Reverb: Transparency Quest

(Photo by Lance Wendt)

by Jac Coyne | MCLA.us

LA CROSSE, Wisc. – Back when I was covering the NCAA for US Lacrosse, one of the notions that I would always scoff at was the concept of parity. There was a belief that if someone besides Hopkins, Le Moyne or Salisbury won a national championship, we were ushering this utopian world of equality where every program started the season with a chance at the title.

And then one of the regulars would win the next season. There is no such thing as parity in college athletics and there never will be. There will always be the haves and the have-nots. It might change from decade to decade, but the playing field is never level. Nor should it be.

In the MCLA, it’s not parity that draws my rhetorical eye-roll. No, it’s the Holy Grail-quest to find “transparency” among the inner workings of the organization, mostly with national tournament selection and seeding. There is this belief that the MCLA is this massive, monolithic entity hiding behind a curtain, issuing decrees as it sees fit with no input from its constituents. There’s a malevolency attributed to the various decision-making bodies that, for anyone who works amidst them, is somewhat comical.

It's just a bunch of coaches, conference directors and modestly paid administrators trying to provide the best experience for the many wonderful student-athletes in the association.

Are there mistakes made. Yep. We mishandled the pandemic eligibility – a gaffe that I will take responsibility for since I should have been more plugged into how the NCAA was operating – that resulted in some unpleasantness this past fall. But it has nothing to do with transparency. Anyone who wanted to contact their conference director or a member of the administration would have gotten a pretty straight-forward answer to how things transpired.

Same with the selection process. Coaches have, and do, get a feel from the committee about how things played out. Just like every NCAA committee operates. Can the process be streamlined? Maybe, but the individuals on that committee put in a lot of time and effort to produce the best results.

I understand the fascination with tournament selections. I’ve always enjoyed the process from both sides of the fence. I also understand that transparency is just a code-word for having a linear selection process with all of the criteria laid out neatly so you just plug and play. Then, ‘Poof’ – a 16-team bracket. We’ll, we’ll never get that in the MCLA – the league is too large to have any kind of objective data adequately producing an appropriate tournament – so, as former Bryant coach Mike Pressler said a couple of decades ago, as long as there is a committee, there will always be the human element.

We all know that social media artificially amplifies voices, but this newfound surge in wanting transparency is a good thing. While those who make it a quest might be chasing their tail, it means that there is an interest in how the MCLA works. And that’s always a good thing.

The St. Thomas Question
As you are already aware, St. Thomas has won it’s MCLA-record seventh national championship at the Division II level. As has been the case for the past 20 years, there continues to be a whisper campaign trying to shame the Tommies into moving up to D-I. With anything that has been around for two decades, it’s a pretty tired argument.

San Diego, Montana, Westminster, Davenport, Utah and Concordia-Irvine have all won Division II national championships and made the leap to Division I. Two of them (USD, Montana) returned to Division II after years of getting trounced, Davenport was ineffectual before moving to the NCAA while Utah is still trying to find traction. Concordia is the only team to win in both divisions before they moved on to NCAA D-II after the 2023 season.

So what’s St. Thomas’ motivation to move? The MCLA has discarded alignment based on NCAA designation, so even though the Tommies are now NCAA Division I in all sports – they literally got booted from their D-III conference for being too good – they aren’t obligated to move to Division I. St. Thomas could be forced to move by their conference, but that’s a non-starter.

Is it frustrating when a team dominates year in and year out? I’m sure it is. But continued success doesn’t necessarily need to be penalized. Unless the MCLA wants to transition to a full relegation league like English soccer, the Tommies’ only sin is being consistently good.

Liberty’s Journey
Until the final day of the season when the Liberty players raised the trophy after an emphatic win over Georgia Tech in the title game, it was hard for me to get Feb. 8 out of my head. It was on that day that the Flames opened the season with a 16-12 loss to Virginia Tech – Liberty's first and only in their 20-game season. Despite dominating faceoffs, Liberty couldn’t slow down the Hokies. Ian Carvajal, who would go on to win all-tournament honors for his outstanding work in Round Rock, was given the hook and his replacement didn’t fare much better.

With the trophy in hand, the loss is either inconsequential or the most important moment of the season. It’s a story for the Liberty players and staff to tell, but I would guess they would tell you now that it didn’t mean a thing. But on Feb. 9, I’m guessing there was a lot of hand-wringing after getting abused by their biggest rival.

Regardless, it’s certainly a reminder that one game does not make a season. And it’s always a good idea to get your losses in early in the season when, apparently, nothing matters to the committee.

Bridesmaids
For the second time in the last four years, Georgia Tech is the Division I runner-up. Coming up short against a powerful Liberty outfit is probably still raw, but this was a very impressive season for the Yellow Jackets.

After getting worked over by Florida at the end of March, Tech was 9-4 with its best win coming against South Carolina, which was 1-4 when they played. The Ramblin' Wreck closed the regular season with a rout of Georgia followed by an SELC title and a run to the cusp of a national championship. It’s not easy to course-correct midseason, but Georgia Tech made it look easy. Beating Utah Valley and Texas is no simple task.

Tech will enter next year in the Top 5 – they do graduate an extremely talented class – and should once again be in the hunt.

Same for Grand Valley State, which had its season ended once again by St. Thomas in the title tilt. With a solid number of the Lakers’ stars returning next spring, they’ll be well suited to make a reappearance in the finals in Virginia. With the elimination of the preseason poll and GVSU’s typically late start, they won’t show up in the polls early on – you need three games under your belt to qualify now – but when they do get eligible, it’s tough not seeing them at No. 1.

That and two dollars will get you a hot dog, as Air Force, UC San Diego and the Lakers found out about holding the top spot in the polls. GVSU will be ornery in the offseason, and, assuming all of the players who can come back do, they should be loaded for another run.

Slides & Rides 
- There have already been some job openings posted on this site. If you have any, send them along to info@mcla.us with a large action shot and we’ll try to get them up on the website ASAP.

- The All-America committees did a nice job this year. I could quibble with a couple of spots in both divisions, but that’s not uncommon. It should be known that selecting All-Americans from every corner of our great country is more difficult than selecting the tournament field by a factor of ten. You’re hugely dependent on the good word of nine conference reps trying to find out who is the best despite often having apples-to-oranges-to-peaches comparisons. Waiting until after the championship weaves in a layer of recency bias, but it’s our best way of getting a little bit of direct comparison.

- Make sure to get your transcripts to your conference directors so they can send them on to ensure that everyone who is deserving Scholar Athlete status receives his just due.

- I’ve got a couple more months before signing off for a second – and final – time. Ask me anything. I’ll answer any questions you might have about our great organization on MCLA.us.