The schools don’t need the exposure of sports to attract students and alumni donations. But some of the league’s alumni complain that the schools offer their students the best of everything, except in this one area. “Why not give them the same opportunities and the same platform in athletics that you do in academics?” says Marcellus Wiley, a former NFL defensive end who played at Columbia in the 1990s. “I think they should revisit everything.”As evidence of the Ivy League's decline, the author pulls some weak evidence.
In men’s and women’s basketball, the Ivies have not won a NCAA tournament game since 1998. The league that spawned the Princeton offense, a thinking-man’s attack that once brought death by deft passing, has lost by double digits in nine of its last 11 men’s tournament appearances.As someone points out on eLynah, "they treat the 1998 Princeton team as if it were at all representative of the preceding decades of Ivy hoops rather than the anomaly it was." Cornell had a solid season this year, but received a #14 seed based on the computer rankings and had to face #3 Missouri. It's hard to expect that game to be competitive, even though Cornell stuck with Mizzou for most of the game.
In men’s ice hockey—long a point of pride for the six participating Ivies, especially Cornell—just one Ivy member has reached the Frozen Four national semifinals since 1995.This is a little misleading. Cornell has made it to the NCAA quarterfinals three times since their 2003 trip to the Frozen Four, and lost twice in overtime. Talent-wise, there isn't a huge difference between the winning and losing teams in a 1-0 triple overtime game. Just this year, 3 of the 6 Ivy hockey squads made the 16-team NCAA tournament.
Besides, can we really blame league restrictions for the fact that Harvard sucks? Let's not forget Harvard's string of awful performances in NCAA hockey tournament first round games:
03/23/02: Maine 4, Harvard 3
03/28/03: BU 6, Harvard 4
03/26/04: Maine 5, Harvard 4
03/26/05: UNH 3, Harvard 2
03/25/06: Maine 6, Harvard 1
The ban on postseason football, which exists because the Ivies don’t want to take up players’ time, prevents players from competing for titles and gaining exposure.Okay, so football isn't big in the Ivy League. I'm perfectly fine with this. Big time football means expensive coaching staffs, players who don't care about classes, and a further lowering of admissions standards for football players.
In sports like hockey, lacrosse (three Ivies in the tournament), and wrestling (Cornell 4th nationally), Cornell and other Ivies have been able to compete on the national level. There's no reason to sacrifice academics and other priorities to try to compete in basketball or football.
Agreed. As a former Cornell athlete (cross country captain once upon a time), I read this article with bated breath, wondering if there was going to be a punchline telling us that a coalition of Ivies had formed to lower standards just so once again, an Ivy can win a first-round game in the Big Dance. There's no reason for the Ivies to lower academic standards just to try to "compete" in a few sports. As you point out, Cornell and other Ivies have done quite well, even when their priorities are placed where collegiate priorities ought to be: academics.
ReplyDelete