So I heard some rumblings around campus that Knapp came out on top after our first Toe To Toe two weeks ago. I thought my experience as a former sports editor, and my experience covering the Dartmouth sports scene would give me an edge as our rhetorical arrows flew, but I guess I was just not that persuasive. Oh well -- another week, another chance to shame Michael.
The Ivy League is a conference steeped in tradition, and with such tradition comes some long-standing rules and regulations that have repeatedly come under scrutiny by players, coaches, administrators and fans.
The league's prohibition on awarding athletic scholarships, for example, has been in place for a long time, but that doesn't mean that many have called for the policy to be changed to give Ivy squads the chance to bring better players into the fold and compete against the top Division I teams in the nation.
Knapp believes that if he could change one of these policies, the Ivy League should implement a conference basketball tournament, with the winner of this competition -- and not the regular season -- getting the automatic bid to the NCAA tournament.
I'll admit this is not a bad idea, considering every other Division I conference holds a tournament at the end of the year for basketball. It gives teams who may have started off the regular season slowly, but finished strong, a chance to prove their worth. The excitement level of tournament-style of play is certainly higher than a mere regular season game (remember Syracuse's Big East tournament run a couple of years ago?). Plus, an Ivy tournament could bring more money and media exposure to the league
But creating a conference basketball tournament is not the most pressing matter for the Ivy League. In either the current system, where the regular season winner gets the automatic bid to the Big Dance, or in Knapp's proposed scheme, Ivy basketball teams always have a shot (albeit an unrealistic shot) to win a national title by playing in the NCAA postseason tournament.
Ivy football programs, on the other hand, are currently prohibited from competing in the FCS playoffs. Ivy teams were not eligible for bowl games prior to the split between D-I A (now BCS) and D-I AA (now FCS) in 1981. The league's ban on postseason play carried over to the playoff system.
The rationale? The Ivy League presidents in the 1950's decided competing in the playoffs would infringe upon class time and thus detract from the academic experience that comes with going to these elite institutions. According to a spokesman from the Ivy League office in Princeton, N.J., and Bob Ceplikas, Dartmouth's deputy director of athletics, the playoff ban has been brought up by coaches, players and others to the college and university presidents. But each time the heads of the eight Ivy institutions have deliberated on the matter, nothing has changed. Even Harper, in our discussion last week, hinted that the football programs should be eligible for the FCS postseason.
I respect the notion that academics should ultimately trump athletics at Ivy League institutions. I also think that making the Ivy League title the highest possible goal for the football teams makes each conference game even more critical and exciting.
But I find it slightly ridiculous that almost every other varsity sport offered at Ivy League schools can compete in the NCAA playoffs -- and thus has to deal with the travel and other extra burdens brought up on playing more games -- while the football teams are flatly denied even the opportunity to win a national title. If the Ivy presidents contend that the postseason football ban is largely about preserving academic integrity, why not extend this to the other sports?
Think about this: One team, maybe two, from the Ivy League are ever good enough in comparison to the other FCS schools -- this year, Harvard was the only Ivy team ranked (No. 15) in the Sports Network's final poll. Taking Harvard as an example, this means that the Crimson would have likely been the only Ivy team this year to make the final FCS postseason bracket. Sure, the Crimson players would have a couple more weeks, at least, of practice and preparation to play an opponent, and perhaps would have to travel for the first-round playoff contest.
But this arrangement would only be limited to Harvard in this scenario (all the players from the other Ivy teams would be finished with their seasons) and part of the FCS playoffs falls during many universities' winter breaks in December. I hardly think that the Ivy League's academic integrity would be irreversibly tarnished by having one (or maybe two) of the Ancient Eight football teams vying for a national title.
Decades ago, the Ivy League had some of the best football programs in the nation. Heck, even Dartmouth was in the top 10 nationally back in the 1970's. But now, programs in the Ivy League are denied the opportunity to reestablish this prominence by being barred from the postseason. I think it's time to let an old tradition fail and let the FCS football world see what Ivy League football is all about.
