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Nescac 2011-2012

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  • #16
    Re: Nescac 2011-2012

    Originally posted by spike View Post
    All good points, although the proximity of the Albany airport puts Williamstown as close to "somewhere" as Middlebury and Hadley. I wasn't trashing the Williams hockey program. Clearly they have had some success relative to some other NESCAC women's programs. What I was attempting to point out is that the school has had the best record in overall athletic achievement in all of Division III since the mid-90's, and they've done it pretty much across the board in most sports. Why then do they have 5 coaches in 6 years? Don't blame it on the facility which is no worse than Orr. Their men's team has had at least the same level of success as the Amherst men in the last 3-4 years, so its clearly not the facility. There is no question in my mind that a top-tier coach could sell Williams as easily as Mandigo and Plumer sell their schools. So why can't the school attract a top-tier coach? Lack of support from the athletic department? that's my whole point. How can THIS athletic department be so successful yet fail to properly support a women's sport of which MA is an epicenter?
    I agree that a good coach can sell a remote school, especially one with the reputation that Williams has. And the coaches may be good at selling Williams. However, if your team doesn't have many admissions tips (something the AD controls), you won't get many admitted to a school that is arguably harder to get admitted to than Harvard. And tips are limited across all programs at NESCAC schools, just like in Ivy. So I will go on the lack of support from the AD.

    I've driven the backroads of VT and the route over the mountain from Albany to Williamstown. I'll take the Vermont backroads any day in the winter, thanks.

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    • #17
      Re: Nescac 2011-2012

      Originally posted by spike View Post
      All good points, although the proximity of the Albany airport puts Williamstown as close to "somewhere" as Middlebury and Hadley.
      I assume you meant Amherst, not Hadley (the town next to Amherst) ... but I would disagree with your statement. For a campus / off campus experience, there's a huge difference between Amherst and Williamstown. Amherst has a well developed downtown area, and is also home to 30,000 UMass students. It is also a free 20 minute bus ride from Northampton, a small, very well developed city ...

      That said, if some folks didn't like being out in the woods/hills, Dartmouth wouldn't be able to attract students, either!

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      • #18
        Re: Nescac 2011-2012

        Originally posted by dontyelldad View Post
        I assume you meant Amherst, not Hadley (the town next to Amherst) ... but I would disagree with your statement. For a campus / off campus experience, there's a huge difference between Amherst and Williamstown. Amherst has a well developed downtown area, and is also home to 30,000 UMass students. It is also a free 20 minute bus ride from Northampton, a small, very well developed city ...

        That said, if some folks didn't like being out in the woods/hills, Dartmouth wouldn't be able to attract students, either!
        Rather than debate the desirablity of being in the mountains of western MA, consider this: Williams could not have done well enough in all those other sports to win the Directors Cup 13 years in a row without some serious quality athletes. Evidently those kids didn't have a problem with the location.

        I think we all agree that their athletic department doesn't do enough to help get female hockey players past the admissions office. I still pose my original question-Why not?

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        • #19
          Re: Nescac 2011-2012

          Congratulations to the Michaela Calnan, a June grad at Bowdoin, on her selection as NESCAC candidate for the 2011 NCAA Woman of the Year!!!
          http://nescac.com/news/2010-11/NCAA_WOTY_062311

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          • #20
            Re: Nescac 2011-2012

            Originally posted by obserbear View Post
            Congratulations to the Michaela Calnan, a June grad at Bowdoin, on her selection as NESCAC candidate for the 2011 NCAA Woman of the Year!!!
            http://nescac.com/news/2010-11/NCAA_WOTY_062311

            Congrats also to Laura Komarek of Trinity's Ice Hockey Team as Trinity's nominee as NCAA Women of the Year in addition to her recieving the Susan E. Martin Award as the College's top female scholar athlete.

            http://athletics.trincoll.edu/sports...e_Hockey_81011
            Last edited by hockeymaven; 07-09-2011, 10:08 AM. Reason: Correction to link

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            • #21
              Re: Nescac 2011-2012

              Originally posted by spike View Post
              Slightly off topic but I didn't want to hunt down the original thread.....

              Williams College has won the Directors Cup for overall Division III athletics success for the 13th straight year and 15th out of the last 16 years. As a sidenote, Middlebury was second and Amherst fourth, while Bowdoin and Tufts also finished in the top 25. Not bad for a conference limited by stringent academic standards.

              The main purpose of my post, however, is to restate a question raised earlier this year about the Williams Women's Hockey Team. At a school perennially ranked #1 or #2 academically by US News, and possessed of an atheletic department devoted to winning as evidenced by their Directors Cup success, why do they struggle to succeed in Womens Ice Hockey? Why does a school so passionate about athletic success fail so miserably to attract a hockey coach that can make them competitive? You cannot win 13 Directors Cups in a row without a total commitment to success, and they are obviously succeeding wildly in most other sports. Its not as if they are in Arizona trying to sell ice hockey to potential recruits. They are in the center of a state that is one of the strongholds of women's ice hockey? Can anyone explain this?
              First, they have to be able to get a coach to remain longer than a year or two before they can think about getting their hockey team to where it would be competitive. I think it takes some consistency in the coaching position to be able to make real progress (presuming the coach is good). If the team is continually "switching gears" so to speak with a new head coach every year, I think it would be near impossible to be competitive in that scenario.

