to replace the I-AA label that has been around for the last 28 years. Quick, try to log onto the old website, i-aa.org. That’s right, dead.

And it’s not just us, either—officials are hoping to refer to our cousins in I-A as the Football Bowl Subdivision.

http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=516516
Wow, those Hahvahd folks are really on top of things, eh? :boring: xcoffeex

[DFW HOYA]

As posted below, is his real issue with the name or the Ivy's place within it?

Maybe the question is whether leagues that are not part of the championship even be classified as such.

[Lehigh Football Nation]

My reply:


Malcolm,

You are of course entitled to your opinion on the name change of I-A and I-AA to Bowl Championship and Playoff Championship, but your gratuitous insulting of schools that participate in the playoffs go over the line. You claim to be insulted by the name change, and then turn around and: 1) make some idiotic joke about Appalachian State, 2) imply that UMass rioting was about the name change, and (worst of all) 3) proceed to call us a "little brother" and "second-rate". Ironically you say you're insulted, and then you turn around and insult the same "level of play" in Harvard's place in D-I football. Who's in poor form now?

I'm not asking you to love the name change, but don't call us second-rate... I've personally spilled a lot of ink about the Ivy League and Patriot League over the past few years, and articles like yours don't help, they hurt. Don't ask people to take a Harvard/Princeton game seriously if you yourself consider the game to be second-rate. I don't think of it as second-rate, though.

Finally, when you say "With no hope of ever competing for the title as the Mountaineers and Minutemen did thanks to the league’s inability to partake in the 16-team playoff, the Crimson and co. knows a little bit about fake attempts at inclusion," I have a comments. First, I don't understand what you mean by "fake attempts at inlcusion". Are you implying that the subdivision has been somehow preventing the Ivy from participating in the playoffs? That's categorically not true. It is your own leadership of the Ivy League which chooses to not participate in the playoffs - it is voted on every year (it seems), and your on league leadership turns it down. If you have a beef with this, please write your president and make your feelings known that your leadership is "excluding" you from the playoffs. I don't feel the Ivy league are "unable" to participate, and I think that the best of the Ivy would do great in the playoffs on a regular basis.

[griz8791]

I am at peace with my team competing in a subdivision that doesn't "dominate water cooler discussion" around the country. I am very probably the least athletic person who posts on this board, yet FCS/I-AA has completely captured my imagination and I didn't stop caring when my team was eliminated. But for a mandatory business meeting on Friday night, I would have watched the entire NC game and as it was I went late so I could watch each team's first offensive series. Let big-time FBS football have its bandwagon fans.

[Ivytalk]

The Crimson was fishwrap when I was there, and it's fishwrap now. The columnist has probably never watched a Harvard football game in person.: smh :

[andy7171]

Here's a question for you. If Ivy League schools don't participate in the I-AA/FCS playoffs, why be in I-AA/FCS at all? Why not be I-A? From what I've seen, IL schools play almost predominantly PL and A-10 schools only for OOC games. Why be part of the "subdivision" if you don't want to play in the playoffs?

By the way, I'm not asking you to defend the IL position, just wondering why the IL is not I-A? For some reason, I always thought they were.

[*****]

The Harvard Crimson has a mention of I-AA.org! How 'bout that?Their previous sports editor was a I-AA.org columnist.
http://www.i-aa.org/images/articles/74410_I-AAIVY.jpg

[BlueHen86]

Here's a question for you. If Ivy League schools don't participate in the I-AA/FCS playoffs, why be in I-AA/FCS at all? Why not be I-A? From what I've seen, IL schools play almost predominantly PL and A-10 schools only for OOC games. Why be part of the "subdivision" if you don't want to play in the playoffs?

By the way, I'm not asking you to defend the IL position, just wondering why the IL is not I-A? For some reason, I always thought they were.
If I'm not mistaken, many years ago (25 or so) the NCAA set requirements (I think seating capacity was one of them) that schools had to meet in order to be in Div. I-A. Not all the Ivies met the requirements and were designated I-AA. I think Yale and Harvard could have remained in I-A if they wanted to, but choose to keep the Ivy League together and switched to I-AA as well.

If I am mistaken I'm sure someone will correct me. But this is how I remember it from along time ago...

[*****]

Article author Malcom A. Glenn can be reached at [email protected]

Send an email to the editor: [email protected]

I already called to notify them that I-AA.org is not "dead" as the author wrote in the article (afterall, I pay the bills so I would know). I also wrote and pointed out the errors in the column among other things.

