Knew a guy who “played football” for MIT a long time back. He described as, “it’s cool to miss a game if you need to study for a test.”
I’ve always wondered what kind of intramural club that sometimes played other schools that was.
Hopkins' - a similar enough school - coach was similar. They're fine with (and, in fact, encourage) having academics as your #1 priority. But running has to be #2.
At the top end the kids would be potential all-Americans in D1.
No...I looked at last year's performance list. The top couple DIII distance runners were 13:50+ and 29:00+. Good times, sure, but essentially the top 5-6 DIII guys would compete to be top 100 and make first rounds at the DI level. Not even conference scoring or scholarship level for many P4 schools. Those times do not indicate an ability to make it through to the Finals and be an all American.
The typical D3 athlete aspires to being called “Doctor”, “Chairman”, or referred to as a Nobel Prize recipient in the future. That’s preferable to being a former D1 and now the second assistant manager of a Best Buy that won’t shut up about his 13:45 clocking from 20 years ago, his master’s three peat at the local Turkey Trot, and that time he was “pro” (equipment only deal) two decades ago.
I never understood this take. You realize that D3 has very few academically "good" schools right? Yeah you have MIT, Johns Hopkins, Caltech, and U Chicago, but outside of the 4-5 top schools, D3 is not a strong academic conference.
I mean in D1 you have Stanford, Berkeley, UCLA, UW, Michigan, Notre Dame, ALL THE IVIES, and pretty much every other academically solid state school. I would guess that the number of Nobel prize winners who came from D1 schools is significantly higher than the number who came from D3 schools.
I thought it would be like "sure it's not D1, but you still probably have to be pretty good to be on a college team", but I did some looking and I was shocked how low the bar is to score in a bad D3 conference. I got down the rabbit hole from someone mentioning Mississippi Valley State playing Mississippi University for Women in men's basketball, and I went ahead and looked at their track results. At their conference championship last year a 21:36 5k and 39:49 10k were scoring times for men. Maybe it was is absolutely atrocious weather, but the 5k time in particular is shocking. Makes me wonder what the quality of low D3 athletes in sports like basketball is.
D3 is kind of all over the place. You have programs that would beat more than half of D1 programs and you have programs that act like a run club where you show up and run 3-5 miles with some friends.
People mean it when they say “If you really want to run in college you can”
Don't know your criteria for 'academically good', but what about Carnegie Mellon, Haverford, Vassar, Swarthmore, Amherst, Claremont Mudd Scripps, and NYU? They aren't far off from the D3 schools you list, but they definitely smoke many of those schools in your D1 list. (if we are comparing academic rigor and reputation).
At the top end the kids would be potential all-Americans in D1.
No...I looked at last year's performance list. The top couple DIII distance runners were 13:50+ and 29:00+. Good times, sure, but essentially the top 5-6 DIII guys would compete to be top 100 and make first rounds at the DI level. Not even conference scoring or scholarship level for many P4 schools. Those times do not indicate an ability to make it through to the Finals and be an all American.
Well, Matt Wilkinson went from D3 to D1 2 time all American in the Steeple and won the 5k and Steeple in the Big10 so yeah he definitely wouldn't get a scholarship. Alex Phillip was 12th in the 10k at nationals and 17th (an all American) at cross country nationals.
I talked to a D3 coach about the level of competition. He recruits the talented high schoolers but now it’s about the college experience instead of qualifying for nationals. The enrollments are down at a lot of schools so a 20 minute 5k runner is welcomed to the team. A few 20 minute runners turn into decent D3 runners too.
No. There about 25 decent academic schools while there are hundreds of D1 schools that are good. Add to that, Michigan, Georgia, Wisconsin, and Virgina have more goos students than all D3 schools. D1 schools have 100 times more good students than D3.
I never understood this take. You realize that D3 has very few academically "good" schools right? Yeah you have MIT, Johns Hopkins, Caltech, and U Chicago, but outside of the 4-5 top schools, D3 is not a strong academic conference.
I mean in D1 you have Stanford, Berkeley, UCLA, UW, Michigan, Notre Dame, ALL THE IVIES, and pretty much every other academically solid state school. I would guess that the number of Nobel prize winners who came from D1 schools is significantly higher than the number who came from D3 schools.
I never understood this take. You realize that D3 has very few academically "good" schools right? Yeah you have MIT, Johns Hopkins, Caltech, and U Chicago, but outside of the 4-5 top schools, D3 is not a strong academic conference.
I mean in D1 you have Stanford, Berkeley, UCLA, UW, Michigan, Notre Dame, ALL THE IVIES, and pretty much every other academically solid state school. I would guess that the number of Nobel prize winners who came from D1 schools is significantly higher than the number who came from D3 schools.
Missing Duke?
Also, which one of those 4 did you go to? How many Nobel Prize winners go to UCLA or Michigan? How many world-changing inventions are from someone who went to UW or Notre Dame?
Imagine spending your life describing everyone who isn't elite as "bad".
It's not non elite I describe as "bad", it's more "male college runner slower than me" that I describe that way. I'd have the 5k easy, and compete with the 10k I posted. At the most recent XC meet for Mississippi University for Women where both the men and women ran 5k their fastest woman had a faster time than their fastest man. As a guy who didn't even run in high school, it's interesting how beatable the slow end of college distance running seems to be.
so you grab one of the worst D3 conferences, with schools i haven't heard of, then say "let's assume that part for the whole, D3 sucks?"
NESCAC or SCIAC are usually similar to something like SWAC or Patriot League.
i mean, if i wanted to be flip, the distance running in SWAC D1, you can get points there with 16-flat or 35:40. you wouldn't get points in my D3 conference with that.
so =p
I didn't say all of D3 socks. I said "bad D3" and "bad D3 conference". I'm just a guy who picked up running in his early 20s shocked that there are men's college times that are beatable for me.
10 guys in D3 ran 14 minutes. 225 guys did it in D1.
D1 is faster, we get it. For >90% of athletes d3 will provide just as good as D1. The difference is they won't have to use a redshirt year and take out loans for a 5th year of school, be forced to run only local meets, pounded in t the ground by teammates running too fast, and all the other crap.
I thought it would be like "sure it's not D1, but you still probably have to be pretty good to be on a college team", but I did some looking and I was shocked how low the bar is to score in a bad D3 conference. I got down the rabbit hole from someone mentioning Mississippi Valley State playing Mississippi University for Women in men's basketball, and I went ahead and looked at their track results. At their conference championship last year a 21:36 5k and 39:49 10k were scoring times for men. Maybe it was is absolutely atrocious weather, but the 5k time in particular is shocking. Makes me wonder what the quality of low D3 athletes in sports like basketball is.
You mean HCBUs are bad at XC, not all of D3.
Most of them are incoming freshman sprinters with good (by D3 standards) times from HS. Why they run XC, I don't know. I've heard of HCBUs making their basketball team run XC to get in shape, but not sprinters.