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              • #22
                Re: Nescac 2011-2012

                Amherst and Bowdoin (along with Harvard, Princeton and Yale) are included in a recent Washington Post article on the best 12 college financial aide policies:
                http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/...vF9H_blog.html

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                • #23
                  Re: Nescac 2011-2012

                  Good for them...Since for years they used to be among the worst. [e.g. collaborating with the other nescac's [in violation of the Anti-Trust laws]...to fix each financial aid package so that in effect, every school would end up costing the student the same $$]. Real nice. ...not to mention the fact that these same schools artificially inflated tuition for years, not based on actual costs or need, but rather to maintain their "ranking" in a tuition ranking system...e.g. if Amherst raised their tuition from $29,000 to $31,500; Bowdoin would raise it's tuition to $31,250 [even if it had no pressing financial reason to do so]...in order to maintain some fictional ranking with Amherst [or Williams, etc.]...and continue to charge slightly more than Colby, Bates, etc.

                  Comment


                  • #24
                    Re: Nescac 2011-2012

                    Originally posted by CrossCheck View Post
                    Good for them...Since for years they used to be among the worst. [e.g. collaborating with the other nescac's [in violation of the Anti-Trust laws]...to fix each financial aid package so that in effect, every school would end up costing the student the same $$]. Real nice. ...not to mention the fact that these same schools artificially inflated tuition for years, not based on actual costs or need, but rather to maintain their "ranking" in a tuition ranking system...e.g. if Amherst raised their tuition from $29,000 to $31,500; Bowdoin would raise it's tuition to $31,250 [even if it had no pressing financial reason to do so]...in order to maintain some fictional ranking with Amherst [or Williams, etc.]...and continue to charge slightly more than Colby, Bates, etc.
                    In the real world they call that Inflation.

                    BTW....In the real world, one of the drivers behind the HYP FA package increases a few years back were the potential increased taxing of large endowment funds.
                    Last edited by OnMAA; 07-13-2011, 11:21 AM.

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                    • #25
                      Re: Nescac 2011-2012

                      Agree completely on your second point...it's hardly a co-inkydink that several of the schools mentioned in the article changed their loan/grant program at exactly the same time [still in collusion I guess...some habits die hard]. As to the inflation point....I ain't buying that one for a second.

                      Comment


                      • #26
                        Re: Nescac 2011-2012

                        Amherst strengthens its MN connection ...

                        https://www.amherst.edu/athletics/te...2/0713_johnson

                        Comment


                        • #27
                          Re: Nescac 2011-2012


                          I still don't get the the logic behind the new schedule! I looked even more closely than I did previously and it makes no sense to me. I can't see where it would save much (or any) money. It also removes the rink as a equalizer.

                          Take, for instance, any team that has to travel to Hamilton for an entire weekend. That is the smallest rink in the league and gives the home team an advantage. It also means there are several teams must travel for a weekend away one more time that the other schools.

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                          • #28
                            Re: Nescac 2011-2012

                            Congratulations to Carson Duggan upon being named interim head coach for the Trinity women's hockey team. The Bantams will be looking to retool on offense (following graduation loss of Weiss and Komarek) and build on their outstanding goaltending tandem.
                            Best wishes to Coach McPhee in his Ivy endeavors!

                            Comment


                            • #29
                              Re: Nescac 2011-2012

                              Originally posted by NHDad View Post

                              I still don't get the the logic behind the new schedule! I looked even more closely than I did previously and it makes no sense to me. I can't see where it would save much (or any) money. It also removes the rink as a equalizer.

                              Take, for instance, any team that has to travel to Hamilton for an entire weekend. That is the smallest rink in the league and gives the home team an advantage. It also means there are several teams must travel for a weekend away one more time that the other schools.
                              It is billed as a two year experiment. It does seem a bit whacky. The only way to balance the number of home and away series with the odd number of teams in the NESCAC is to eliminate the home and home games with the former travel partners (and traditional rivals). No Midd-Williams, Colby-Bowdoin, Trinity-Wesleyan or Amherst-Hamilton (how would you like that series to open the schedule)? This year Conn is the team with four series home and four on the road.
                              Nice to see the Polar Bears adding Plattsburgh and Norwich to their non-conference schedule!

                              Comment


                              • #30
                                Re: Nescac 2011-2012

                                Originally posted by obserbear View Post
                                It is billed as a two year experiment. It does seem a bit whacky. The only way to balance the number of home and away series with the odd number of teams in the NESCAC is to eliminate the home and home games with the former travel partners (and traditional rivals). No Midd-Williams, Colby-Bowdoin, Trinity-Wesleyan or Amherst-Hamilton (how would you like that series to open the schedule)? This year Conn is the team with four series home and four on the road.
                                Nice to see the Polar Bears adding Plattsburgh and Norwich to their non-conference schedule!
                                It's absolutely baffling to me that Amherst opens Friday night AT Hamilton (7 pm), then returns home to HOST Hamilton on Saturday (4 pm). Truly bizarre.

                                Comment

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