[mcveyrl]

If I'm not mistaken, many years ago (25 or so) the NCAA set requirements (I think seating capacity was one of them) that schools had to meet in order to be in Div. I-A. Not all the Ivies met the requirements and were designated I-AA. I think Yale and Harvard could have remained in I-A if they wanted to, but choose to keep the Ivy League together and switched to I-AA as well.

If I am mistaken I'm sure someone will correct me. But this is how I remember it from along time ago...

I thought you only had to meet requirements in order to go to a bowl game, but I too may be wrong...

[Cobblestone]

The columnist has probably never watched a Harvard football game in person.: smh :

That's certainly the impression I got. I still cannot understand why the Ivy League will not send its champion to the playoffs. I've yet to see a good argument as to why they don't.

[Harvard Worship]

The columnist has probably never watched a Harvard football game in person.: smh :

Yeah. They don't have much attention-to-detail either when it comes to the sports section. I remember some weeks when they wouldn't update their drive charts from week to week, so we'd still have the Dartmouth drives illustrating the recap of the columbia game, etc. That bothered me.

Even more embarrassing than writing about a football game without watching it is writing about a hockey game. I remember some pretty amusing Crimson articles about hockey, too.

[UNH_Alum_In_CT]

I thought you only had to meet requirements in order to go to a bowl game, but I too may be wrong...

Actually, I don't think that would have been an issue because the smallest Ivy stadium was 17K (Columbia's Wien Stadium at Baker Field) and I believe the I-A capacity requirement was 15K.

[aggie6thman]

Actually, I don't think that would have been an issue because the smallest Ivy stadium was 17K (Columbia's Wien Stadium at Baker Field) and I believe the I-A capacity requirement was 15K.

Did Harvard average more than the requirement in attendence? I know that San Jose State was in trouble with that a few years ago and they pulled themselves out of it.

[DFW HOYA]

Actually, I don't think that would have been an issue because the smallest Ivy stadium was 17K (Columbia's Wien Stadium at Baker Field) and I believe the I-A capacity requirement was 15K.

When the I-AA downgrade took place, Baker Field (pre-Wien) sat close to 30K.

As attendance goes, Yale and Princeton are the strongest, followed by Penn and Harvard (in years when they are hosting Yale). It drops off considerably after that, particularly now that Dartmouth has not been as strong.

[Lehigh Football Nation]

I honestly can't believe all this I-A nostalgia. It's probably an indicator as to how the league has strangled itself. How sad it is that if the Ivy League simply lifted its postseason ban, there would be renewed interest in all the Ivy League's games, not to mention a more accurate depiction of where the Ivies stand in our subdivision. :twocents:

As to "why be FCS if you're not in the playoffs", the answer to that is: philosophy, if you're the Ivies. The Ivy presidents have long thought that the big money in college football is a corrupting influence. That's why the postseason ban has been in place since forever. It's also fits FCS better than FBS - FCS is a sort of "cost-containment division" for football.

It also fits with the Ivies since they want to keep their basketball teams D-I so they can play in the NCAA Tournament (among other teams). So although they talk a lot about purity in sports when football is concerned, they see no reason not to prostitute their other sports (i.e. Basketball).

[YaleFootballFan]

Actually, I don't think that would have been an issue because the smallest Ivy stadium was 17K (Columbia's Wien Stadium at Baker Field) and I believe the I-A capacity requirement was 15K.

Over the summer, Darmouth reduced the capacity of its stadium from 20K to about 12K so now they have the smallest stadium in the league. Dartmouth renovated the visitors side grand stand and made it smaller. Of course if they ever wanted to expand it for whatever reason, they still can.

[Model Citizen]

More recently, scholarship requirements have been added for I-A/bowl sub membership. There are requirements for both football scholarships and total (all sports) scholarships.

Even if the entire Ivy League met I-A attendance standards, they could not join I-A.

[DFW HOYA]

More recently, scholarship requirements have been added for I-A/bowl sub membership. There are requirements for both football scholarships and total (all sports) scholarships. Even if the entire Ivy League met I-A attendance standards, they could not join I-A.

The service academies are I-A even though their grants are not strictly scholarships. The Ivies could require a need based and grade component, and call it a "scholarship".

[aggie6thman]

The service academies are I-A even though their grants are not strictly scholarships. The Ivies could require a need based and grade component, and call it a "scholarship".

The service academies could call the grant whatever they wanted. They are all on "scholarship."

[Model Citizen]

Under 20.9.6.4.1, service acadamies are specifically exempted from the scholarship requirements. Crafting a similar exemption for the Ivy League would be difficult, don't you think?